Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[HVC]

They gonna call it "Your Other Party"?

[Norgy]

This sounds son incredibly healthy for the state of Britain's class society.

[Sheilbh]

This sounds son incredibly healthy for the state of Britain's class society.

Incredible and incredibly depressing detail that the strongest indicator of whether someone voted Labour in 2024 is if they went to private school

It makes sense as university education is a key divide, and while 40-50% of kids go to university I suspect that 95% of kids who went to private school do. But still...

[Sheilbh]

Significant intervention from Lord Robertson who was a New Laour Defence Secretary and was then appointed NATO Secretary-General in 1999 (he was there when 9/11 happened).

I've been complaining on here that the government's stated plans are to get from 2.5% of GDP on defence to 3.5% of GDP by the mid 2030s (end of the next parliament), most of those rises to happen in the next parliament (i.e. in Treasury thinking after Trump and in political thinking the next government's problem). Pained to discover in this article that the goal is actually to get to 3%

Starmer accused of 'corrosive complacency' on UK defence by former Nato chief
Lord George Robertson, author of British military review, says premier is not willing to make the necessary investment
Lucy Fisher in London

Publishedyesterday

Britain's leaders have shown a "corrosive complacency" towards defence, putting the country "in peril" while it is "under attack", a key government adviser has warned, in a stinging rebuke of Sir Keir Starmer's military policy.

Lord George Robertson, former Nato secretary-general and author of the government's strategic defence review (SDR), told the FT that there was a gap between the prime minister's rhetoric and action on defence — saying Starmer was "not willing to make the necessary investment".

The former Labour defence secretary will use a lecture in Salisbury on Tuesday to warn that the Iran war "has to be a rude wake-up call".

He will accuse "non-military experts in the Treasury" of "vandalism", adding: "We cannot defend Britain with an ever-expanding welfare budget."

It is a significant intervention by Robertson, who had kept his counsel and tried to work constructively behind the scenes until now, but has run out of patience with the government's failure to grip the problem.

In the speech, he will say: "We are underprepared. We are underinsured. We are under attack. We are not safe . . . Britain's national security and safety is in peril."

The government promised to spell out its proposals to fund the ambitions set out in the SDR, which reported last June, with a 10-year defence investment plan (DIP). However, this funding blueprint, initially due last autumn, has been repeatedly postponed. Industry and allies have sounded the alarm over the delay.

The Ministry of Defence, Treasury and Downing Street have been in deadlock about how to proceed, according to people familiar with the matter.

There is a funding gap of around £28bn over the next four years in the UK military's existing plans, according to officials, even before the ambitions of the SDR are taken into account.

The Treasury has been adamant that it will not ease its fiscal rules, which renders any further borrowing for defence difficult. There is also widespread reluctance across government for further tax rises.

By highlighting the swelling welfare budget, Robertson signalled that spending cuts in other departments may be required to boost defence funding.

He will highlight that chancellor Rachel Reeves "used a mere 40 words on defence in over an hour" in her Budget speech last year, while last month "in the Spring Statement she used none".

In his speech, he will say: "There is a corrosive complacency today in Britain's political leadership. Lip service is paid to the risks, the threats, the bright red signals of danger — but even a promised national conversation about defence can't be started."

Robertson will cite the UK's inability to deploy more than one Royal Navy warship to the Mediterranean within the first fortnight of the Iran war this spring as an example of the "parlous state" of its current defences.

He will warn that the country faces not just shortages of military kit, but "crises in logistics, engineering, cyber, ammunition, training and medical resources".

His intervention comes after UK defence secretary John Healey last week exposed a covert Russian submarine operation loitering near undersea cables in and around UK waters, framing it as only the latest "hybrid warfare activities" that Moscow is conducting against Britain and its allies.

On Monday the Kremlin confirmed that a Russian warship escorted oil tankers through the English Channel last week. Robertson told the FT that "there's a hybrid war being declared on us already, and it could change at any moment" to direct military confrontation.

Referring to Donald Trump's criticism of Nato, the former alliance chief will say: "Recent days have shown that the role and priorities of the United States have shifted, and will never be the same again."

He will warn against gloating from opposition parties, describing political point-scoring as "a dangerous luxury". He will also reveal that "depressingly" the leaders of the Liberal Democrats and Reform UK have not taken him up on his offer of a briefing about what the SDR says and means.

A spokesperson for Nigel Farage said his team was unaware of any offer of a briefing. Sir Ed Davey's spokesperson was approached for comment.

A defence official pointed out that the government has set a target to spend 3 per cent of GDP on defence by the end of the next parliament, rising to the Nato-wide goal of spending 5 per cent of GDP on national security by 2035.

A government spokesperson said: "We are delivering on the Strategic Defence Review to meet the threats we face.

"It is backed by the largest sustained increase in defence spending since the cold war, with a total of over £270bn being invested across this parliament."

The government is finalising the DIP and will publish it as soon as possible, the spokesperson added.

In addition to the DIP the government also committed to passing defence readiness legislation, which was one of the recommendations in the SDR. This is similar to legislation passed in other European countries recently and is basically emergency powers for government in the event of conflict - particularly around industry. The government had committed to introducing the legislation in early 2026. They have since confirmed it is not ready and are now aiming to bring it forward in 2027

And Sky News today has reported that senior MoD officials are literally meeting this week to find an additional £3.5 billion spending cuts this year to meet Treasury requirements.

