Starmer's expressionless face finally serves him well
While the US president held court for an hour and 10 minutes – fielding questions on everything from the suffering in Gaza and US interest rates to the dead paedophile Jeffrey Epstein – the Prime Minister kept his eyes dead ahead, like a passer-by trying to avoid eye contact with someone talking to themself.
He encountered a president in top form after two days of golf at one of his favourite courses, and 24 hours after unveiling a trade deal with the EU worth trillions of dollars in investment.
After small talk on the steps of Turnberry with Sir Keir and his wife Victoria – who Mr Trump described as 'very respected – about Aisla Craig, the island in the distance, discussions soon turned to Russia and Palestinian statehood.
The president went on to say: 'I don't know what he's [Sir Keir] doing but she's very respected, as respected as him. I don't want to say more, I'll get myself in trouble. But she's very, she's a great woman and is very highly respected.'
Perhaps tellingly, Lady Starmer did not join the Prime Minister and Mr Trump later on an Air Force One flight to Aberdeen.
What was meant to be a quick photo-op became an impromptu press conference, despite the best efforts of a bagpiper almost drowning out journalists' questions.
It may have been Scottish soil, but there was no doubt who was the host.
Inside the ballroom, it was the same. Sir Keir was invisible for minutes at a time, a prop at his own bilateral meeting.
'He poached people that worked for me,' said Mr Trump, as he was lured by an American reporter into discussing his falling out with Epstein 20 years ago. 'I said, 'Don't ever do that again.' He did it again. And I threw him out of the place.'
Sir Keir pressed his hands together, brushed lint from his sleeves, crossed and uncrossed his legs as Mr Trump held forth.
To one side, Sophie Nazemi, his director of communications, kept her eyes fixed on the Prime Minister, as if monitoring for a distress signal.
The room was vast – eight huge chandeliers at least – but the chairs at its centre had been positioned to evoke the intimacy of the Oval Office. It meant there was nowhere for Sir Keir to hide.
He and Mr Trump sat at the heads of their teams, who were lined up in chairs set out in the space where the White House sofas would be. It made the US president the host, and Sir Keir the dutiful guest.
'Thank you so much for showing us around and having this opportunity to sit in this fantastic ballroom, which is absolutely incredible,' he said.
Somehow, Sir Keir and Mr Trump have developed a warm working relationship. But occasionally it sounded as if the president rather wished that there was a different person in the seat next to him.
'Nigel, as you know, is a friend of mine,' he said as he discussed Nigel Farage 's demand that the president be allowed to address Parliament during his September state visit.
'Keir is a friend of mine,' he added, in the nick of time.
It was a chance for the Prime Minister to jump in, and dispel any notion of the US president turning Parliament into a set for the Trump show.
'Parliament's in recess at the time,' he said, before using words like 'unprecedented', 'sophisticated', and 'historic' to describe Mr Trump's second visit of the year.
Sir Keir's poker face became a thousand-yard stare as the minutes ticked by. Was anyone going to end this press conference?
He found moments of relief along the way, pivoting quickly from a tricky question about whether the Open should return to Turnberry, to answer an earlier question about the Lionesses' European Championship victory in Basel on Sunday.
'The mental and physical resilience that they showed was quite incredible,' he said, no doubt comparing it with his own capacity for resilience. 'So there's a lot of bunting out today or tomorrow to celebrate them bringing that cup home.'
Relief came in the end not from the president but from one of the junior White House staffers. 'That's it,' she shouted. 'Everyone out.'
Mr Trump was still answering a question on whether the UK needed its own 'Alligator Alcatraz' immigrant camp, while Sir Keir could breathe a sigh of relief.
Sir Keir still had the rest of the evening to go – a trip on Air Force One, then Marine One to Aberdeenshire and Mr Trump's second golf course.
