Timetable for US-UK trade deal is 'tight', says Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson has played down the prospects of striking a trade agreement with Donald Trump within 12 months, saying that timetable was “tight” and would require flexibility from the US.

Trump talked up the prospects for a US-UK trade agreement when the two men met face to face in Biarritz on Sunday, for the first time since Johnson became prime minister.

The US president said they would sign a “very big trade deal, bigger than we’ve ever had,” once the UK is freed from the “anchor” of the EU around its “ankle”.

Johnson later said the US would like to do a deal within a year, but while he would “love” to achieve that, “to do it all within a year is going to be tight”.

Johnson confirmed he had reiterated his opposition to the NHS being opened up to US firms as part of any trade deal – and to the UK lowering animal welfare standards to US levels to get a deal.

“Not only have I made clear of that, the president has made that very, very clear. There is complete unanimity on that point,” he said. He suggested there would be “tough talks ahead”.

En route to the G7 summit, Johnson pointed to the complexity of a potential deal when he gave a shopping list of products, from cauliflowers to shower trays to insurance, on which he said the UK would be pressing for the US to lower trade barriers.

Trump described Johnson as “the right man” to deliver Brexit.

Asked what his advice was for Brexit, the president said: “He [Johnson] needs no advice. He is the right man for the job.” Johnson said Trump was “on message there”.

The pair were speaking to reporters ahead of a working breakfast, accompanied by advisers and officials.

Following the meeting, the two governments released a joint statement, saying they would launch a “special relationship economic working group” (SREWG) to “develop market-oriented principles for economic growth and increase bilateral cooperation on issues related to the modern 21st-century economy”.

Before their meeting, Johnson had said he would raise with Trump the issue of the increasingly bitter trade spat between the US and China, and press him to throw open the US market to British goods after Brexit.

When Trump was asked by reporters if allies were pressuring him to give up his trade war with China, he said: “Not at all.” He said his predecessors had allowed Beijing “to get away with taking hundreds of billions of dollars out every year, putting it into China”.

Asked if he had had second thoughts on escalating the dispute he said: “Sure … why not.” But then he added: “I have second thoughts about everything.”

Johnson told reporters en route to Biarritz that he was “very, very concerned” about the tit-for-tat conflict between the US and China. The two countries have imposed tariffs on a swathe of each other’s imports, as the White House accuses Beijing of unfair competition and China hits back.

Johnson said on Saturday: “This is not the way to proceed. Apart from anything else, those who support the tariffs are at risk of incurring the blame for the downturn in the global economy, irrespective of whether that is true.

“I want to see an opening up of global trade, I want to see a dialling down of tensions, and I want to see tariffs come off.”

Speaking alongside Trump, his language was more conciliatory, however. “I congratulate the president on everything the American economy is achieving. It’s fantastic to see that.

“But just to register a faint, sheeplike note of our view on the trade war – we are in favour of trade peace on the whole,” he said, adding that “the UK has profited massively in the last 200 years from free trade”.

The rise of protectionism has inevitably been a theme at the summit – though the French president, Emmanuel Macron, has also sought to focus on other issues, including inequality and the environment.

Trump and Johnson struck up a warm relationship when Johnson was foreign secretary. They had already met at a dinner for G7 leaders on Saturday night, and been spotted walking and talking in the margins of the summit.