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Rachel Reeves has vowed the Defence Investment Plan, Dip, will ‘meet the moment’, having previously been warned a planned funding envelope ‘falls well short of what is required’. The UK chancellor also said she was ‘confident’ the defence spending plan would be published before this year’s Nato summit, which begins on July 7. The summit in Ankara, Turkey, had previously been touted by ministers as their deadline for unveiling the strategy. If the government meets its deadline, Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who announced his resignation on Monday, will still be in post when it is published. Nominations for his successor are not due to open until after the summit, on July 9. Andy Burnham, who is treading a path into No 10, would like the Dip to be delayed until he enters Downing Street, The Times and Telegraph newspapers have reported. Downing Street and defence leaders have previously fallen out over the Dip. Former defence secretary John Healey and armed forces minister Al Carns resigned earlier this month, with Healey telling Starmer the money on offer to fund the plan ‘falls well short of what is required for defence and the country at this dangerous time’. Reeves told the Commons that she had met on Monday with Defence Secretary Dan Jarvis and Chief of the Defence Staff Richard Knighton ‘to talk through the Dip’. She said: ‘The Ministry of Defence are producing the Dip that will meet the scale of the challenges and meet the moment with increased readiness. ‘I am confident that the new Dip will be published before the Nato Ankara summit. It will involve more money spent more effectively and will meet the scale of challenges facing our country.’ Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy on Monday also vowed to meet the Nato summit deadline. ‘I can confirm that the Dip will be published before the Nato summit,’ he told MPs. ‘And I think it is important that the prime minister is in post for that Nato summit.’ Reeves made her comments in an exchange with Conservative MP for South West Devon Rebecca Smith. ‘The former defence secretary has blown apart the Dip, revealing that the Treasury were prepared to offer only a pitiful increase in defence spending, just 0.08% by 2030, despite growing threats across the world,’ Smith said. ‘At the same time, the Treasury continues to fork out billions for welfare and net-zero agendas. ‘Innovative defence small and medium-sized enterprises are effectively locked out of MoD [Ministry of Defence] contracts and denied the opportunity to scale their capabilities.’ Asked whether she would ‘stand in the way of the delivery of the Dip’, Reeves said: ‘The Dip will be published before the summit and it will involve more money spent more effectively. ‘And it will meet the scale of the challenges we face, but frankly, I will take no lectures from the party opposite.’ Reeves said the Conservatives made ‘£12 billion-worth of cuts’ during their first five years in office. ‘We are turning that around with the biggest uplift in defence spending since the end of the Cold War,’ she said. ‘This Labour government will continue to invest in defence, with contracts awarded to firms here in Britain to keep our country safe.’ By Will Meakin-Durrant, Press Association Political Staff Press Association: News source: PA Copyright 2026 Alliance News Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
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