Later, the two leaders emerged from the presidential helicopter at Mr Trump's country hotel on his Menie Estate. The president's adult sons, wives and partners had made the trip, but there was no sign of Lady Starmer.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
a minute ago
- The Independent
Putting conditions on recognising a Palestinian state is a humiliating joke for my people
Keir Starmer wants us to believe he's making a bold moral stand by announcing the UK will recognise a Palestinian state. But look closer, and the truth is far more disturbing. This 'recognition' isn't rooted in justice or principle. It's a policy so morally upside down, it sounds almost satirical. If Israel continues bombing children, annexing land and starving a population into submission, then, yes, Britain might recognise Palestine. But if Israel suddenly behaves, agrees to a ceasefire and recommits to peace, then recognition won't be necessary. What kind of justice operates on those terms? This is not diplomacy. This is moral blackmail. It is Britain saying to Palestinians: your right to exist is not yours. It depends entirely on the behaviour of your occupier. When I asked my sister in Gaza what she thought of the UK's announcement, her first response was to laugh. She said: 'I don't think we really care what the UK has to say about us. We'll never forget that they're one of the main reasons we're in this situation. We're just trying to survive here.' Of all countries, Britain should know better. It was Britain that helped initiate our dispossession with the Balfour Declaration. Britain stood by during the Nakba, the displacement of Palestinians when the Israeli state was founded in the aftermath of the Second World War. Britain has armed and funded Israel through occupation, siege and massacre. And now, as Gaza is being starved into history, Britain still can't bring itself to say: Palestinians deserve a state because they are a people who deserve to live in freedom and dignity. When my 14-year-old niece asked her mother, 'What does it mean that they want to recognise us? Don't we already exist?', my sister said the family laughed – not because it was funny, but because it was absurd. Even a child could see the madness: a government saying they might recognise you if your people continue to be killed. Starmer called Palestinian statehood an 'inalienable right'. But a right can't be delayed, denied or dangled as a threat. If you attach conditions to a right, especially ones dictated by the very state occupying and bombing us, it's no longer a right but a bargaining chip. What's worse is that it isn't even sincere. This isn't about us. It's about Starmer trying to appear principled while staying comfortably aligned with US policy, arms contracts and the pro-Israel lobby at home. What Palestinians hear in all this is painfully clear: your suffering alone isn't enough. Your history, your dispossession, the killing of more than 60,000 people in Gaza… none of it justifies our support. But if we can use your dead to shame Israel into behaving, then yes, we might finally utter the word 'Palestine' without choking on it. It's grotesque. It's like saying to a battered woman: 'If your abuser continues, I'll acknowledge your pain. But if he stops, then you'll be fine on your own, won't you?' Recognition is supposed to be an affirmation of our humanity. But in Starmer's hands, it's a punishment doled out to our oppressor. And if he gets his way – if Israel suddenly agrees to a ceasefire and halts annexation – then we, the victims, get nothing. We just keep waiting. Again. This isn't even neutrality. It's complicity dressed as strategy. It tells Palestinians that we must continue dying in order to be politically useful. That a ceasefire may be good for Israel – but bad for us, because it might delay recognition even further. It's a contradiction so absurd it becomes insulting. The more they kill us, the closer we get to being recognised as human. And the moment they pause, even slightly, we're erased again. What kind of justice works like that? What leadership reduces human rights to this level of transactional absurdity? Instead, we are told to wait until our deaths are politically useful. Wait until our grief becomes leverage. Wait until Starmer needs to send a message to Israel. Only then, perhaps, will we be deemed worthy of recognition. But we have waited for decades. Through every war, every failed 'peace process', every insult, every massacre, every broken promise. We have waited while Britain and the West told us to be patient. While they recognised our oppressors, funded them, armed them and applauded their 'restraint' as we were buried under the rubble of our homes. If this is what recognition looks like, it is no recognition at all. It is a joke. A cruel, humiliating joke played on a people who have already lost everything. Because if the world's recognition of our right to exist depends on the mood of our killers, that recognition is not a gift – it is another form of violence. And if Britain cannot affirm our humanity without asking Israel for permission first, then what value does that recognition really hold? It's not leadership. It's cowardice. And it will be remembered as such.
The Independent
a minute ago
- The Independent
Nigel Farage under investigation by parliamentary watchdog
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage is under investigation by Parliament's standards watchdog, it has emerged. A probe has been opened into the "registration of an interest". Nigel Farage told The Independent the inquiry was opened following a complaint from a member of the House of Lords, but added: "It is not to do with any undeclared income". A spokesman for Nigel Farage added that, following the complaint, 'the Commissioner for Standards is doing his job'. The investigation was opened on July 28, according to the commissioner's official website, and is under paragraph 5 of the code of conduct. This says that 'members must fulfil conscientiously the requirements of the House in respect of the registration of interests in the Register of Members' Financial Interests. New members must register all their current financial interests, and any registrable benefits (other than earnings) received in the 12 months before their election within one month of their election, and members must register any change in those registrable interests within 28 days.' Earlier this month the commissioner found that Rachel Reeves had inadvertently breached parliament's rules by failing to declare gifts on time. The chancellor was probed over free theatre tickets, which she failed to add to her register of interests within 28 days. She blamed 'an oversight' for her initial failure to declare the gifts, which included tickets to an adaptation of the classic children's novel Ballet Shoes at the National Theatre over Christmas
The Independent
a minute ago
- The Independent
Data sovereignty must be more than a slogan
