Starmer to raise defence spending to 2.5%

To the Commons, where Sir Keir Starmer has just made a rather big announcement on the issue of defence. The Prime Minister took to the Chamber today to announce to parliamentarians that Labour will raise Britain’s defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027 – with a commitment to hit 3 per cent by 2034 if his party wins a second term. Golly!

It wasn’t all spending increases, however. The PM announced that the proposed 0.2 per cent rise for defence over the next two years would see a cut to foreign aid spending – from 0.5 per cent of GDP to 0.3 per cent. ‘It is not an announcement I am happy to make,’ he told politicians, ‘but security must come first’. His speech signals a victory for The Spectator’s Spaff project – which raised awareness of wasteful spending including, you guessed it, the foreign aid budget. Mr S wonders where exactly the PM got his inspiration for today’s decision from…