Daily Telegraph quoted unnamed US source as warning ‘no free trade without free speech’

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The business secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, has denied that the issue of free speech has directly featured in tariff negotiations with the US following reports a deal could be jeopardised by the outcome of a criminal case held at a magistrates court in Dorset.

The Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, & Labour (DRL), an office within the US Department of State, has met anti-abortion campaigner Livia Tossici-Bolt, who has been prosecuted for an alleged breach of a buffer zone outside a Bournemouth abortion clinic. Following a trial in Poole, the verdict is due on Friday.