The country needs to be “woken up” to the threat of war, a former Nato secretary general has said, as he urged the next prime minister to look again at the level of spending on defence.
Lord Robertson told MPs that Britain’s Nato allies were “disturbed” by the delay to the UK government’s plan to invest in defence, which he described as “unconvincing”.
Last week, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer set out plans to increase military spending by £15bn over the next four years, following a bitter row over defence funding.
Sir Keir is expected to face pressure to ramp up defence spending sooner at a Nato summit attended by US President Donald Trump in Turkey this week.
The prime minister landed in the Turkish capital Ankara for the Nato summit on Tuesday.
Ahead of the summit Lord Robertson, the former Labour defence secretary who wrote a strategic review of defence for Sir Keir, gave his assessment of the UK’s plan to fund defence in front of a committee of MPs.
He said the delay of the defence investment plan (DIP) had “caused a degree of confusion inside the Ministry of Defence and considerable disturbance in the industry as well”.
Lord Robertson said the challenge of increasing military spending to levels that meet the threats facing the UK “is now bigger, more serious, and earlier than we had anticipated, and yet the defence investment plan itself doesn’t come up to it”.
He said a warning he made, in a speech in April, about the UK government showing “corrosive complacency” towards defence “applies to the whole political leadership”.
“There is a degree of complacency in the country as a whole, which I think is very very dangerous,” Lord Robertson said. “People need to be woken up.”
He added: “We need to alarm people because as the review said, we are under daily attack at the present moment and that will be ramped up.”
Sir Keir has said “there could be an attack by Russia on Nato as soon as 2030”.
The prime minister said the DIP would ensure the UK is “more ready to fight and defend our nation and better prepared to win”.
The plan prioritises spending on the UK’s nuclear deterrent and a transition towards greater use of drones and other unmanned systems in the armed forces.
Speaking to the Defence Committee on Tuesday, Lord Robertson said the UK “will have a force to fight with when the day comes”.
But he said it may take a “crisis” to raise sufficient funds to fight a war.
“In this country, we need to get used to the fact we are no longer immune and we are being targeted,” Lord Robertson said.
Sir Keir said the DIP would be built on by his successor, who is widely expected to be Makerfield MP Andy Burnham.
In an interview with LBC last week, Burnham said he would “take my responsibilities fully to fund the defence investment plan”.
He added: “If I’m in the position to do so, I will take those responsibilities extremely seriously – no compromise on the security of the nation.”
The extra £15bn in spending over the next four years is more than the £13.5bn secured by former Defence Secretary John Healey, who resigned in protest at the plans.
But the £15bn is less than the £28bn reportedly sought by defence chiefs.
The DIP will increase the military budget to 2.7% of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2029, and put the UK on track to meet Nato’s core defence spending target of 3.5% of GDP by 2035.
But a target date to reach 3% of GDP of defence spending was not in the DIP.
The DIP says the plan to hit the 3% target would be set out at the next spending review, which is currently scheduled to take place next year.
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When asked if Sir Keir’s successor should come up with a new plan to fund defence, Lord Robertson said: “Speaking as a politician, the new prime minister is going to have to look at the DIP again.”
He said the next prime minister will be “confronted by allies in Nato, especially by the American president” over the UK’s plan to hit the 3% spending target.
“So the assumption by Nato and the Americans is we’re going to have to plot our way towards that,” Lord Robertson said. “And that is where the DIP is unconvincing.”
The prime minister’s spokesperson said they would not speculate on the future of the DIP.
“I am not going to speak about the potential future prime minister, whoever that may be,” Sir Keir’s spokesperson told reporters.
“But the prime minister will make clear at the Nato summit that the UK’s contribution to Nato will not waiver.
“Alongside Nato allies, we remain committed to reaching 3.5% of GDP on defence spending by 2035.”
