17 April 2008
Transcript of joint press conference held in Washington
Read the transcript
President Bush:
Mr Prime Minister welcome to the Rose Garden. I am glad you are here. It is a beautiful day. It has been a pleasure to welcome a good friend to the Oval Office and we had a good discussion. I appreciate our special relationship with Britain and I believe that the actions we have taken are making it stronger
We have spent time talking about the terrorists and extremists and I would remind my fellow citizens that just days after the Prime Minister took office his country was attacked by murderers and extremists, and he handled the situation brilliantly. Prime Minister Brown understands our enemies remain determined to strike our countries and to kill our people. And I share your determination, your fierce determination that these evil men must be stopped and that we can defeat their hateful ideology by the spreading of liberty and peace.
We are working together in Iraq and we appreciate the sacrifice of the British troops, their families and the British people. During the recent fighting in the Basra Province our nations coordinated our support for the Iraqi security forces as they took on extremists and criminals. I am most thankful for the brilliance of the British helicopter crews, they (inaudible) courage and helped evacuate wounded Iraqi soldiers.
I have talked to the Prime Minister about my meetings with General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker on why I made the decision I made about our troop levels in Iraq. I appreciate the fact that the Prime Minister briefed me on what the British Commanders are saying about Iraq. The key thing there is that we are working very closely together and that we are making progress.
I also talked about Afghanistan with the Prime Minister. I appreciate the 7,900 British troops that are serving bravely in that country. We talked about the very successful NATO Summit that we have just concluded in Romania. We talked about our commitment to see to it that we succeed in Afghanistan.
We spent some time on Iran. Our position is clear that we are going to work together, along with other nations, to make it abundantly clear to the Iranian regime that they must not have the capability of developing a nuclear weapon.
We talked about Zimbabwe. And I appreciate Gordon Brown’s strong position on that issue, and I appreciate the fact that he went to the United Nations and made it abundantly clear that which I feel as well, which is you can’t have elections unless you are willing to put the results out. What kind of election is it? Now let the will of the people be known. I appreciate those in the region who have spoken out on this issue. I appreciate the fact that some in the region have spoken out against violence. More leaders in the region need to speak out. And the United Nations and the AU must play an active role in resolving the situation in Zimbabwe.
We shared our deep concern about the people in Darfur and our sheer frustration that the United Nations AU peace keeping force is slow in arriving. You know I made the decision not to put our troops in there, and the expectation that the United Nations, along with the AU, could be effective, and they haven’t been as effective as they should have been and we will continue to work to help them.
We talked about our joint desire to train healthcare workers in Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique and Zambia, as well as our continued effort to confront disease, whether it be malaria or HIV Aids.
And then of course we spent time on our economy - that would be two economies. We first spent some time on the global financial markets and then we spent time talking about what each of us are doing in our respective countries to deal with our financial circumstances.
We spent some time on trade. Now the worst signal we could send during this global uncertainty is that the world is going to become more protectionist and less willing to open up markets. And I want to thank Gordon Brown for his strong belief that the Doha round ought to proceed, I agree with you Sir, and believe we can make good progress towards that end.
We talked about the climate change issue. I gave a speech right here in the Rose Garden yesterday. I don’t know whether any of our press corps read it, but it was a far reaching speech. I talked about our commitment to deal with the issue in such a way that we can develop technologies without wrecking our economy. And there is a clear recognition that unless countries like China and India are at the table, any agreement is not going to work. And I assured the Prime Minister that by the time the G8 comes we will work hard to make sure we can reach an international consensus that will be effective.
All in all we had a fabulous conversation. I am looking forward to dinner tonight. The Prime Minister is bringing his wife, Sarah, up here to the White House and Laura and I are going to cook you up a meal - well we will eat one with you.
Thanks for coming.
Prime Minister:
Thank you very much Mr President. Let me first of all thank you for your warm welcome, for your hospitality and for your offer to cook the meal this evening.
And let me thank you most of all for your leadership. The world owes President George Bush a huge debt of gratitude for leading the world in our determination to root out terrorism and to ensure that there is no safe haven for terrorism and no hiding place for terrorists.
