Theresa May reveals Donald Trump told her to sue the EU over Brexit

Theresa May has revealed Donald Trump told her to “sue” the European Union rather than negotiate with them.

The US president said in a press conference on Friday he had offered her a "strong suggestion" on how to handle Brexit but she found it too “brutal”.

The Prime Minister finally revealed the details of his advice when she appeared on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show on Sunday.

“He told me I should sue the EU,” she said smiling. “Not go into negotiations – sue them.”

“Actually, no, we’re going into negotiations with them," she added, in what will be seen as a put-down of the president.

She then said: "But interestingly, what the president also said was ‘don’t walk away from negotiations because then you’re stuck’.”

It comes after Mr Trump appeared to criticise Mrs May's Brexit strategy in an interview with the Sun, which he later branded "fake news".

In the interview, which was released on the second day of his visit to the UK, Mr Trump said Mrs May had ignored his advice by opting for a soft Brexit.

He warned Mrs May that her Brexit plan could “kill” any US-trade deal because it would leave the UK closely aligned to the EU.

But the two leaders presented a united front during the brief visit, posing for photographs and hailing their "very good relationship".

During Sunday's show, host Marr also grilled the PM over Mr Trump grabbing her by the hand and appearing to guide her into a press conference.

“Whenever he takes me down a slope or stairs… he takes my hand to help in going up the steps,” she said, denying a claim that it made her look “submissive”.

The PM also defended her Brexit plan and urged Tory rebels and other critics to support it.

Ministers David Davis and Boris Johnson resigned before the publication of a Brexit White Paper last week claiming that the deal agreed was not what people voted for in the 2016 referendum.

In an article for The Mail on Sunday, Mrs May called for MPs to take a "practical and pragmatic" approach rather than face a "damaging and disorderly" Brexit.

Mrs May acknowledged some MPs had concerns about her plan for a "common rule book" with the EU for goods and customs traded within what she called a new "UK-EU free trade area".

However, she insisted that she had yet to see a "workable alternative" to the proposals - agreed by the Cabinet at Chequers - that would ensure trade remained as "frictionless" as possible while avoiding the return of a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

"We need to keep our eyes on the prize. If we don't, we risk ending up with no Brexit at all," she said.

"I know there are some who have concerns about the 'common rule book' for goods and the customs arrangements which we have proposed will underpin the new UK-EU free trade area. I understand those concerns.

"But the legacy of Brexit cannot be a hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland that unpicks the historic Belfast Agreement.

"It cannot be the breaking up of our precious United Kingdom with a border down the Irish Sea. And it cannot be the destruction of integrated supply chains and just-in-time processes on which jobs and livelihoods depend."

Her warning came as the Trade Bill returns to the Commons on Tuesday with rival amendments tabled by pro- and anti-EU Conservatives.

She said a series of "wrecking" changes backed by members of the pro-Brexit Tory European Research Group would put at risk the Government's plans for a "no deal scenario".

"This could lead to a damaging and disorderly Brexit because without this Bill passing we would not be able to retain the benefits of more than 40 existing trade arrangements; and neither will we have the means to protect consumers, industries and workers from being undercut by unfairly traded goods in a post-Brexit Britain," she said.

She also warned the Government could not accept an amendment by pro-EU Tories which would keep Britain in a customs union with the EU after Brexit.

"This would be the ultimate betrayal of the Brexit vote. It would remove our ability to have an independent trade policy at all, conceding Britain's role on the global stage as a force for free trade and endangering people's jobs and livelihoods. This Government will never stand for that," she said.

In practice, the Brexiteers stand little chance of success as Labour will not support them while it is unclear whether the pro-EU faction, who largely supported the Chequers plan, will press ahead with their amendment.

Mrs May's intervention came as former Brexit minister Steve Baker, who quit over the Chequers plan along with Boris Johnson and David Davis, said the proposal was the work of an "establishment elite" bent on thwarting the EU referendum vote.

"It does appear to me that there has been a year's worth of cloak and dagger to land us into the Chequers position," he told The Sunday Telegraph.

"An establishment elite who never accepted the fundamental right of the public to choose democratically their institutions are working towards overturning them.

"We're back to what civil servants wanted a year ago, the advice they were giving then, of something like the EEA (European Economic Area membership) plus something like the customs union.

"In terms of who ultimately holds the pen on the papers that go to Cabinet for collective decision, it has been the Cabinet Office's Europe Unit, and they have clearly been operating to a different ultimate goal to the one what we were operating to."