May I express my admiration for my right hon. Friend’s dedicated and distinguished service as Defence Secretary? It is a sad
commentary on the state of the special relationship that our American ally did not recognise his suitability to be the next Secretary-General of NATO.
My right hon. Friend will remember that successive Defence Committees, well before the invasion of Ukraine, argued that defence expenditure should never have been allowed to fall below 3% of GDP. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer, when he was standing for the leadership in 2019, even expressed the wish that it should be at 4% of GDP, which would have taken us back to the cold war percentage of between 4% and 5.1% of GDP spent on defence. In what way does this refresh allow defence the potential to expand quickly if that extra money is belatedly made available?