It is my profound belief that over many decades no international partnership has served the world better than the special relationship between our two countries - the United States and the United Kingdom. And following our excellent meeting I am able to report that the bond between our two countries is stronger than ever. From the darkest days of the Second World War when the strongest transatlantic partnership was forged to defend freedom, to the challenges we face together against terrorism in every part of the world, our alliance will remain strong and steadfast in standing for freedom and for justice. And we will continue to work together with the strenuous efforts we are making together in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Today we agreed our determination that in advance of the July G8 meeting in Japan, where all the major economies will meet together, we will do everything in our power to ensure economic stability and growth. We should be vigilant in maintaining the pro-active approach to monetary and fiscal policy to enable our economies to resume their paths of upward growth, we want all our international partners to do the same. To ensure greater confidence in the financial system, all countries should ensure the immediate implementation of the plans for transparency and disclosure and risk management agreed by our Finance Ministers. We agreed to work, and President Bush has just referred to this, for an early world trade deal that will give new confidence to the international economy at this time. An enhanced dialogue between oil consumers and oil producers, with rising output from the oil producing countries, should help stabilise and then cut the price of oil, now at over $110 a barrel. We want to work with the World Bank and agricultural producers to enhance food supplies, tackle food shortages and increase agricultural production. And both Britain and America are taking action to help the housing market for home owners and those who want to buy their homes for the first time.
President Bush and I also talked about an agreed new work programme between our two governments on development. And let me acknowledge the pioneering work of President Bush’s administration in tackling on the African continent HIV Aids and addressing the scandal of avoidable deaths from malaria. We agreed to work together, as President Bush has just said, to increase the number of doctors, nurses and midwives in Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique and Zambia, a down-payment which if extended to the whole of Africa would lead to one and a half million more health service healthcare workers.
At the same time the professionalism and commitment of our brave forces, serving alongside America, with determination in Iraq and Afghanistan was the subject of much of our discussions. We praised the commitment of the troops of both America and Britain and all who serve in these two countries. And we believe that our programme of overwatch in Basra in the south of Iraq is making substantial progress.
At the same time we have agreed at the NATO Summit in Bucharest measures that we can take so that we match the military effort in Afghanistan with proposals that will enable economic and social development of that country. America and Britain have the first and second largest number of forces in both these countries and we are determined on the success of our missions.
We have reiterated our common stand on Darfur and we want to see talks with the rebels and the government working together. We reiterated our common stand also on Burma where it is important to repeat the call for reconciliation. And on the situation in Zimbabwe, President Bush has made a strong statement that I entirely endorse, calling for full democratic rights of the Zimbabwean people to be respected, and that elections that happened have got to be not only reported but be fair and be seen to be fair in the interests of democracy, not just in Zimbabwe, but the reputation of democracy throughout Africa and the world.
We have repeated our common commitments in the fight against terrorism and we will continue to work together at every level to defeat terrorism wherever it is.
Iran continues to defy the will of the international community and we are agreed on the need to strengthen the sanctions regime and ensure that these sanctions are effectively implemented. I will be talking to my European colleagues in the next few days about how we can move forward with both these issues throughout Europe. And we want to extend measures to include investments in liquefied natural gas.
We also discussed climate change following President Bush’s announcement yesterday, and we agreed we must work internationally to secure progress at the G8 and towards a post-Kyoto deal on climate change.
President, this is an ambitious agenda that we share together. It can only be achieved by closer cooperation. That will happen over these next few months. I look forward to continuing to work with President Bush and his administration in taking it forward. And thank you for your warm welcome and hospitality.
Question:
Mr President, you said last week that Iraq was not an endless war, but others have called it in open-ended war and a war with no end in sight. Do you agree with those descriptions? And Mr Prime Minister, you met today with the three candidates who want to succeed President Bush, did you feel a special kinship with any one of them, and do you think that the transatlantic relationship will improve under the next President?
