Keir Starmer has never been one for half-measures when it comes to optics, and his latest defence announcement is no different. Extra spending, firm language, a photo op or two. But beneath the confident messaging lies a financial knot that whoever sits in Number 10 after him will have to spend years unpicking.
The headline figure is £4.7 billion. That’s the shortfall projected to remain in the defence budget even after Starmer’s pledged increases are factored in, according to analysis of current commitments against NATO’s 2.5% of GDP target. It’s not small change, and it doesn’t go away quietly.
The core problem is timing. Starmer’s plan front-loads the political credit while back-loading the actual cost. The spending ramps up gradually over several years, meaning the bulk of the heavy lifting lands somewhere around 2028 and beyond, conveniently after the next general election would be due.
The government insists the trajectory is credible and fully costed. Critics from both left and right are considerably less convinced.
Conservative defence spokespeople have pointed out that the Ministry of Defence is already managing a procurement programme widely described as “unaffordable” by the National Audit Office. Adding ambition without fixing the underlying budget discipline, they argue, simply makes the problem bigger.
Then there’s the question of what “defence spending” actually means in practice. Some of the increase Starmer is counting involves creative accounting, folding in items like military pensions and intelligence service costs that weren’t traditionally part of the defence budget. Strip those out and the uplift looks considerably thinner.
It’s worth remembering, too, that this is happening against a backdrop of pressure on public services across the board. Every pound committed to defence is a pound the Treasury can’t spend on the NHS, housing, or the creaking welfare system. The trade-offs are brutal and getting more so.
Nobody seriously disputes that the UK needs to spend more on defence. The world in 2025 is a genuinely more dangerous place than it was a decade ago. The argument is about honesty, about whether this plan actually delivers or simply defers.
The next Prime Minister, whoever they are and from whichever party, will inherit these commitments. Whether they also inherit the money to meet them is a rather different question.
