let us begin. with me is richard griffiths who's corporate communications director at the global pr firm ketchum. good morning. you must be glad you are not doing pr for theresa may on friday the 13th. it would be challenging. the thing i would say about this meeting this week if it is blenheim palace, not buckingham palace, and i think the visit by donald trump is a real art in terms of positioning. this is not a full state visit, but if you looked at the tv pictures we saw overnight, holding hands with theresa may, all the pageantry at blenheim palace yesterday, the home, or the birthplace of winston churchill, it had the feel of a state visit, but it wasn't. how did the sun get this interview? i think we can speculate about how the sun got this interview. i think it is a prescription for tom newton dunn, the political editor of the sun. we understand that murdoch, the owner of the sun has been close to trump.

—— trump. no surprise may have had a hand in brokering this scoop. —— nigel farage. this again is hours after he was holding hands going up the steps that blenheim palace last night. he knew at that point that this article was going to be published. be absolutely new. the interview was done in brussels before he even arrived in the uk —— he absolutely new. saying that boris johnson would be a great pm, migration is killing europe, terror is sadiq khan's fault. it feels like he is interfering with uk politics. others might say barack obama did the same thing. but i think it is the same thing. but i think it is the way he is doing it in terms of generating more heat than light, it does not lead to much understanding. it is more that trump is once again selling. you can bet your bottom dollar that at the end of this is

that he will say i had a great visit to the uk. in this particular juncture would be brexit deal, he makes a few points, for example, and this is the guy who wrote a book about the art of the deal. he makes about the art of the deal. he makes a point about if a deal takes this long it will always be difficult. he has a point there, right? trump has never made any secret that he does politics differently. he does politics differently. he does politics in the manner of a business leader, the manner of a dealmaker. theresa may is not a business leader. she does politics in a very diplomatic way. you can criticise herfor that, diplomatic way. you can criticise her for that, but that is a very different style. i think what is also a interesting with this is that the sun is milky, unsurprisingly, it is six or seven pages. if you go inside the paper donald trump is saying, he admits he "feels unwelcome in london" but then he says "thousands of people in the uk sent me messages of support". if you go to the streets of london to date

there is a miklik 200,000 people protesting his visit. —— today there are something like. we have asked people to tweeters about this. we wa nt to people to tweeters about this. we want to know if people at home watching think that what donald trump says should sway theresa may's brexit policy. megan says donald trump says it how it is. someone from plymouth says theresa may has to go. charles has tweeted in saying good grief we must dig in and wait for the next president. lots of different opinions. donald trump is an absolute right to voice his opinion, but equally so do the protest as it will be taking to the streets in london today and elsewhere. this, from my perspective, this is not a demonstration against the united states, it is not a demonstration against the us people, a lot of americans i have been speaking to this week, friends in america, are

delighted that many people are taking to the streets. this is a demonstration against a man who is perceived as a misogynist, a racist, and they don't like it. let us move on to this next article. it is in the independent, i believe. nato leaders rebut trump claimed that he forced them to spend on defence. this is on the back of the nato meeting and that extraordinary press conference. just to take a step back for a conference. just to take a step back fora minute, conference. just to take a step back for a minute, let conference. just to take a step back fora minute, let us conference. just to take a step back for a minute, let us remind ourselves nato was set up back in 1949 to establish a system of collective defence between north america and europe and donald trump's beefier is that the us has continued to pay a higher proportion of its gdp than many eu countries, but eagerly rich european countries like germany. now he is claiming that he has persuaded them to chip in more. the message from european leaders, emmanuel macron being one example yesterday, is total denial. within minutes of the press

conference ending the french president said that the other alliance members had simply agree to keep to the spending commitments, which had already been made. what is interesting about this is it is a classic example of the kind of war of words that trump is famous for. he says one thing, it is denied. you are never actually quite clear what the reality, where the truth lies. it isa the reality, where the truth lies. it is a tactic, a pressure tactic, one could call it. it is a pressure tactic and a way of donald trump trying to take credit for a visit which bacchae will be playing as a rather mixed reception he has had in europe. —— back home. it won't play well in the united states. let us talk about the ft. hammond, the finance minister, chancellor, defending the brexit plan. what are the people in the city sank you about the white paper? a couple of things. there is concern from the services sector that they have been

overlooked in this and the focus has been more on goods than on services. i have to say, going through the papers this morning, and i have not read this 98 page white paper... why not? i need to do my research better. people in the next few days will be looking at the white paper to see what it means. it is quite technical. essentially, the challenge with that is when it was published yesterday the government is setting out its plans for the future relationship between the uk and the eu, and it suggests a softer brexit on goods, but a harder brexit for services. surely they are interlinked and you cannot have one without the other? absolutely. this is the key issue. this is why the likes of the boss of lloyd's of london are saying they will set up in brussels. there is concern they will not get the access on the service aside that they need. there is all to play for you. it is not