President Bush:
One of those three has a good chance of winning. I am interested in succeeding in Iraq. This is a mission that is succeeding on the security front, it is getting better on the economic front, and it is improving on the political front. And therefore my statement has been we will have the troops there necessary to succeed. It hasn’t been easy, it has been difficult, it has taken longer than I anticipated, but it is worth it. A failure in Iraq would embolden al Qaeda, it would give al Qaeda a huge victory, enable them to more likely establish a safe haven in a wealthy country from which to launch attacks against us. And failure in Iraq would send a message to Iran that the United States and its allies were not intent upon making sure that they stay within the borders of their country and stop promoting terrorism through organisations like Hezbollah. They wouldn’t take us seriously when it came to stopping their desire to have a nuclear weapon. Failure in Iraq would send a message to our friends that you can’t count on America. Success in Iraq would be a significant blow to both al Qaeda and Iran’s ambitions. And it is worth it, in my judgment, to succeed against al Qaeda, the very group of people that attacked our country, and those who would like to do so again even on a more massive scale. And it is worth it to say to the theocrats in Iran that you must reform and that we are going to work to prevent you from having a nuclear weapon. And so when it comes to troop levels and duration my question is what does it take to win? General Petraeus thinks we can win with fewer troops. That is why I accepted the recommendations. General Petraeus and Ryan Crocker know that the troops were necessary to provide stability for the political progress to be made that is being made and for the economy to improve. And so as long as I am the President my measure of success is victory and success. I have only got ten more months left of the Presidency.
Prime Minister:
There is no artificial timetable here. Let’s not forget that Iraq is now a democracy, that democratic rights have been restored to the Iraqi people, that we are now building schools and hospitals, seeing economic development. And I am particularly referring to the area where we have responsibility and that is Basra. And let us also remember that there is progress in Iraqis now being able to take more control of their own affairs. We are now in a situation where we have trained up 20,000 Iraqi forces, 22,000 Iraqi policemen and women. We have got more to do in that area. And so our role in training the Iraqis, making it possible for them, as they did in the Basra operations to assume more control of their own affairs is the way that we want to move from combat to overwatch in Iraq and that is exactly what we are going to do. And we are going to combine that with building up local government where there will be local government elections that will force the militias to make a choice between the democratic process and armed insurrection, and at the same time economic and social development will be pushed forward. And we are having a conference in London in the next few days where Iraqis and others will look at how we can move forward with the reconstruction and economic development of the area so that people have a stake in the future, they have jobs, businesses are being created and Iraq and Iraqis are now running their own affairs.
It is, if I might answer your second question, it is for Americans to decide who their President is going to be. I was delighted to meet the three Presidential candidates who remain in the field. What I was convinced of after talking to each of them, and talking about the issues that concern them and concern the world, is that the relationship between America and Britain will remain strong, will remain steadfast, it will be one that will be able to rise to the challenges of the future, and I look forward to continuing my discussions with all three of them over the next few months.
Question:
Mr President, Prime Minister, the Prime Minister has repeatedly said that Britain’s economic difficulties started here in the United States. Does the solution to them have to begin here as well? And Prime Minister can I just ask you, you have got a very important agenda here on this trip and yet at home increasingly you are being criticised from within your own political party. What is going wrong in your party and government and what are you going to do about it?
Prime Minister:
I am sticking to the job and I am getting on with the job. And I think people understand that there is a difficult situation round the world, we did have a credit crunch, it did mean that there were problems that started in the financial institutions in America, but these are problems now in Europe, there are problems in Britain, there are problems in every country of the world. And one of the issues that we are dealing with is that the issues that brought about the credit crunch are combined with rising food prices round the world, rising oil prices and the threat of inflation in certain areas as well. And I am satisfied that the discussions we have had today with President Bush, yesterday in Wall Street, I am meeting Ben Bernanke, the head of the Federal Reserve tomorrow, show the common ground we have in dealing with the issues ahead, and in getting the economy to the position where markets are moving again, where growth is restored and on an upward path and where people can feel more safe and more secure about their jobs. What matters to me is that people feel safe and secure about their future, about their prospects and about their jobs. And that is why we will not hesitate to take any action that is necessary to keep the economy moving forward. That is why I have outlined today measures that include what we can do in the housing market, what we can do to tackle food price rises, what we can do to tackle oil price rises, and that is why it is important that there is coordination across the Atlantic, indeed coordination between all the major industrial powers so that we can all contribute what each of us can on each continent to the process of restoring both confidence in the world economy and stability and growth, and we will continue to do that.
And as far as the domestic situation back home, I will continue to do the right thing and do what is right for the British economy and the British people.
