In his statement to parliament last week, Keir Starmer pledged £13.4bn more spending on defence from 2027, rising to 3% of GDP in the next parliament. This additional spending is critical for our future defence. The House of Lords defence committee has pointed out that decades of underinvestment have hollowed out our defences, and that our vulnerabilities, especially in air defences, could put the UK in peril.

The prime minister also promised that the government “will translate defence spending into British growth, British jobs, British skills and British innovation”. Our 70,000 Unite members working in UK defence companies will certainly hold him to it.

The first test of this “brave new world” will be how we replace our ageing RAF fighter jets. The RAF has 24 T1

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