Defence Secretary John Healey has warned that the UK faces a 28 billion pound gap over four years between the requirements of the defence review and the amount of money the Treasury is prepared to provide. Speaking on Sky News, Healey said the nation must make hard choices about how to close this gap, suggesting that welfare spending, which accounts for more than 300 billion pounds annually compared to 67 billion for defence, may need to be trimmed.
"It is not a question of affordability," Healey stated. "The UK spends 1.3 trillion pounds a year on public services. Defence is about 67 billion of that. We spend more than 100 billion on debt interest and way more than 300 billion on welfare. The question is whether we can make very hard choices to move our money about before something terrible happens."
Healey emphasized that if the UK fails to properly fund deterrence, the consequences would be far worse than any cuts to welfare. "There is no point worrying about our welfare if the cities are in ashes because we failed to deter," he said. He estimated that the cost of actually fighting a war would consume around 50% of GDP, plus devastating costs in death, destruction and trauma spanning three generations.
The defence investment plan has been long delayed, originally expected in September. Reports suggest that the Treasury may find approximately 18 billion pounds over four years, which would significantly close the gap but still leave difficult choices about delaying or cutting certain defence capabilities. Healey urged the government to act decisively, noting that governments have faced similar choices for 2,000 years when confronting existential threats to national security.