Johnson, who travelled to the United States earlier this week to meet senior advisers to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, told parliament he had found a "huge fund of goodwill" for Britain.

"There was a huge fund of goodwill for the United Kingdom on Capitol Hill and a very large measure of understanding that now is the time to do a free trade deal," he said.

"They want to do it and they want to do it fast and that understanding was most vivid and most urgent on the part of the incoming administration."

(Reporting by William James, writing by Elizabeth Piper; editing by Stephen Addison)