Politics is a matter of timing – and Keir Starmer perfected today. Barely two hours after Kemi Badenoch’s big foreign affairs speech, the Prime Minister has stolen the headlines off her in a textbook example of the difference between fruitless opposition and the possibilities of government. While the Tory leader could only muse on the need for higher defence spending post-2030, Starmer just went ahead and announced he wants 3 per cent spending of GDP in the next parliament.
Under Starmer’s plans, current expenditure will rise from 2.3 per cent to 2.5 per cent by 2027. The additional £13.4 billion a year, he claimed in the Commons, will come in large part from reducing the aid budget from 0.5 per cent to 0.3 per cent in 2027. Back of the fag packet sums suggest that this move would generate £5.3 billion for defence, meaning a further £8.04 billion remains to be found elsewhere. Starmer’s announcement comes ahead of his trip to Washington on Thursday and is clearly intended to show the Americans that Britain means business.
Today’s announcement was a brutal exercise in power. There is a sizeable Labour caucus on the backbenches who have spent time working in the charitable or international aid sector. Their fears about cuts to development have been brutally brushed aside. David Lammy has talked about ‘progressive realists’ – today’s announcement is intended to show that Labour believes in the noun, even at the expense of the adjective. The speed with which Labour intends to move on defence will take both critics and supporters of the government by surprise. It means Starmer can hope to arrive in America with a credible offer to the Donald – and a recognition of the fact that the European defence posture has changed irrevocably after 20 January.
Coincidentally, the reallocation of the aid budget comes on the same day that Amanda Pritchard left the NHS: both positions advocated by Robert Jenrick in his leadership bid last summer. It was reported that those close to Starmer believed the Tory candidate had the analysis most likely to cause problems for Labour: that governments were unable to deliver necessary systemic reforms owing to bureaucratic and legal obstacles. Funding defence by cutting aid shows an appreciation of the facts of political life – even if that means confronting a few liberal shibboleths.
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