Burnham should cut welfare to fund defence, Tories say as he faces friendly fire in first PMQs
Kemi Badenoch is set to commit her party to meeting targets asked for by Labour's Tan Dhesi during Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday
Andy Burnham has been urged by the Tories to cut welfare and scrap the Chagos deal to raise the funds needed to rearm Britain after the Prime Minister faced friendly fire over military spending in his first PMQs.
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Mr Burnham was challenged on the targets from both the opposition and his own benches at his first Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday.
Chair of the Defence Select Committee Tan Dhesi challenged the Prime Minister to hit the 2030 target, saying that "vibes are not enough" when it comes to Britain's defence.
The Prime Minister was also asked Tory leader Kemi Badenoch about how he would meet the target, as well as the UK’s long-term commitment to Nato to raise defence spending to 5% by 2035.
Mr Burnham said details of when the UK would meet its defence commitments would be left to Chancellor John Healey, who resigned from Sir Keir Starmer's cabinet over the controversial Defence Spending Plan.
In a sign he is confident of meeting the target, Mr Burnham insisted there was “no problem” with Labour’s commitment to defence.
Mrs Badenoch will set out how she would hike defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2030 in a speech on Thursday.
But the Tories have signalled Labour must provide more details, as Mrs Badenoch is expected to set out her plans to create room within the public finances to boost defence spending.
Some £4 billion could be saved by reforming housing benefit, and a further £3.1 billion through reimposing the two-child benefit cap, the Tories believe.
Mrs Badenoch’s overhaul would also save £1 billion by ending VAT exemptions for Motability cars, and scrap the Chagos deal to save £200 million a year, among other steps.
The Tories believe that these measures would fund an annual £10 billion increase in the defence budget, and would meet the 3% by 2030 target, something Mr Healey said was necessary to keep Britain safe in his resignation letter as defence secretary to Sir Keir Starmer.
Ahead of her speech on Thursday, opposition leader Mrs Badenoch said: “The first duty of every government is defence and the Conservatives will always put our defence first.
“That’s why we are setting out our plans to reach 3% on defence spending by the end of this Parliament through further cuts to welfare and restoring the two-child benefit cap.
“John Healey resigned from Keir Starmer’s Government saying Labour were not keeping our country safe. Now he is the Chancellor he should adopt our plans and make sure our armed forces have the funding they need.”