Newsnight's Evan Davies ridicules Michael Gove over his 'weakest answer' on interview with Donald Trump

'Should the world just say "OK Mr Trump, you're a big man you can do what you want"' presenter asks

Evan Davies has ridiculed Michael Gove for giving his "weakest answer" he has given to a question about his interview with Donald Trump.

The Newsnight presenter criticised the Vote Leave campaigner for his response to a question on how the world should respond to the President-elect.

​"Should the world just say 'OK Mr Trump, you're a big man you can do what you want' or should the world frame a response to the person who breaks up the international trade system?" he asked.

"What should the world do?"

Mr Gove replied: "Take it one step back. Trump is making the first move in a negotiation. And one of the things about a negotiation, certainly with a deal maker like Trump, is that his starting position is not going to be the end position.

"So I think the first thing to do is to use the skills that we have in the foreign office and the political connections that we have in order to be able to ensure that we are in a position to shape and to frame American policy in a way that recognises Donald Trump's desire to boost jobs and growth in America without necessarily going down the path that would not be in all our intersts."

Mr Davies interrupted Mr Gove to say: "I've listened to a lot of your interviews today Michael. I think that is the weakest answer you have given.

"What do we do when this bloke [Mr Trump] does stuff that we really, in our Atlantic tradition, have come to not like? I mean, he called Nato obsolete."

Mr Gove then defended his answer, saying he was not Mr Trump's general secretary, adding "trade is not an area where I have a Regis professorship".

He also said: "But I do think when it comes to Nato... This is one of the interesting things about Trump, is that candidate Trump and President Trump occupy different positions."

He went on to reiterate Mr Trump's two concerns about Nato, which the President-elect said was "obsolete because it wasn't taking care of terror" and was marred by member organisations not paying their "fair share".

“I said a long time ago that Nato had problems," Mr Trump said in an interview with Mr Gove for The Sunday Times. "Number one it was obsolete, because it was designed many, many years ago. Number two the countries aren’t paying what they’re supposed to pay."

He added: "A lot of these countries aren’t paying what they’re supposed to be paying, which I think is very unfair to the United States. With that being said, Nato is very important to me."

During the Newsnight interview, Mr Gove also laughed off a suggestion he could be the next UK ambassador to America.