Sir Keir Starmer has suffered another blow to his authority as armed forces minister Al Carns followed John Healey in leaving the Government over a dispute about long-term military funding.
Mr Carns quit as a defence minister on Thursday evening, writing to the Prime Minister that he could not defend “a level of investment I know to be inadequate to the task”.
Mr Healey had earlier resigned as defence secretary, claiming Sir Keir had been “unable, and the Treasury has been unwilling”, to provide adequate funding for the defence investment plan (Dip).
The Dip, a blueprint for sustained military investment, was originally called for by the strategic defence review almost exactly a year ago and has been long delayed by funding wrangling.
In his resignation letter, Mr Carns wrote: “I have sat in the rooms, seen the assessments, and spoken to the commanders who will be asked to do more with less, and I cannot in good conscience stand at the dispatch box and defend a level of investment I know to be inadequate to the task.”
He added: “A serious country funds its defence to meet the threat it actually faces, not the threat it wishes it faced.”
Just an hour before his resignation, Mr Carns had suggested he was willing to wait until the Dip was finalised before considering his position. However, he also indicated to Sky News he could walk away if the final plan did not do “right by the armed forces”.
Mr Healey is understood to have asked other defence ministers to remain in post after his exit, but not all heeded his request. Pamela Nash, Mr Healey’s parliamentary private secretary, also left the Government.
In her resignation letter, Nash described the “delays and difficulties” dogging the Dip as “the latest issue that is damaging to the trust of the public in us”.
Responding to Mr Healey’s resignation, Sir Keir agreed that the Government must “go further” on defence funding but insisted the Dip “will provide the resources our military needs to keep us safe and the clarity the British defence industry needs to plan”.
The plan is backed by “the necessary investment”, Sir Keir said, adding that spending increases will be “sustainable and fair”. Warning of cuts elsewhere, he said extra defence spending “will mean significant reallocations of funding from across Government departments”.
Concluding his letter, Sir Keir said: “Taking these decisions is never easy. I am determined to rebuild our country after years of being buffeted by crises. I am sorry that you will not be part of that work going forward.”
Mr Healey said he received a financial settlement for the Dip on Monday afternoon which “falls well short of what is required”, with extra support coming after 2030 when the “imperative to speed up readiness to fight is in the first two years”.
He said: “After explaining to you that I would not be able to accept a Dip settlement that does not give our forces the resources they need, I am now left with no other option than to submit my resignation as your defence secretary.”
Sources said the Government wanted to publish the Dip on Thursday, but with a £13.5 billion uplift that military chiefs said would not be enough to fund the transformation needed.
While the Government has committed to spending 3.5% of GDP on defence by 2035, Mr Healey said the plan presented on Monday moved too slowly, with defence spending rising to just 2.68% in 2030 after 2.6% next year.
He added that without a Dip that “meets the moment” he was “forced to make decisions that would reduce the readiness of our forces and increase the risk to personnel on operations, and could make our country less safe”.
Sources said the Treasury deal did not set a date for increasing spending to 3%, and tried to force the MoD to plan to reach that figure only in 2034/35.
An ally of Mr Healey said the former defence secretary had been “one of the most loyal Labour men for over 30 years” and had “only ever wanted a successful Labour government”.
A Treasury source said the Chancellor would “always do what is right and needed to keep this country safe”, adding she had been “working alongside the PM to deliver billions more to fund the defence investment plan in full”.
A press conference Mr Healey was due to hold with Australian defence minister Richard Marles on a Portsmouth naval base on Thursday afternoon was cancelled at the last minute.
Mr Healey is the fourth Cabinet minister to leave Sir Keir’s Government since coming to power and the second to resign over policy differences after Wes Streeting quit as health secretary last month amid the fallout from Labour’s local election losses.
