John Healey quit over defence money. UK Budgets rarely set a year for that goal.

What happened

Andrew Griffith, the opposition’s finance spokesman, has called for John Healey to resign if he fails to set out how the UK will spend 3% of GDP on defence by 2030.

John Healey presents his first Budget as Chancellor on Wednesday 28 October. In June he resigned as defence secretary, because he said the plan for defence money fell “well short“. He had called for defence spending of 3% of GDP, the value of everything the country produces in a year, by 2030.

In his resignation letter Healey asked for a “headmark date for 3% of GDP on defence in 2030“, a target date and said the Treasury was “unwilling“ to give the money. On 28 August the Treasury said the Budget will not name a date for 3%. It will fully fund the current defence plan, and the date will come at a spending review next year. Healey told Sky News that money discipline was his “first priority“.

Current plans take defence to 2.7% of GDP by 2030 and to 3% only in 2034/35. The UK has also promised NATO, the Western military alliance, 3.5% by 2035. Prime Minister Andy Burnham has refused to commit to the 3% goal.

On 25 October Andrew Griffith said Healey should resign without a plan for 3%. Defence Secretary Wes Streeting said the government was “determined to give our armed forces the investment needed“. The Times reported on 24 October that Healey will give billions more for defence as a first payment towards 3%. The government’s room under its borrowing rule has shrunk since March, and it has promised not to raise income tax, National Insurance or VAT.

The Budget will be held on 28 October 2026.

GOV.UK, Chancellor’s letter to the Treasury Committee

Sources: bbc.co.uk

The Pattern

We looked for cases where a UK finance minister gave a planned Budget or spending statement while a defence spending goal in % of GDP had no year, and room under the borrowing rules was shrinking or not clear. We found seven such Budgets and statements since 2015. Three different chancellors gave them, and six of them gave no year.

The Read

The Treasury has already said there will be no date for 3% in this Budget, and Healey has put money discipline first. In the six times a Budget or statement named no year, the finance minister never named one later. In four of them the prime minister did, in a speech outside a Budget, and Burnham has not taken on the 3% goal.

There are reasons for doubt. All seven Budgets and statements were in the UK, and one speech by Rishi Sunak on 23 April 2024 gave a year for 2.5% after three of them. The only one that gave a year, in July 2015, promised to keep spending at 2% every year, a level the UK had already reached, and set no year for a new goal. None of the chancellors in these seven Budgets and statements had quit the government over such a date, and the opposition now says he should resign without one.

The second market asks whether the Budget lifts the plan for 2030 above 2.7%. The Treasury promised in August only to fully fund the current plan. The Times reported on 24 October that Healey will add billions more as a first payment towards 3%, and this market counts it only if the share of GDP planned for 2030 goes up.