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Britain hopes royal welcome will appeal to Trump

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Tariff rates for steel and aluminium still to be finalised

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Tech partnership and nuclear energy deal to be announced

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Despite differences, Starmer and Trump have good

relationship

By Andrew MacAskill

LONDON, Sept 15 (Reuters) - The United States and

Britain will announce agreements on technology and civil nuclear

energy during U.S. President Donald Trump's unprecedented second

state visit this week, as the UK hopes to finalise steel tariffs

under a much-vaunted trade deal.

Trump and his wife, Melania, will be treated to a display of

British royal pageantry during their visit on Wednesday,

including a carriage tour, a state banquet, a flypast by

military aircraft and a gun salute.

The British government hopes the soft power of the royals

will appeal to Trump as it seeks tighter defence, security and

energy ties with Washington, having already secured a favourable

tariff deal.

STARMER HOPES TO SEAL LOWER TARIFF RATES

Prime Minister Keir Starmer will host Trump at his Chequers

country residence on Thursday to discuss working more closely

together, on issues like Ukraine, and with the aim of finalising

promised lower tariffs for steel and aluminium.

A spokesperson for Starmer said the leaders would sign "a

world-leading tech partnership" and "a major civil nuclear deal"

during the trip.

"The UK-U.S. relationship is the strongest in the world,"

Starmer's spokesperson told reporters. "This week we are

delivering a step change in that relationship."

The British leader, a technocrat and a self-proclaimed

socialist, and Trump, a proudly unpredictable politician who has

pushed the Republican Party further to the right, have overcome

their differences to develop a good working relationship.

Starmer was the first world leader to agree an economic deal

with Trump on reducing his global tariffs.

Under that agreement, the United States said it planned to

reduce tariffs on imports of cars and aluminum and steel. While

details on car tariffs were agreed in June, the deal for steel

and aluminium is yet to be finalised.

"When it comes to steel, we will make sure that we have an

announcement as soon as possible," British business minister

Peter Kyle told the BBC on Sunday.

INVESTMENTS FLOW, MANDELSON SCANDAL

Before Trump's arrival, Britain on Saturday announced over

1.25 billion pounds ($1.69 billion) of U.S. investment from

PayPal, Bank of America and others, while Nvidia ( NVDA ) and OpenAI are

expected to announce investment deals as part of the technology

agreement, according to sources, who asked not to be named.

CoreWeave, a U.S. cloud computing provider, also said it

would announce investments in Britain this week.

A delegation of British officials will be in the United

States on Monday to finalise the details of Trump's visit,

Starmer's spokesperson said.

Those talks will be complicated by Starmer's decision last

week to fire Peter Mandelson, his ambassador to the United

States, over his ties with the late convicted U.S. sex offender

Jeffrey Epstein.

The sacking is deeply embarrassing for Starmer, who

appointed him to Britain's most desirable diplomatic post less

than a year ago.

This will be Trump's second visit to Britain in the last two

months after he spent time in Scotland at his golf courses at

the end of July.

During this week's visit, Starmer's spokesperson said there

would also be announcements on deepening cultural ties,

including promoting basketball in Britain and developing

partnerships between heritage and art institutions.

($1 = 0.7377 pounds)

(Reporting by Andrew MacAskill, additional reporting by Sarah

Young;

Editing by Ros Russell)