Chris Mason

So I think he was acutely aware that that was the immediate context

Because if you have a story out there, a narrative out there, an accusation out there with the credibility that it comes with from a departing defence secretary, as a prime minister, in any circumstance, you can't let that sit for long, particularly if you're of the view.

confronted by all the trade-offs, et cetera, et cetera, that he does, that he just doesn't think it's right.

He thinks it's wrong.

And he wanted to disagree with that and set out why he thought there was a plausible alternative argument.

And as we discussed on Thursday, the catalyst for John Healy's resignation was the wrangling over this defence investment plan, which is this

multi-billion pound, multi-year plan to upgrade Britain's armed forces for the conflicts of the future, which was born out of the Defence Review, which was published last summer.

And actually going back to that review, it says, oh, and we will back this up with a defence investment plan published in autumn 2025.

And here we are in kind of mid-summer 2026, and it's still not here.

Anyway, here is Keir Starmer telling you, Chris, basically kind of like a defence of what he's already done on defence.

Now, he was also saying in this interview that he'd already increased defence spending and he'd already had to do a difficult thing to do that, which was to cut international aid.

So I think he was asking for a bit of credit for having already done what he sees as quite a big thing in defence, irrespective of what John Healy is accusing him of not doing now.

Yes, exactly.

So I was really struck by that.

And it's worth for newscasters just unpacking an element of the timeline here.

So he was trying to make an argument there that says, hang on a minute, look how far we've got already.

because of the increase in defence spending that there has been since the general election, and then the target that will be hit, which is clearing 2.5% of national income by April of next year.

And the key thing in understanding the defence investment plan, RAU,

is to recognise that the starting line for that row is next April.

It's kind of going beyond that.