President Bush:
We are in a rough patch right now, we have had a pretty good run, as a matter of fact we have had the most consecutive months of job growth in the country’s history, and our housing market went soft and it began to affect the financial markets so we have taken a variety of steps. First, we are trying to help creditworthy people stay in their homes. I don’t know what it is like in Britain, but here you know the guy who gave you your mortgage generally doesn’t own the paper any more, they bundled it up and sold it somewhere else and it is hard to find somebody to re-negotiate with. So we put a system in place that helps credit-worthy home owners re-negotiate. We want to help people stay in their homes. I am not particularly interested in baling out lenders or you know speculators, but I am interested in helping hard working Americans be able to find a way to stay in their homes. And it has been effective, an effective programme. And secondly, we worked with Congress on a pro-growth package, over $150 billion of tax cuts, most of which will start hitting people’s mail boxes and/or accounts in the second week of May. Some of the incentives in the pro-growth package are for small business and businesses with accelerated appreciation, incentives to invest. It is beginning to kick in a little bit but this programme hasn’t really taken effect. I mean consumers don’t have their cheques yet, and it will feel good, this is to help our economy and finally the FED, which is independent from the White House I might add, it has taken some strong actions to enhance liquidity in the system. And we will work with Congress on pieces of legislation that will actually help people and you know I will take a dim view of legislation that will make it harder for the economy to correct.
Question:
Mr President, Mr El Baradei of the IAEA said today that Iran’s progress in developing uranium enrichment is slow and that its centrifuges are older models. So how do you reconcile that with US views that Iran is a major nuclear threat? And Prime Minister Brown what concrete measures can western governments take to address the soaring food prices, and do you think there should be a rethinking of bio fuel policies?
President Bush:
Let me start on Iran here. If they learn how to enrich, it is knowledge which can be used to develop a nuclear weapon. They claim that they have got a civilian programme in place, this is only for civilian purposes. If that is the case, why do they have a secret programme? Why have they violated the IAEA? And so our objective is to on the one hand recognise they have a sovereign right to have civilian power by joining Russia and providing them with the fuel necessary to run their civilian nuclear facility, and then having them honour the agreements they have signed up to. They have proven themselves to be untrustworthy. And to say that well OK, it is OK to let them learn to enrich and assume that that programme, that knowledge could not be transferred to a programme, a military programme, is in my judgment naïve. And that is why the United States in working with Britain, and France, and Germany, the United Nations Security Council, is all aiming to say to the Iranians verifiably suspend your programme and there is a better way forward for you. And so our diplomatic efforts are ongoing and I appreciate the fact that Great Britain has been a great country to work with on this issue because Gordon Brown seriously sees the threat, as do I. And now is the time to confront this threat and I believe we can solve the problem diplomatically and that is why we are working to verifiably suspend their enrichment.
Prime Minister:
Well I make no apology for saying that we will extend sanctions where possible on Iran. Iran is in breach of the Non Proliferation Treaty, Iran has not told the truth to the international community about what its plans are, and that is why I am talking to other European leaders about how we can extend European sanctions against Iran over the next period of time, and to ensure that what sanctions are taken are effectively implemented, and to monitor the effect on the Iranian regime where we see high inflation in Iran that is not properly disclosed by the regime and the effect that sanctions are actually beginning to have on that country. So in the next few weeks we want to extend the measures on sanctions to include investment in liquefied natural gas, I believe that sends another signal to the region that what is happening is unacceptable. I am pleased Secretary of State Rice is here with us today because we will support her in the efforts that are being made, working with our other partners, including of course Russia and China on this, to make sure that Iran recognises that it cannot ignore the international community and its obligations with impunity.
You also asked about food prices. I am calling a meeting in London in the next few days with the head of the World Food Programme to discuss what we can do to deal with the situation that is producing food riots in many countries, the lowest supplies of food for 30 years, shortages of food in many continents and many countries that are making people worry about whether in some countries they can actually feed the people. Now there are long and detailed causes for why this is happening. In Asia people’s demand for better and a higher quality of food means that more agricultural production is needed, subsidies in some areas has meant that there is less agricultural production in Africa than there should be. The World Food Programme is wanting and has issued an appeal for more support and we and America have already offered more support to help feed people who are in the greatest of difficulty. And in the long term, yes, we will look at bio fuels where we have withdrawn some of the subsidies for bio fuels, we have got to get it absolutely right that we are dealing with the environmental issue as well as dealing with the problem of increased production of food, and of course we have got to increase generally our ability to produce more food for more of the world’s people over the next few years. So yes we must act immediately and yes we must have a long term plan. The world needs to have more supply of food to meet the rising demands of people round the world.
