UK defence spending to rise to 2.5% of GDP by 2027 with aid budget slashed to help fund move – UK politics live
Starmer says defence spending will rise to 2.5% of GDP from 2027 – or 2.6% if intelligence agencies included
Starmer says his fourth point is “we must change our national security posture”.
That will involve difficult choices, he says.
He says the govenrment will begin the biggest sustained increase in defence spending since the end of the cold war.
The govenrment will get defence spending up to 2.5% of GDP by 2027. That is earlier than expected.
And it will mean spending an extra £13.4bn on defence every year from 2027.
Taking into account spending on intelligence and the security services, defence spending will be at 2.6% of GDP from 2027.
And he says he has a “clear ambition” to get it to 3% in the next parliament.
Key events
Starmer is responding to Badenoch.
He thanks her for her support in relation to today’s anouncement, and for her support over Ukraine.
He says he hopes the Commons retains its unity in relation to Ukraine.
On intelligence and the security agencies, Starmer says there was new money for them in the budget.
He says he mentioned them in his statement because, given the threat has changed, those agencies now play an important role in defence.
Referring to Badenoch’s claim that the Tories had a plan to raise defence spending to 2.5% of GDP, he says the Institute for Government thinktank said the numbers in the plan did not add up and the Institute for Fiscal Studies thinktank said the plan was misleading and opaque.
Kemi Badenoch is responding now. She thanks Starmer for the partial copy of the statement she got in advance. And she says, having heard the bits that were redacted (the figures for defence spending going up, and aid spending being cut), she welcomes that.
She says all Tories will welcome the announcement.
Referring to the figures quoted by Starmer on intelligence spending, she asks if there will be new money for them.
She points out that she called for aid spending to be cut at the weekend.
And she urges him to adopt her other proposal for welfare spending to be cut to free up more money for defence spending.
There is some jeering at this point. Starmer was resolutely non-partisan in his statement, and some MPs think that she should be responding in kind, with a consensual tone, instead of going into party politics.
But Badenoch is not being put off. She goes on to attack the governmen over the Chagos Islands policy.
Starmer says aid spending being cut from 0.5% of GDP to 0.3% in 2027 to fund increase in defence budget
Starmer says the government will fund this by cutting aid spending from 0.5% of GDP to 0.3% from 2027.
He goes on:
I want to be clear to the house that is not an announcement I am happy to make. I am proud of our record on overseas development, and we will continue to play a key humanitarian role in Sudan, in Ukraine and in Gaza, tackling climate change, supporting multi-national efforts on global health and challenges like vaccination.
He says some aid spending has gone on hotels for asylum seekers, and as the asylum backlog is cleared, there is money that can be saved there.
But nonetheless, it remains a cut, and I will not pretend otherwise. We will do everything we can to return to a world where that is not the case and rebuild a capability on development.
But at times like this, the defence and security of the British people must always come first.
Starmer says defence spending will rise to 2.5% of GDP from 2027 – or 2.6% if intelligence agencies included
Starmer says his fourth point is “we must change our national security posture”.
That will involve difficult choices, he says.
He says the govenrment will begin the biggest sustained increase in defence spending since the end of the cold war.
The govenrment will get defence spending up to 2.5% of GDP by 2027. That is earlier than expected.
And it will mean spending an extra £13.4bn on defence every year from 2027.
Taking into account spending on intelligence and the security services, defence spending will be at 2.6% of GDP from 2027.
And he says he has a “clear ambition” to get it to 3% in the next parliament.
Starmer says the third element of his policy is a commitment to peace.
But that involves deterrence.
Using a Trump slogan, he goes on:
I know that this house will endorse the principle of winning peace through strength.
Starmer says it is essential to stand by Ukraine.
As the nature of the conflict changes, the UK’s response comes into “sharper focus”.
He says he will spell out how defence policy is being renewed.
First, the UK remains committed to Nato.
Putin thought he would weaken Nato. He has achieved the exact opposite.
Second, the UK will reject any “false choice” between the US and Europe, he says.
In the past, we fought wars together with the closest partners in trade, growth and security. So this week when I meet President Trump, I will be clear. I want this relationship to go from strength to strength.
Starmer says he is going to Washington this week.
He says he is proud to be a Nato supporter.
On my first week as prime minister, I travelled to the Nato summit in Washington with a simple message that Nato and our allies could trust this government would fulfill Britain and indeed, the Labour party’s historic role to put our collective security first.
He recalls the fall of the Berlin wall.
It felt as if we were casting off the shackles of history, a continent united by freedom and democracy.
If you had told me then that in my lifetime, we would see Russian tanks rolling into European cities again, I would not have believed you.
Yet here we are, in a world where everything has changed, because three years ago. That is exactly what happened.
He says the Conservative party was robust in its response to the invastion of Ukraine when it was in government. He supported them at the time, he says, and applauds them for that now.
Starmer makes statement to MPs about defence and security
Keir Starmer is about to make his statement now.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the speaker, says the advance copy of the statement given to the opposition had some parts redacated.
He says he is very unhappy about claims that this was given to the media.
Starmer says he can absolutely assure the speaker that this was not “given” to the media. He apologise to Kemi Badenoch and he says he will hold a leak inquiry
Badenoch calls for aid budget to be cut to fund MoD, saying raising defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2030 ‘no longer sufficient’
If Keir Starmer does announce cuts to aid spending to pay for a higher defence budget, Kemi Badenoch will be able to claim that he has lifted one of her ideas.
At the weekend she proposed this in an open letter to Starmer. And this morning she repeated the proposal in her speech, where she said:
2.5 per cent by 2030 is now no longer sufficient.
We must rebuild and go further and faster …
I will back the prime minister in taking difficult decisions to increase defence spending. For example, he should consider whether some of the 0.5 per cent currently spent on development aid should be repurposed – at least in the short term – towards defence and security.
Minister refuses to deny claim government about to cut aid budget to fund increased defence spending
In the Commons Foreign Office ministers are taking questions, ahead of Keir Starmer’s statement at 12.30pm. Chris Law (SNP) asked about rumours that the government is going to cut aid spending from 0.5% of GDP to 0.2% to fund increased defence spending.
Anneliese Dodds, the development minister, was responding. She did not confirm or deny that aid spending would be cut, and just made a general point about the value of aid.
Exposed: Labour peer’s involvement in apparent cash-for-access venture
The Guardian is publishing the results of an extensive inquiry into the business interests of members of the House of Lords. Today Henry Dyer and Rob Evans have a story about how a Labour peer, Lord David Evans of Watford, offered access to ministers during discussions about a commercial deal worth tens of thousands of pounds, an undercover investigation revealed.
(This is not the David Evans who was general secretary of the Labour party until last autumn. He is also a Labour peer, but he is Lord Evans of Sealand.)
Here is the news story.
And here is a profile of Evans.
