Originally Posted by
Mickj3
Genuine Question. Some years ago, but since the end of the cold war, didn’t the government include (for the first time) into the defence budget the costs of the UK nuclear deterrent force (Trident) and HM forces pensions costs? If I remember correctly this “fiddling of the books” enabled the government to continue to claim that the defence bill was still at 2% of GNP.
Pensions yes, deterrent, no. It's a common myth that the costs of the deterrent were somehow "not in the defence budget" until recently. I'm old enough to remember the debates about the effect of Trident on the budget in the mid-80s.
While I'm not particularly happy with only £5Bn, the confected nonsense from the opposition is risible. I would remind those foaming at the mouth over Nott 1981 and SDSR2010 to cast their minds back as to the circumstances. Nott 1981 was constrained as direct result of a certain previous government having to go cap in hand to the IMF IIRC? The precursor to the SDSR 2010 review was a certain Chief Secretary to the Treasury - one Liam Byrne MP - leaving a note to his coalition successor that read "I'm sorry there is no money left".
Now - credit where it's due. Robertson's SDR98 was a very good review, good analysis decent looking force structure. Unfortunately, it was never fully-funded courtesy of a certain one-eyed "financial genius" who hated defence with a passion. As exemplified by his refusal to provide the required funds when we were operating way above the planning assumptions behind that review in terms of both scale and duration.
Glass houses and all that.....