Ministry of Defence

Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

It is an honour and a privilege to open this debate as Chair of the Defence Committee, and as a Member of this House who believes profoundly that the first duty of any Government, and indeed of any Parliament, is the safety and security of our nation and our people. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for agreeing to allocate time for this important debate.

I will begin with a simple but unavoidable truth: the world is rearming at pace, and the United Kingdom is not keeping up. We must confront the reality together that national defence requires long-term thinking, stable investment and, as far as possible, cross-party working. Our adversaries do not operate on the basis of electoral cycles, and neither can we. While unity on principles is important, it must never prevent this House from holding any Government to account where delivery falls short.

First, let me turn to the threat picture. Russia is operating a war economy, supported by China. The Defence Committee has heard that 60% of the Russian war effort in Ukraine is being bankrolled by China. Russia may not be winning the war, but it is also not losing—it is slowly gaining territory, and there is no sign that it is genuinely interested in peace. Russia now has experience of attritional combat; it is delivering new technology to the battlefield in weeks, not years; its economy is geared to warfighting; and many think that its next step will be to extend operations, not halt them.

[Jim McMahon (Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank the Chair of the Select Committee for the work he has been doing on Ukraine. A number of us were in Ukraine last week as part of a cross-party delegation, and the thing that really stood out for me—aside from the horrendous circumstances that people there face on a daily basis, and the injuries and death toll on the frontline—was that the UK and our allies are doing enough to hold off Russian aggression, but nowhere near enough to support Ukraine to win the peace. I would welcome my hon. Friend’s reflections on what the UK needs to do more of to ensure that Ukraine can win.

[Mr Dhesi]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. It is very important that we stand in steadfast support of our Ukrainian friends, and his point is similar to the conclusions that our Defence Committee drew after our recent visit to Ukraine. It is important that the Government continue with their support for Ukraine, and we must do so in collaboration with our European allies to ensure that the Ukrainians win that fight. I am sure that the Government have heard that message loud and clear from across the Chamber.

As my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces has said, we may have as little as three years before we will have no option but to fight a significant confrontation with a major state. Russia is already operating in the grey zone against the UK and our allies, notably in sabotage and cyber-operations against the infrastructure that supports our prosperity. That summarises the threat, both to the east and to the north, because the High North is the focus of the Defence Committee’s latest inquiry. That is another front for both Russia and China, as melting polar ice caps open up new strategic frontiers.

Meanwhile, the middle east is in turmoil, and to the west our once dependable ally, the United States, is withdrawing from its historic role as the protector of democracy in Europe. We have grown to rely—in fact, over-rely—on the US militarily, and the dependencies are many and deep. But it is increasingly unclear how far that is sustainable or how much our interests align. We need to make sure that while we solidify our relationship with the US, we are not in a state of over-reliance.

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

Does the Chair of the Defence Committee share my concern that our continued reduction in numbers in the armed forces potentially undermines our ability to maintain our NATO commitments? Does he also share my concern about the huge numbers of people interested in joining the armed forces and the significant time lag in their ability to join, which is leading to many of them pulling out?

[Mr Dhesi]

I thank the hon. Lady for that excellent point. The Defence Committee has raised those concerns—the relationship between force size and expanding commitments—and we are pressing the Government to explain clearly how personnel levels align with strategic ambitions.

I want to move on from the context in which we must judge our defence posture and spending. The United Kingdom remains, by any measure, one of the largest contributors in NATO. We should rightly be proud of that. Historically, we have always achieved the alliance’s core benchmark of spending at least 2% of GDP on defence, but that benchmark no longer meets the threat. Pride must not blind us to reality: 2%, or even 2.5%, is no longer enough. The Prime Minister said last month, and has reiterated, that Britain needs to go faster on defence spending. I agree, and cold, hard reality dictates that we must. Going faster means just that—we do not have the luxury of time. If we need to be ready for a significant confrontation with a peer adversary in as little as three years, we cannot wait until the end of this Parliament to begin moving towards just 3% of GDP. We need a profiled increase.

[Lauren Edwards (Rochester and Strood) (Lab)]

I thank the Chair of the Defence Committee for securing this debate. There was a lot of focus in the House on the percentage of GDP that we spend on defence, and it is important to meet our NATO obligations. I welcome the Prime Minister’s statement that the Government will reach at least 4.1% of GDP being spent on defence in 2027, on the way to 5% by 2035. That is an indicator of our commitment to defence, but it is not the whole story. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need a more nuanced debate that considers whether we are spending the defence budget on the right things, with the appropriate lead times, for those short, medium and long-term strategic defence challenges that we face? The events of the last week make it even more important that we see the defence investment plan that the Government have promised as soon as possible.

