Voters need ministers to chop international support, not defence spending
Voters want ministers to cut foreign aid, not defence, in next month’s Budget.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves has warned all departments they will have to contribute savings as she seeks £15billion in cuts at next month’s Budget.
The Ministry of Defence has been warned it will not be spared the knife, despite the menacing global situation and Sir Keir Starmer‘s stated ‘ambition’ to boost military spending in the long term.
A Survation survey for the Daily Mail today suggests that the public would support cuts to Britain’s £15.4billion-a-year foreign aid Budget.
The survey found that people back a reduction in aid by a margin of 55 per cent to 19 per cent.
The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has warned departments they will need to contribute to savings as she seeks £15billion in cuts in next month’s Budget
The poll findings come as Foreign Secretary David Lammy has pushed back against cutting the foreign aid budget, saying squeezing it further would diminish the UK’s influence abroad
But cuts to defence are opposed by a margin of 43 per cent to 27 per cent.
The aid budget was cut from 0.7 per cent of GDP to 0.5 per cent to help pay for massive spending during the pandemic.
It has been squeezed further by a decision to use aid money to help cover the cost of housing asylum seekers in the UK.
The poll findings come as Foreign Secretary David Lammy launches a rearguard action within government to protect the aid budget.
Mr Lammy has warned fellow ministers that squeezing the aid budget further would diminish the UK’s influence abroad.
He is pushing Rachel Reeves to sign off billions more to cover the cost of housing asylum seekers, which ate up £4.3billion of aid spending last year.
Jeremy Hunt and Rishi Sunak signed off an extra £2.5billion over two years to ease the pressure on the aid budget.
However, that funding will run out at the end of the year, meaning that Mr Lammy is likely to have to cut aid projects further unless the Chancellor provides more cash.
In a speech this week, Mr Lammy said Labour wanted to return aid spending to 0.7 per cent of GDP – a move which would cost an extra £6billion a year – but admitted it would take time.
