"We cannot guarantee social security without national security": the UK government aims to lift defence spending to 3 % of GDP but remains unclear on the budget cuts it will impose

In June, he slammed the door of the government. Here he is back to provide his country with a budget. Four months ago, John Healey resigned as British Defense Minister due to disagreements with the then Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, over the budget allocated to the country's armies.

Since then, Keir Starmer has left and Andy Burnham took over as head of government and put John Healey in charge of finance. The latter presented his first budget this Wednesday, but inflation (3.5% in September) and public borrowing costs, which have reached levels not seen in decades, offer him reduced room for maneuver. Anxious to reassure the markets, the now Minister of Finance John Healey affirmed that “budgetary discipline” constituted his “first commitment”.

But he still promised to increase defense spending to 3% of GDP in 2030 and to 3.5% by 2035. A share which corresponds to the commitments of NATO member countries. Private sector and international allies According to estimates from the Office for Budget Responsibility (public body responsible for budget forecasts), to achieve this target of 3% by the end of the decade, an additional budgetary effort of £17.3 billion for the financial year 2029-2030 is necessary.

And to reach the 3.5% mark in 2035, the estimate is £35 billion. To achieve this, John Healey asked each ministry to reduce its spending by 1%. He also wants to launch a "thorough review of public spending" and warned that further budget cuts will be necessary to achieve this objective, without specifying which ones.

“There will be difficult decisions,” he simply told Bloomberg. The minister also opened the way "to more innovative financing, in collaboration with the private sector and our international allies", such as Finland, Poland and the Netherlands. With these countries, John Healey wishes to establish “multilateral defense mechanisms”.

“New investments in defense, now and over the coming years, are fully funded,” John Healey told Sky News. “Certain key decisions unfortunately postponed” Although he assures that the objective of 3% of GDP for defense in 2030 is transpartisan, John Healey is far from having convinced the deputies. The latter criticize John Healey for reproducing the budget with which he disagreed in June and for which he had resigned.

The government is also accused of being too vague on how to increase defense budgets. The Minister of Finance promised this Wednesday in the House of Commons to "detail" the measures "during the expenditure review next year". Some key decisions on defense spending have unfortunately been postponed until the next spending review.

Machine-translated from French