Keir Starmer and Donald Trump discuss trade 'prosperity deal' and agree to put 'pressure on Putin'

30 March 2025, 21:30 | Updated: 30 March 2025, 22:26

Sir Keir Starmer and Donald Trump had 'productive negotiations' towards a UK-US economic deal, while agreeing to 'put the pressure on Putin' in a phone call on Sunday night.

A Downing Street spokesperson said: "The Prime Minister spoke to President Trump this evening.

"The President opened by wishing His Majesty the King best wishes and good health.

"They discussed the productive negotiations between their respective teams on a UK-US economic prosperity deal, agreeing that these will continue at pace this week.

"Discussing Ukraine, the Prime Minister updated the President on the productive discussions at the meeting of the Coalition of Willing in Paris this week. The leaders agreed on the need to keep up the collective pressure on Putin.

"They agreed to stay in touch in the coming days."

This comes as Donald Trump announced this week that a 25% import tax would be introduced on all cars imported to the US, a measure expected to hit British luxury carmakers such as Rolls-Royce and Aston Martin.

The levy is on top of a series of reciprocal tariffs set to come into effect on April 2, which could include a general 20% tax on UK products in response to the rate of VAT.

In the same call, the two leaders agreed on the need to "keep up the collective pressure on Putin".

The Prime Minister updated the US leader on the latest meeting of the so-called coalition of the willing when they spoke, according to Downing Street

"Discussing Ukraine, the Prime Minister updated the President on the productive discussions at the meeting of the coalition of willing in Paris this week," a No 10 spokesperson said.

They added: "The leaders agreed on the need to keep up the collective pressure on Putin."

The Sunday night call came after Mr Trump said he was "angry, pissed off" with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin for questioning the credibility of Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky.

Russian drone attacks have continued in Ukraine, with strikes taking place on a military hospital, shopping centre and apartment blocks in Kharkiv, the second-largest city in Ukraine, killing two people and wounding more.

In an interview with NBC News, Mr Trump criticised the Russian president for "getting into Zelensky's credibility".

The US leader suggested he was considering putting "secondary sanctions" on Russian oil, after Mr Putin continued to claim that Ukraine's president lacks the legitimacy to sign a peace deal.

Mr Zelensky's presidential term expired last year but Ukraine cannot hold elections at the moment under its constitution, as martial law has been declared while it is at war with Russia.

Mr Trump previously suggested he was open to relaxing US sanctions on Russia as part of the progression in peace talks to end the war in Ukraine.

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The UK is trying to negotiate an exemption from tariffs on imports into the US.

Negotiations are said to be intense, with moves to decrease or even abolish a British tax on US big tech firms among the bargaining chips.

A top economist has warned that "playing hardball" with the US on tariffs will hurt the UK, as Yvette Cooper said that the trade barriers could harm the entire global economy.

Jonathan Portes told LBC's Ali Miraj that Keir Starmer is right to put the UK's national interest first in talks with the US over tariffs, some of which are set to come in on Wednesday.

But the prominent economist and former senior civil servant said that "playing hardball in the sense of deliberately raising tariffs across the board... would frankly do significantly more damage to the UK economy than it would do to the US".

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The new trade taxes come into force just after Rachel Reeves made a series of spending cuts at the spring statement in order to restore a narrow buffer for her public spending plans.

Mr Portes, who was previously chief economist at the Cabinet Office and the Department for Work and Pensions, said: "The government will have to be quite careful, quite measured, probably try and coordinate, at least to some extent, with our European partners and be very careful.

"I mean, the basic point here, of course, is that Trump is not acting in a way that is rational either by... economic standards, but not even by any sort of conventional political standards either. And that means that the conventional rules don't apply.

"You just have to try and avoid as much damage as possible."

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The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has warned the impact of reciprocal tariffs would be worse for the UK than allowing the levy to go ahead unimpeded.

Ministers are currently attempting to negotiate an exemption from the tariffs, with reports suggesting a tax on American big tech companies could be reduced or even abolished in exchange for a carve-out on British imports to the US.

It comes as Yvette Cooper reiterated the Prime Minister's message that "no option is off the table" when it comes to responding to the tariff plans.

Ms Cooper said: "In the end, if you increase barriers to trade right across the world, that's not good for the world economy, let alone any individual country as part of that.

"So that's why our approach to this has been to try and seek new trade agreements across the world, including improving our trading relationship with the EU, as well as with the US."

Discussions with the US over exemptions from the levy are "intense", she said.

Ms Cooper added: "We obviously can't keep a running commentary on different discussions that are taking place, but we have to always make sure that we're acting in the national interest."

Part of the problem appears to be that the Trump administration has shifting priorities for its tariff regime. Several tariffs have been announced in recent months before being postponed or changed.

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Dmitry Grozoubinski, a trade expert and founder of ExplainTrade training service, said that the Trump administration "so far seems like it is less willing to do transactional deals in advance of these tariffs."

He told LBC's Iain Dale: "I think there's a sense that they want to roll out the pain and then negotiate it away rather than letting people get out from under it in advance.

"What makes this so hard to predict is that the administration has been incredibly unclear about what its actual goals are and what it actually wants from a lot of its trading partners, including the United Kingdom.

"So it is a matter... of representatives from the UK going over there and either blind-bidding or trying to work out what a deal could look like. And that's always a difficult place to be."

In a turbulent week for Trump, on Friday he said he is "very angry and p***** off" with Vladimir Putin after the Russian president called for Volodymyr Zelenskyy to step down.

Trump said that comments made by Mr Putin, in which he called for a "transitional government" to take power in Ukraine in place of Mr Zelenskyy were "not going in the right direction"

It comes after a top Kremlin official also said that a ceasefire in Ukraine may not come into effect this year because the two sides were too far apart in their negotiating positions

Mr Trump told NBC: “If Russia and I are unable to make a deal on stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine, and if I think it was Russia’s fault — which it might not be — but if I think it was Russia’s fault, I am going to put secondary tariffs on oil, on all oil coming out of Russia.

“That would be that if you buy oil from Russia, you can’t do business in the United States. There will be a 25% tariff on all oil, a 25- to 50-point tariff on all oil.”

Talks between Russia, Ukraine and the US appear to have stalled after bullish comments made initially by Mr Trump. Mr Zelenskyy has accused Russia of being "manipulative" and warned the US not to fall for the Kremlin's demands.