Sir Keir Starmer accused of 'dithering' over defence investment amid tax rise fears
The Defence Investment Plan was supposed to be published last autumn, however it has been repeatedly delayed.
Kemi Badenoch has accused the Government of “dithering” over continued delays to defence investment, demanding the Prime Minister reveal if he will raise taxes to fund it.
The Conservative leader was quizzing Sir Keir Starmer on the Defence Investment Plan (Dip) at Prime Minister’s Questions earlier today, which was supposed to be published last autumn.
Sir Keir has now promised the Dip will be published in a few weeks time, before the Nato summit in early July.
The Yorkshire Post understands that discussions are still taking place between No10 and government departments over where to find savings to fund defence.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves suggested on Tuesday that she would prefer the “pain of higher taxes” to fund the Dip, instead of more borrowing.
At PMQs, Mrs Badenoch said: “He can’t borrow more, because the markets have no confidence in him.
“He did not rule out raising taxes, so tax rises are coming.”
She told MPs: “The reason that he’s dithering is because he doesn’t know where the money is coming from”
“He has only three options: cutting spending, more borrowing, or higher taxes.
The Prime Minister highlighted that when the Tories came into power “defence spending was 2.5 per cent and they took it down to 2.3 per cent”.
He said his government will increase this as a proportion of gross domestic product (GDP) to 2.6 per cent in 2027, spending £270bn over this Parliament.
Mrs Badenoch suggested that Sir Keir could cut welfare to fund defence while avoiding raising taxes, but said he is “too weak” to do so.
She continued: “As the sun sets on his premiership, he is scrabbling around for a legacy, but isn’t it the case that the real legacy will be a bloated welfare state and a weaker armed forces?”
Following this, the Prime Minister failed to deny money for defence would be taken from the New Hospitals Programme (NHP), raised by Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey.
Both Airedale General Hospital in Keighley and the Leeds General Infirmary are part of the NHP, which was started under the Conservatives.
They were two of 40 “new” hospitals which Boris Johnson claimed would be completed before 2030, ahead of the 2019 election.
However, despite currently being at risk of collapse from reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (Raac), Airedale’s completion date has been set at 2033, while the LGI’s new wing won’t be finished until 2040.
Sir Ed said: “Surely in 21st century Britain, people can expect both a decent local hospital and armed forces that keep them safe. So, will the Prime Minister rule out any cuts to the NHS budget to fund defence?”
The Prime Minister responded: “We will also take the measures, as we have done, to invest in our public services, and forgive me, I was running a public service when the government that his party were part of was stripping them bare under austerity.”
The challenge comes as the University of Sheffield has been awarded a share of £3m in Government funding to offer 100 new student places on defence courses starting this September.
The funding is focused on engineering and computer science to boost national security, including areas such as cyber security, robotics and aerospace engineering.