cast in stone yet. there will be a loss of negotiation. philip hammond is writing in the ft in a column this morning, a lot of technical complexity here, it needs to be much clearer exactly what is on offer for the services sector because it is not entirely clear to me. our other top story. terribly sad. the tragedy of the floods in western japan. the death toll is at around 200. the headline on the front of the japan times is interesting. they are going with the headline around the rail network still being crippled, which is the consequence of this. we all know that japan's famous for its bullet trains. i have been on them. they are phenomenal. always on time. they are phenomenal. always on time. the reality behind this is 200 people have been killed as a result of torrential rain. 60 people are still missing. it is not the kind of story that we are familiar with from japan. it is a really interesting

story, but a tragic one, because there has been a loss of life. parts of the region in western japan saw as much as four times the average july rainfall during 11 days through sunday. we have got to hope that some of those 60 missing are found alive. they really tragic story. we move alive. they really tragic story. we m ove o nto alive. they really tragic story. we move onto a final story. the guardian. this is close your high because you loved teddy bears. do i? i will be honest. people who queue for five hours to get a cheap teddy bear, do they not realise that ultimately kids willjust grow this after a few weeks, months, days, what have you? what is interesting for me is the scenes, they remind you of those terrible black friday scenes where everyone goes thank yous up. there were children involved in this, kids queueing. they were queueing up to get a teddy bear at the same price as their child's age rather than the £52

price. look at it from a marketeers cli pless price. look at it from a marketeers clipless perspective. this is what happens when you don't get your marketing right and you don't think about people rocking up and not being able to get that they want.“ it good to go in the papers anyway regardless of the story? there are some people as they get any papers at any cost. i do not agree with that. it is a marketing strategy that. it is a marketing strategy that has not worked. richard griffiths, lovely to talk to. stay with us here on bbc news — so much more to come. goodbye for now. hello there. it's hotting up as we head on into the weekend, particularly across central, southern parts of the country. but there will be a few heavy showers and maybe thunderstorms in the forecast for

the next couple of days. thursday was a fine day for many of us, some lovely sunsets around, but it wasn't dry everywhere. we did see some heavy showers across western england and into parts of wales, even some reports of local flooding in just one or two places. now, these showers are likely to linger on to the first part of friday across some western areas. a bit of cloud tending to roll back in across eastern areas, but for most, it's going to be a dry and quite a warm start to friday, with towns and city values not falling any lower than 10—15 degrees. so friday we start on a largely dry note. variable amounts of morning cloud, that should burn away, and we should see quite a good deal of sunshine around. but showers will develop once again, and we're thinking they could be a bit heavier, a bit more potent on friday afternoon, in a line again across some western parts of scotland, western parts of england, central, eastern wales, and also this time the midlands, in towards southern parts of england. so if you catch one, it could be really torrential, with the risk of some localised flooding. but again, hit—and—miss,

some areas staying dry altogether, and it's going to be quite warm, top temperatures 26, maybe 27 celsius. this is the picture into saturday, then. we've got more cloud, more of a breeze pushing into northern ireland, northern and western parts of scotland, maybe some outbreaks of rain here too. but the further south and east that you are, generally drier, with more in the way of sunshine. just an isolated shower, but warmer — 28 or 29 degrees, potentially, across the south—east. and the reason for the divide is this area of low pressure anchored to the north—west of the uk will bring more of a breeze and outbreaks of rain to the north—west of the country. but further south—east, closer to an area of high pressure over the near continent, we'll be swooping up that warmth, particularly in towards england and wales. could see warmth reaching eastern scotland, as well, but generally it's going to be cloudier for the west of scotland and into northern ireland, the odd spot of rain. england and wales, a hot and a sunny day. you can see those deep orange colours pushing away even a little bit further northwards. so a hot afternoon, actually,

mid—to—high 20s celsius for many, with some areas in the south—east seeing 30 or 31 celsius. so for the weekend, it's looking hot, certainly across england and wales, parts of eastern scotland. a few showers around, mainly on saturday, but always a bit cooler and damp and breezy in the north—west, with the odd spot of rain. as we head on in towards next week, though, we start off on a hot note. but then temperatures, as the week wears on, begin to fall and return to more of a seasonal average. good morning. welcome to breakfast, with naga munchetty and jon kay. our top story today: with friends like these... donald trump warns theresa may her brexit plan will kill any hopes of a trade deal with the us, and he backs borisjohnson as a future prime minister. with more protests planned against his visit, the us president

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