Labour’s attempts to stop Donald Trump visiting Britain are “extremely odd” as the country’s relationship with the United States is “crucial”, Boris Johnson has said.
The Foreign Secretary, who is attending a two day summit on North Korea in Vancouver, highlighted the controversial US president’s visits to France, Germany and Japan as he insisted he would visit “in due course” and called for a “grown up conversation”.
Mr Trump has cancelled a proposed visit to open the new US embassy in London, claiming the move to a new building represented a “bad deal”.
However, reports have suggested he called off his trip because he felt he had “not been shown enough love” by the British Government.
Mr Johnson has already criticised Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and London Mayor Sadiq Khan, arguing they were risking the UK’s relationship with the US.
And before his visit to Canada, he told the Guardian: “For Jeremy Corbyn to say that this relationship doesn’t matter, is I think insanity, and irresponsible. And to try to banish the president of the United States from visiting the UK when he’s had trips to France, to Germany, to Japan, to China, is, I think, for the Labour Party extremely odd.”
“It’s a crucial relationship, and it’s a very positive relationship.”
On the prospect of a visit from Mr Trump, Mr Johnson said: “I think that we will have a visit in due course.”
And he told protesters to “understand that America, for better or worse, in our lifetimes, has incarnated values of liberty and fairness and freedom around the world, and it still does”.
Asked whether Mr Trump represents those values, he said: “Let us have a grown-up conversation with our American friends about the things we want to do together.”
Time taken for the UK to invite a new US president for a state visit. (PA Graphics)
Mrs May controversially extended the offer of a state visit, officially on behalf of the Queen, when she became the first world leader to meet Mr Trump in the White House following his inauguration last year.
Since then, however, the president has indicated he does not want to take up the invitation if he is going to face mass demonstrations and it had been expected he could make a low-key working visit rather than a trip which involved all the trappings of a state occasion.