{"id":4314,"date":"2026-07-22T16:49:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T16:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/4314\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T16:49:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T16:49:07","slug":"uk-prime-minister-burnham-signals-higher-defence-spending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/4314\/","title":{"rendered":"UK Prime Minister Burnham signals higher defence spending"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andy Burnham<\/a>, the new UK Prime Minister, told the Farnborough International Airshow on Wednesday that his government would \u201creindustrialise the nation\u201d together with growing defence businesses. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe are going to honour our commitments on defence and use that investment to transform people’s lives,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd we are going to work even more closely with our allies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Expectations are high that the new government will spend more money on UK defence than under Mr Burnham’s predecessor Keir Starmer<\/a>, a Labour<\/a> expert on the sector has told The National.<\/p>\n

Paul Mason, who has previously shaped the party\u2019s defence industrial strategy, said that the extra billions needed to fund the UK armed forces<\/a> would have to be found, given that a key reason for Mr Starmer\u2019s downfall was his refusal to borrow.<\/p>\n

Defence Secretary Wes Streeting on Wednesday endorsed a new British-drone system, Brontanax, to augment the fighting capabilities of fighter jets. In a speech, he said it was the start of autonomous air warfare. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re investing \u00a3300 million in our Storm Fighter programme to develop an autonomous combat aircraft here in the UK,\u201d he told the air show in the south of England.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis launch shows the depth of industrial capability we have here in Britain to help deliver our ambition to become Europe\u2019s first sixth generation air force,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Investment returns<\/p>\n

Mr Mason said that investing borrowed money in arms factories<\/a> would create jobs and produce British-made goods that could be exported. His case has been echoed by defence industry leaders. <\/p>\n

Under its Nato commitment, the UK is set to increase defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP by 2035. Mr Burnham said that by 2030 there would be half a million defence or aerospace jobs in the UK. <\/p>\n

The deteriorating global security situation means that the new Prime Minister faces the same strategic challenges as his predecessor, alongside finding enough money for the Defence Investment Plan (DIP). <\/p>\n

Disagreement over that plan \u2013 Downing Street offered the Ministry of Defence \u00a313 billion rather than the \u00a318 billion the ministry said was needed \u2013 led to the resignation of the previous defence secretary John Healey in June, a move that proved terminal for Mr Starmer\u2019s premiership. Mr Healey is now Chancellor and well placed to deliver on the missing funds that triggered his walkout. <\/p>\n

Threatening times <\/p>\n

Mr Mason said last year’s Strategic Defence Review had already demonstrated that current spending plans were insufficient to deliver Britain\u2019s military ambitions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat review came back, and it said: look, it’s going to cost you 3 per cent by 2030 and you’re committed to 3.5 per cent of GDP by 2035, so get on with it. But the Treasury would not supply that money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Keeping defence spending at current levels would mean scaling back military ambitions, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cCurrent defence plans are not doable on the money, so if the money is fixed at \u00a313 billion, they will have to be ripped up,\u201d he said. \u201cFurthermore, the global security environment is deteriorating and the Atlantic alliance is fraying, so Andy [Burnham] will have to solve the exact same problems as his predecessor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Budget disputes<\/p>\n

Former chancellor Rachel Reeves\u2019s mistake, Mr Mason said, was insisting that any increase had to be funded by cuts elsewhere rather than through borrowing, in order to stick to fiscal rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conundrum was that the Treasury and the Starmer set-up had an effective rule that any money for defence had to come from somewhere else. They wouldn’t borrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

He insisted there was a clear economic distinction between borrowing to finance day-to-day spending and borrowing to expand Britain’s industrial base.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s no problem borrowing to invest in equipment that grows the economy. We are not against that, but for some reason the Treasury under Rachel Reeves became reticent to do so.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe economic advisers around Burnham know this full well, that borrowing to invest, even in a country that’s approaching \u00a33 trillion worth of debt, is not a problem as long as you invest in UK research and development, UK technology using UK skills and creating UK jobs.\u201d <\/p>\n

But if it was spent on \u201cforeign equipment\u201d it then became \u201cfiscally questionable\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ebbing influence<\/p>\n

Britain also faces the prospect of losing influence within Nato if it fails to keep pace with European allies\u2019 rearmament, Mr Mason said.<\/p>\n

\u201cGermany is for the first time spending more than Britain in absolute cash terms,\u201d he said, arguing that international defence companies would choose to invest in countries committed to higher levels of military spending.<\/p>\n

He added that modern defence investment, given the Ukraine war experience of cheap and plentiful drones, called into question spending on advanced technologies. \u201cIt involves moving away from big vulnerable platforms like warships towards more technologically enabled, cheaper kit that you can rapidly upgrade,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The argument that higher defence spending could also act as an economic stimulus has been echoed by defence manufacturers.<\/p>\n

Trade unions said predictable defence orders directly translated into apprenticeships and skilled industrial jobs. <\/p>\n

One senior MP, Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, has warned that without sustained domestic investment \u201csmall businesses are not able to survive, so the capacity will be less and that is likely to drive more production abroad\u201d.<\/p>\n

Burnham resilience<\/p>\n

Mr Burnham’s government will place greater emphasis on national resilience, Mr Mason said, drawing on the former Manchester mayor’s experience following the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing and the Covid-19 pandemic. He said Mr Burnham viewed resilience as extending beyond military capability to communities and the ability to withstand cyber attacks and sabotage.<\/p>\n

He said Mr Burnham had been \u201crock solid on Ukraine\u201d, pointing out he had helped to establish the Unbroken Cities partnership with Lviv after Russia’s full-scale invasion and said there would be \u201cno difference\u201d in Britain’s backing for Kyiv under his leadership.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andy Burnham, the new UK Prime Minister, told the Farnborough International Airshow on Wednesday that his government would…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4315,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[14,134,133,135,1166],"class_list":["post-4314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-defence-industry","tag-standard","tag-story","tag-uk-bureau","tag-uk-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/defence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}