The UK plans to increase defence spending by cutting investment in road development and energy projects, but will do so without issuing bonds. Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced this while presenting his defence investment plan.
“Some capital construction projects, such as those in road infrastructure and energy, while important, are not essential in the near future and will therefore no longer be carried out as originally planned“, the Prime Minister said, as reported by Sky News.
Starmer explained that defence funding “requires strict but necessary measures“. Therefore, the Prime Minister explained, the funding will be provided through “redistribution of spending between government departments“ – the budgets of all other ministries will be reduced by 1%.
The Prime Minister rejected the idea of issuing bonds to raise the necessary funds for rearmament. This idea was proposed by the Liberal Democrats. “Defence bonds are just loans by another name. Financing them in this way will lead to higher interest rates at a time when one in ten pounds of government spending already goes to paying interest on the debt“, the politician said.