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Rishi Sunak is to increase UK defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2030 as he warns European allies that the continent is at a “turning point” in the face of the growing threats from Russia, Iran and China.
Speaking alongside NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, the UK prime minister said he planned to steadily increase defence spending by the end of the decade, rising to 2.4% a year until 2027/28 – then hitting 2.5% by 2030/31.
Funding will rise from £64.6bn in 2024 to £78.2bn in 2028, and then jump to £87bn in 2030/31.
The government said the commitment amounted to an additional £75bn in funding over the next six years and would see the UK remain “by far the second largest defence spender in NATO after the US”.
Labour’s Steve Reed told Sky News’ Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge that his party “would want to match” the pledge from the prime minister.
But he accused Mr Sunak of “belatedly seeing the defence of our country as important” after his performance in government on defence.
Politics latest: PM gives news conference after defence spending pledge
Making the announcement on a visit to Poland, Mr Sunak said the additional funding represented the “biggest strengthening of our national defence in a generation to meet the challenge of an increasingly dangerous world”.
He revealed a further £10bn would be spent over the next decade on munitions production and modernisation of the armed forces, and that at least 5% of the defence budget would be committed to research and development.
The prime minister said: “An axis of autocratic states like Russia, Iran and China are increasingly working together to undermine democracies and reshape the world order.
“They are also investing heavily in their own militaries and in cyber capabilities and in low-cost technology, like the Shahed attack drones Iran fired towards Israel last weekend.”
He added that this posed a “direct threat to the lives and livelihoods of people in the UK, as well as across Europe…
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