[Mr Dhesi]

My hon. Friend is right that we need to increase defence spending to the agreed NATO target of 5% in total—3.5% on conventional military spend and 1.5% extra on defence and security-related matters. However, as she rightly points out—and she has made similar points in discussions before—we must ensure that we get full bang for our buck, and we must also ensure that we have sovereign capability, and not just in the medium term, but in the long term.

Everything in deterrence theory tells us that waiting makes conflict more likely, not less. Russia is running a war economy now, and China has indicated that it wants to be ready to seize Taiwan by next year. As the Defence Committee heard last month, it does not make sense to say that we think we will be ready by about 2030. We also need to be honest about how much we should abuse the debt of peacetime to allow our armed forces to become hollowed out. We need to stop pretending that we can still operate as if we were a global power with historic reach. Our Committee has heard repeatedly that the gap between political ambition and real-world capability is widening, and that that gap risks undermining operational readiness, long-term planning and industrial confidence.

[Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)]

I hope that the Chairman of the Select Committee, who is making an excellent speech, will forgive me for interrupting him. He has referred to readiness and timings. Is he, like me, concerned about the comment on—from memory—page 43 of the strategic defence review that we must be prepared to fight a peer enemy by 2035, which is nine years from now? We may not have that much time.

[Mr Dhesi]

I thank the shadow Minister for making that excellent point. In fact, as I said earlier, the Minister for the Armed Forces has said that we need to be ready within three years. Either way, we need to wake up and smell the coffee, and actually start taking defence investment seriously. The issue is not just the need to spend more on defence, but the need to provide confidence and predictability and show that we do what we say we are doing, so that we can achieve the outcomes that we are seeking. However, one of the most pressing issues for defence at present is the continuing uncertainty surrounding future commitments.

[Michelle Welsh (Sherwood Forest) (Lab)]

In my constituency, defence investment has supported high-skilled jobs since before the first ever vertical flight took off there, and today firms such as ITP Aero in Hucknall continue that proud tradition. Does my hon. Friend agree that increasing defence spending is not only vital for our security but an investment in our economy, and that when contracts are awarded UK defence contracts should support UK jobs, strengthening British industries and communities such as mine?

[Mr Dhesi]

My hon. Friend, who is a strong champion for her community, has made an excellent point. Defence is about not just security but skilled employment and regional growth. That is precisely why industry needs long-term certainty, so that those jobs can expand and endure.

Let me move on to the defence investment plan, which was promised last autumn. We are still waiting. Industry and trade union leaders say that the delay has created a planning “vacuum”. Companies cannot invest in new facilities, expand supply chains, or recruit or even retain skilled workers when they lack clarity on future procurement pipelines. This uncertainty is not merely an accounting inconvenience; it has real-world consequences. It affects jobs in communities across our country, the resilience of our industrial base and the armed forces themselves, who depend on predictable equipment delivery and long-term sustainability arrangements.

To put it simply, uncertainty costs money and capability. If we are serious about strengthening defence, we must be equally serious about strengthening defence industrial capacity, and that means four things. First, it means long-term certainty in procurement pipelines so that firms can invest confidently. Secondly, it means streamlined acquisition processes to reduce delays, bureaucracy and duplication. Thirdly, it means a sustained focus on skills, workforce development and supply chain resilience, ensuring that we can retain critical sovereign capabilities in areas such as ship and aircraft building, advanced manufacturing, cyber and emerging technologies, and can build additional production capacity so that we are not just competing with our allies to spend more money to achieve the same outputs, and so that we can export at scale and contribute to UK growth. Fourthly, we need improved access to credit so that industry can invest over the required timescales. I hope that my fellow Defence Committee members will elaborate further on that element; I am sure that, in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Alex Baker) will focus on it. Industrial capacity is not just a secondary concern; it is a strategic asset, and a decisive factor in deterrence and conflict.

On the UK’s position within NATO, we have long prided ourselves on being a leading European contributor, but the international landscape is shifting rapidly. Several allies, particularly in northern and eastern Europe, are now increasing defence spending at a pace that outstrips our own. Some are moving well beyond the 2% of GDP threshold and towards 3% or more. Whereas the UK was, relative to our GDP, the third-highest spender within NATO in 2012, 11 NATO members spent proportionately more than we did in 2025. That matters for two reasons: first, it affects our credibility and leadership within the alliance; and secondly, it shapes perceptions of burden sharing at a time when transatlantic solidarity is under strain.

