Andy Burnham has been accused of leaving “Britain’s security underfunded” as Labour weighs up a delay to a decision on when to boost defence spending.Ministers had been expected to set out a timetable for increasing defence spending to three per cent of GDP in spring, which would outline plans for all Government spending until the end of the decade.But the UK Government is now considering whether to delay the review until the autumn of next year.It is hoped pushing back a final decision to coincide with the next Budget will allow ministers to foot the bill for the increase through raising taxes or slashing spending.Reaching the Nato defence spending target of three per cent is expected to cost roughly £10billion per year, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.One Whitehall source told The Times the “working assumption” among civil servants is that the review will not place until October.A Government insider also stressed to the newspaper that a formal date for the review had not been set, so it would unfair to label it a delay. The Conservatives will unveil plans to build a £10billion “Iron Dome” missile defence system to protect Britain at the party conference in Birmingham today.Andy Burnham is now considering whether to delay the defence spending review until the autumn of next year | PAAnnouncing plans for the “Britannia Shield”, Kemi Badenoch said the move proves her party are taking Britain’s security seriously, while the Prime Minister would still “not commit the money Britain needs for defence”.Speaking to GB News earlier today, the Tory leader said it was “completely crazy” that ministers were planning to “kick this into the long grass for another year” after the US withdrew all of its bombers from RAF Fairford.She told the People’s Channel: “The Defence Secretary resigned from Keir Starmer’s Government. He’s the Chancellor now. He needs to find the money. And I’m not having it from Labour about what we did in Government, they were asking us to spend less on defence.”Jeremy Corbyn wanted us to disarm more nuclear missiles, he was saying we should leave Nato. So the idea that things would have been better under under them is for the birds.
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Kemi Badenoch told GB News it was ‘completely crazy’ that ministers were planning to ‘kick this into the long grass for another year’ | GB NEWS”We’re in a different era now. Back in those days, Russia was in the G8. We were having a golden age with China. We spent the peace dividend.”We thought we were in an era of peace. We’re not in an era of peace anymore.”Chancellor John Healey is expected to cap his defence spending commitments in a bid to scrape together funding for the Government’s defence investment plan (Dip), expected to cost around £4.7billion. The limitations mean that the Chancellor must either unveil another Budget in the spring or delay the spending review until autumn. Chancellor John Healey is expected to cap his defence spending commitments to help fund the Dip | PAInstitute for Fiscal Studies director Helen Miller said pushing the review back could give ministers more time to craft plans, but warned it would not “make the exercise any easier”.She told The Times: “Under current plans, growth in overall spending slows over the rest of the parliament and sticking to those plans would almost certainly mean that the spending review entails cuts for some departments.“If defence spending was increased to three per cent of GDP it would take up all of the currently planned increase in spending in coming years.”A Treasury spokesman said: “The date of the spending review has not been set. This is pure rumour and speculation.”