I'd add on the point about Russia and under-sea cables I think that's the second time in recent months were John Healey (who I generally quite like) has done a speech basically saying to Russia/Putin "we know what you're doing. We see you." I suspect because as Defence Secretary he is hamstrung that we are not able to do anything so seeing is about the limits of our capabilities right now.

[Valmy]

Complacency and business as usual might as well be Labour's official slogan. And the Democrats for that matter.

[Valmy]

Your Party continues to astound as a parody of left wing politics.

Having decided to go for a collective leadership, all twelve members of Your Party Scotland's collective leadership have resigned and are going to found their own party

Really rising to the demands of the moment. Is anybody in Western politics serious about anything?

[Sheilbh]

Really rising to the demands of the moment. Is anybody in Western politics serious about anything?

The Greens have done well - as have Reform.

But yeah I think there was space for one party further to the left of Labour and the Greens took their chance. And Your Party lived down to everyone's lowest expectations of a new left-wing party

[crazy canuck]

Your Party continues to astound as a parody of left wing politics.

Having decided to go for a collective leadership, all twelve members of Your Party Scotland's collective leadership have resigned and are going to found their own party

Really rising to the demands of the moment. Is anybody in Western politics serious about anything?

Yes.  Just because American and UK politicians are generally not serious people does not mean the whole of Western politics suffers from the same defect.

[Sheilbh]

Complacency and business as usual might as well be Labour's official slogan. And the Democrats for that matter.

The more it goes on I genuinely sort of think that Starmer understands the job of being PM as being being the administrator of a large organisation. Anything political such as making choice, trade-offs, putting an argument to the people seem to be things he just doesn't think is in his purview.

An example - apparently he was told about the £28 billion funding gap in current defence spending and put his head in his hand and moaned that he thought this had been fully costed by officials.

I think he is in almost every respect pretty uniquely unsuited to the moment - and I think he may well end up, like Gordon Brown (uniquely suited to the moment, catastrophically unsuited to the role), staying as leader even though everyone can see the crash slowly approaching. On the upside mre positively it sounds like Burnham has put together a proper leadership team and strategy and there is support consolidating around him as a better bet than Rayner or Streeting (which he is). He also expects a seat to become available (one Manchester Labour MP is currently under pressure over ties to a child sexual abuse offender and there's a possible Liverpool seat that could become available too).

[Tonitrus]

Complacency and business as usual might as well be Labour's official slogan. And the Democrats for that matter.

The more it goes on I genuinely sort of think that Starmer understands the job of being PM as being being the administrator of a large organisation. Anything political such as making choice, trade-offs, putting an argument to the people seem to be things he just doesn't think is in his purview.

Who's purview would it be then?  The King? 

[garbon]

7 May can't come soon enough.

[Sheilbh]

7 May can't come soon enough.

On class politics I went for a walk in my area at the weekend. Went up Telegraph Hill, which is lovely area. Decent farmer's market, lovely community cafe by the park, great views over London, beautiful terraced houses where a one bed flat is at least £500k and no house is under £1 million.

And saw my first Labour election poster in people's windows. Saw about 4-5 of them

[Sheilbh]

Who's purview would it be then?  The King? 

Fair. From everything I've read, he outsources his judgement. He was Corbynism without Corbyn. Then he needed to win an election and reached out to the Labour right. Then he discovered government is difficult so he packed Number 10 with ex-Blair staffers. Now he's ditched them for a variety of reasons/scandals and because a lot of the parliamentary Labour Party don't really like what they were doing, so he's now tilting soft left.

As I say I think on his view of the job he's doing what he should. He is conscientious, reads all his briefing notes, asks for extra details, works very hard - but he doesn't have a politics. So he gets other people to do foreign policy, political strategy, economic policy etc.

There's a bit with Starmer of there not being any there there. And in a really weird way I think it's authentically him. It makes him very very normal but in an age of authenticity it comes across as incredibly insincere. I think he genuinely dislikes politics on the sort of craft of it side (many accounts of how much he dislikes actual politics). By all accounts his major interest is basically football (Arsenal) - he likes playing five a side and going to the game. In conversation he asks people about football and their families.

But it leads to weirdness like him doing a softball interview and he says he doesn't have a favourite book, or poem and doesn't dream. He also says he doesn't think about the history of his office or about his predecessors and doesn't have a "favourite" former Labour leader. All of those things probably make him like 90% of the general public - but are really weird in someone at the top of politics. I always thought this stuff was because he'd been media trained too much and so just said nothing for fear of offending someone by accident. I now think it might just be who he is - he's not that interested in history, or books or ideas. He just does his paperwork and then likes to see his mates at football and spending time with his family

[Tonitrus]

Sounds like he needs someone wearing a giant Farage mask to shake him around violently.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Your Party continues to astound as a parody of left wing politics.

Having decided to go for a collective leadership, all twelve members of Your Party Scotland's collective leadership have resigned and are going to found their own party

Really rising to the demands of the moment. Is anybody in Western politics serious about anything?

Nope, generally not. It's theatre more often than not with what seems the express purpose of not even shuffling the  chairs on the deck anymore.