[Peter Lamb (Crawley) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend accept that part of the reason for the difference in defence spending is that those nations’ security is at much more immediate risk than that of the UK? If we are going to maintain a leading role and ensure the security of our people moving forward, we must be honest with our constituents. The reality is that, in order for our current way of life to be maintained, sacrifices will now be needed to secure the funding necessary to guarantee our defence.

[Mr Dhesi]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. As I have shown, the uncomfortable truth is that our adversaries are moving faster than our acquisition cycles. We need to bring the public on board, because that reality must serve as a burning platform for reform. Incremental change will not be enough.

It would be remiss of me to discuss defence spending without addressing the issue that often fuels Treasury scepticism: the perception that Defence wastes the money that it spends. There have been too many examples of programmes exceeding budgets, missing timelines and delivering reduced capability. The Army’s Ajax vehicle programme is perhaps the most prominent recent case. Years of delay, spiralling costs and repeated safety concerns have eroded confidence. The repeated failures undermine trust, waste taxpayer resources and, ultimately, weaken our armed forces. It is easy to say that we must never repeat that, but our ability to spend effectively has now become an urgent question of national security.

[Jim McMahon]

Overall, the Government have a pretty poor reputation for spending public money wisely. My hon. Friend mentions Ajax, but I raise him: High Speed 2. Governments of all stripes need to do better. Given that our mayors and local authorities are developing the skill base at a local level, does he agree that it is best to link defence spending to our regional growth strategy, so that we do not have the constant stop-start that we see from central Government?

[Mr Dhesi]

My hon. Friend speaks with considerable experience, having previously served as the shadow Transport Secretary and in various roles. He is right to say that part of the solution is devolution. We must ensure that we empower local people to make decisions for the benefit of their communities.

We must also recognise a broader truth: although robust scrutiny is essential, persistent institutional scepticism towards defence investment risks becoming self-defeating. If the Treasury’s default position is one of mistrust and funding is withheld due to past failures, the armed forces will be trapped in a cycle in which they cannot modernise effectively. What we need is not permanent suspicion, but a new compact, stronger accountability within defence procurement, greater transparency in programme delivery and, in return, a willingness from the centre of Government to invest at the scale required in today’s strategic environment. Trust must be rebuilt on both sides, and we on the Defence Committee want to give the Treasury the opportunity to show that it is acting as a team with Defence, with the same goals and national interests at heart. Indeed, we have invited a Treasury Minister to appear before us and are waiting eagerly for a positive response to this invitation. I hope the Minister agrees that this is a constructive request to which the only reasonable answer is yes. 

I want briefly to address the proposed defence readiness Bill. I hope Ministers will bring that forward from the intended date of 2027, because that delay matters and drift carries very real consequences. Public understanding is another vital component to success, and we must ensure that such a national conversation happens at pace, because at the present point in time we are not taking the public along with us.

I also want to address the issue of personnel reductions—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman will have seen that many Members want to speak in this very important debate, and I am sure he will be bringing his remarks to a close shortly.

[Mr Dhesi]

I shall, Madam Deputy Speaker. Thank you for your kind reminder.

I would like to get a response from the Minister about the supplementary estimate that includes a request for an additional £9 billion to cover:

“Depreciation and impairment arising from non-routine accounting adjustments”.

The Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, the hon. Member for North Cotswolds (Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown), and I have been at pains to convey that to the Ministry of Defence, and I hope we can get a response about it.

The world is becoming more dangerous, more contested and more uncertain, and at this point we cannot let complacency and inaction be the driving force. We must match national unity with national urgency. I look forward to hearing hon. Members’ contributions to this urgently needed debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Dhesi]

Along with extending my gratitude to the Backbench Business Committee, I thank hon. Members across the Chamber for the range and quality of the speeches they have made. They have underlined why these estimates day debates are so important; we have not just scrutinised the numbers, but explained the kind of defence posture that our armed forces should be adopting.

Given the increased security threats, I hope the Minister will take away why the House feels the urgency with which we must act. I thank him for addressing some of my concerns, but there are certain things on which I think the House still needs an answer, predominantly the defence investment plan—we need a publication date to give a clear demand signal to industry, our allies and our adversaries—and a clear, hopefully incremental, path to chart towards 3% of GDP spending. We also need better vehicles to attract private investment. There is also the need to fix the perennial procurement problems that the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee and I have been trying to outline with respect to the MOD. Of course, we also need to rebuild trust with Treasury.

Thank you for your forbearance, Madam Deputy Speaker. I thank all hon. Members for enabling such an excellent debate.

Question deferred (Standing Order No. 54).