Question:
Mr President, I noticed your warm words at the start there. Some people would suggest that the special relationship is a little less special than it was under Mr Brown’s predecessor. Is that true or false? And Prime Minister, a domestic question I am afraid, a member of your government appears upset enough tonight about the abolition of the 10p rate to consider resigning. Isn’t it time for you to at least consider unravelling that particular change?
President Bush:
False. We have a great relationship and we are working on a variety of issues. Our special relationship has been forged on common values in history and we are making history together. And we are dealing with a lot of problems. The most severe problem as far as I am concerned is the willingness of people to murder innocent people to achieve their political objectives, and this is the fundamental threat facing civilisation in the 21st century. And Prime Minister Brown sees the threat, he had to live through the threat. And so our relationship is very special and I am confident that future Presidents will keep it that way. There is just such a uniqueness in the relationship. That is not to say you can’t have other friends, and we do, but this is a unique relationship, it truly is, and I value it. I value my personal friendship as well as the relationship between our countries. Look if there wasn’t a personal relationship I wouldn’t be inviting the man to have a hamburger - well done I might add.
Prime Minister:
I am very proud to be here today to celebrate our special relationship. In 1941 Winston Churchill met Franklin Roosevelt and inaugurated what is the modern phase of that special relationship and Churchill said at the time, same language, same hymns, he said, same ideals, same values, something big is happening. And what was big that happened was that never before has a relationship yielded so much, in the 1940s in the fight against fascism, in the Cold War that then followed where we worked together, in the fight against terrorism where as Tony Blair said we stand shoulder to shoulder with the American people and with President Bush, and I continue to stand shoulder to shoulder with him in rooting out terrorism wherever we find it in any part of the world which puts freedom, democracy and justice at risk. And what I think is fascinating is that over the next few months we will be developing that special relationship in new ways, a special relationship of peoples as well as of governments, more cooperation between our universities, more exchanges between young people in Britain and young people in America, more scientific cooperation, more cooperation in the fight against cancer where there are joint projects, the human genome project where we are working together, environmental action where the institutes in Britain and America are agreeing this week to have more cooperation, and right across the board as we take the English language, Britain and America, and make it a gift and an offer to the rest of the world and make it possible for millions of people in different parts of the world to learn the English language. So this is a special relationship, not just of governments, but of peoples, and I look forward to its enhancement at all levels in the years to come and I will work as hard as President Bush to make that relationship as strong and as enduring for the future.
You asked also about our economic policies. We have low inflation, therefore we have brought down interest rates, we have low debt, therefore we can afford to spend more, we have made a major tax reform and you ask about the 10p rate. Let’s not forget that this April the tax rate in Britain, the basic rate of tax is going down from 22p to 20p. We have virtually doubled child benefit for families over the last ten years and raised it again this year and we will raise it next year. We are raising the child tax credit, we have got a new winter allowance addition for pensioners so that they can meet their fuel bills. And every area where the 10p rate has affected people, whether it be low paid workers or pensioners or where there be families with children, we have acted to see that we can do the best by people in our country. Now of course a tax reform is a big thing but when you are reducing the basic rate from 22p to 20, the first time it has been achieved, the lowest basic tax rate for 75 years, it is an important thing to do it and I am satisfied that once people understand the scale of the good things that we have been able to do in reforming the tax system and making it better, and that we are tackling poverty, as they do in America, by introducing an increasing tax credit for the poorest people, then whatever questions people have about these changes can be answered. Yes they are important changes, they move the British economy forward. We have just seen this week that despite all the world difficulties we have the highest employment rates at any time in our history, we have lower unemployment than at any time for 30 years, we have more vacancies in the economy, and that combined with low inflation, a stable economy, lower interest rates as we have managed to achieve over the last few weeks, means that the British economy is well positioned to face the challenges of the future and will continue to be so. And my answer to people who say what is happening domestically is that we are taking the right long term decisions for the British economy, whether it is on nuclear power, or on housing, or on planning or infrastructure. And of course sometimes people ask questions about whether you are doing the right thing, but we will see these long term changes through and these are the right long term changes for Britain and for the British people.
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