Nutanix is a Business Reporter client Why business leaders must build digital exit strategies before regulation or geopolitics forces their hand. Not long ago, cloud strategy was all about performance, price and scale. Today, something far more fundamental is at stake – control. In boardrooms across Europe, business and public sector leaders are asking the same question: how can we ensure our data stays within reach, and outside the grip of foreign companies and powers? This is the question at the heart of digital sovereignty, a concept that has shifted from technical jargon to strategic imperative in record time. For the UK, it is becoming a defining issue of the post-Brexit digital economy. For the rest of Europe, it is a response to growing fears that foreign control over digital infrastructure represents not just a business risk, but a national one. And for all of us, it raises a critical truth. If we cannot walk away from our digital providers, we don't really own our data. We're only renting it and hoping the landlord stays friendly. The legal reality behind the cloud The urgency behind digital sovereignty isn't ideological. It's legal. Businesses may believe that hosting their data in a local or regional data centre provides protection, but legal jurisdiction often overrides geography. Take the United States CLOUD Act. This legislation compels US-based technology companies to provide access to data, no matter where that data is physically stored, if requested by US law enforcement or intelligence agencies. Crucially, it can also prohibit providers from disclosing those requests to customers. That creates a chilling scenario for European organisations. A UK business using a US-owned cloud provider might find its data accessed by US authorities without ever being notified. And if services are suspended, whether due to sanctions, litigation or political pressure, there may be no immediate recourse. This isn't theoretical. It's happening. One high-profile incident this spring saw Microsoft temporarily restrict access to services for the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, reportedly in response to US sanctions. Whether politically motivated or not, it proved a point: legal control trumps marketing claims, and companies are more exposed than they realise. Sovereignty demands mobility Digital sovereignty is not about avoiding the cloud. It's about being able to move if you need to. And that's where many businesses are still unprepared. Over the past decade, enterprises have become deeply dependent on hyperscale cloud platforms. That's not a criticism as those platforms offer incredible agility and innovation. But it also means many organisations lack a plan B. They have no practical, tested way to exit a provider if trust breaks down, prices spike or the geopolitical climate shifts. In fact, we increasingly see governments stepping in. In Norway, regulators have begun requiring public institutions to develop exit strategies for their cloud services. In Germany and Switzerland, digital infrastructure investment is being weighed not only on technical merit but on the legal independence of the provider. The UK, too, is moving. A bill currently under discussion would require stress-testing of organisational data strategies. This reflects a growing recognition that resilience must include the ability to change providers, quickly and cleanly, without downtime or data loss. What boards need to ask today Is this really an IT problem, or is it a C-suite issue that demands board-level attention? Senior leaders must now assess their organisation's digital dependencies as carefully as their financial exposure. Can you move your workloads if you need to? Do you have contracts that support rapid migration? Have you mapped where your data resides and who has legal access? Do you have the internal capabilities to operate hybrid or multicloud environments? Visibility remains a major challenge. According to the 2023 Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Index, only 13 per cent of public sector IT leaders say they completely understand where their data is located and under which jurisdiction it falls. That lack of clarity introduces unacceptable risk in a landscape where legal access matters as much as physical access. These are not questions to leave for later. In a crisis, it's already too late to design a safe exit. Sovereignty is not something that can be switched on. Instead, it must be built into the architecture of your business. The opportunity in resilience The good news is that a better approach is emerging. Modern, cloud-native platforms are enabling businesses to operate across multiple providers without lock-in. Hybrid multicloud infrastructure makes it possible to move data and applications across environments, without sacrificing performance or compliance. This is more than a future vision: it is already the direction of travel. To this point, 84 per cent of public sector organisations globally now view hybrid multicloud as their ideal operating model. The appeal is clear: the ability to combine flexibility, resilience and compliance within a single architecture. At Nutanix, we work with customers across Europe who are building exactly this kind of resilience. Whether in financial services, public sector or healthcare, these organisations recognise that sovereignty is not about cutting ties with the global cloud ecosystem. It is about making sure those ties are balanced, reversible and governed by clear terms. One such example is the UK's Department for Work & Pensions (DWP), which has embraced a modern cloud strategy to ensure operational continuity and flexibility at national scale. As one of the country's largest public service departments, DWP's ability to manage critical infrastructure with both agility and control speaks to the strategic importance of sovereign-ready digital platforms. We are also seeing growing momentum from policymakers, regulators and industry leaders who want to ensure European organisations can retain digital self-determination without cutting themselves off from innovation. This is the real goal. Not isolation, but independence. Now is the time to act In times of stability, it's easy to overlook hidden dependencies. But we are not in a stable time. From economic volatility to political fragmentation, the risks of inaction are growing. Sovereignty cannot be retrofitted. It must be planned for, budgeted for and tested, just like any other pillar of enterprise risk management. That process starts with visibility, continues with strategy and succeeds only with executive support. European business leaders, especially in critical sectors such as government, finance and healthcare, now face a choice. Treat data sovereignty as a compliance box to tick or as a competitive differentiator. This is no longer a niche concern, as 72 per cent of public sector decision-makers now say their top priority for cloud deployment is the ability to move workloads freely across environments. Because in the digital age, true sovereignty is not just about where your data lives. It's about whether you can take it with you. For more information, visit
