Labour must concede ‘trade-offs’ to ‘keep country safe’ with defence spending boost, warns former Nato chief

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Speaking to Tonight with Andrew Marr, Lord Robertson said bolstered spending on defence is desperately needed amid a world of increasing threats.

He warned Britain is at risk of coming “under attack” from its adversaries including Russia and said MPs need to wake up to the fact some government departments will have to take a hit in order to protect the country.

“What I want to be sure [of] is that the members of the Parliamentary Labour Party, new MPs especially, recognise that it's going to involve trade-offs… There will be pain inevitably,” he told Andrew.

It comes after Britain committed to spending an extra 2.5% of GDP on defence by 2027/28. It will then boost its core defence spending to 3.5% of GDP by 2035 in line with its Nato commitments.

Lord Robertson said: “There will have to be trade-offs if the country is going to be safe, if we're going to discharge our obligations to the NATO commitment of an extra 3.5% of GDP on defence, and you're talking about multi billions of pounds, then it will have to come presumably from other departmental budgets."

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He added that people will have to be prepared for that and warned MPs “will have to put up with that if they want their constituents to be safe.”

The former Nato chief has previously warned the UK is underprepared for war due to a “corrosive complacency” from Sir Keir Starmer’s government and suggested defence is being jeopardised by the “ever-expanding welfare budget”.

Reiterating those concerns, he said: “We're definitely not safe, as I've said repeatedly, we are underprepared, we're underinsured, we're under attack, and we're therefore not safe.

"And you only have to look at what's happening in Ukraine today, you only have to listen to what Vladimir Putin says in public."

He warned Britain has a network of underseas cables, of which 99% of all the data that we use passes through, that must be kept safe as they are at risk of sabotage.

Lord Robertson added that 77% of all of the gas supplies the UK depends upon comes from a single pipeline from Norway, which also needs protecting.

He said: "All over Europe, we've got sabotage being organised from outside, cyber attacks, targeted assassinations, disinformation campaigns, election interference, all on a regular basis.

H“So we are under attack, and therefore we've got to be safe, and that means spending more money on defence of the nation.”

It comes as the Government comes under mourning pressure to fund the additional defence spending by slashing welfare.

Former Chief of the Defence Staff Lord Stirrup told LBC in April: “This government is the one which says, rightly, that the security of the nation and its people is their first priority. Well, it's all very well to say that, but you need to back that up with deeds, and so far they're not doing it.”

He later added: "For decades now we have funded ever-increasing social provision at the expense of defence. And I'm afraid there has to be some rowing back on that now.

"There'd be no good providing all the social services that people would like if we're not secure, if we're not safe."

The warning adds to a growing debate over whether Britain’s defence posture reflects its spending commitments, with critics increasingly questioning whether the armed forces are equipped for modern threats despite rising investment.

But an industry leader has warned that rising UK defence spending will count for little unless it results in equipment and systems that can actually be deployed at scale.

Writing for LBC Opinion, Rob Harper, founder and chief executive of Rowden, argued that the only meaningful measure of success is whether spending produces technology that can be fielded in sufficient numbers to make a difference on operations.

“The challenge is not intent, but execution,” he said, pointing to a persistent gap between strategic ambition and what is ultimately delivered.

Harper warned that structural issues within the defence system are holding back progress, with parts of the industrial base still geared towards outcomes that are “good enough” rather than genuinely effective.