The Treasury was in denial: John Healey on why he resigned as defence secretary
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Hello and welcome to Political Thinking. We must prepare for war with Russia within the next five years, so said my guest on political thinking this week, as he explained why he'd resigned as defense secretary, in what was perhaps the final blow to an already reeling Keir Starmer. John Healy believes that the threat we now face demands more money for defence than the Treasury is willing to provide, and the Prime Minister was prepared to insist on. This, he says, is not the moment for calibration or incremental change. This means bigger politics, bolder priorities, harder choices. His resignation stunned many in a party which he's described as his family. A low key and loyal Labour man, he served leaders with views as far apart as Tony Blair and Jeremy Corbyn.
He has given no interview since resigning, but now, as Keir Starmer heads to a crucial NATO summit, we can hear his account of what is at stake. For all of us.
John Healy, welcome to political thinking. Thank you. You were defence secretary for two years, shadow defence secretary for three years. It was a big decision to resign. How are you feeling about it now?
Um a mix of the same um I guess agony and certainty. It was the very last thing I wanted to do, the very last thing I expected to do. Keir and I had been alongside each other actually for four years, when he rang me that first weekend, he became Labour leader. He said, John, we need to establish Labour credibility on defence. I want you to do defence. And at that time we were uh less trusted on defence and security than we were on managing the economy and public finances. Those of us that had worked through the twenty nineteen election remember the hardest doors to knock were those with Help for Heroes stickers in the window and He knows like I know that if you don't meet those basic tests of public confidence on defense and security and on the economy, you don't get to talk about schools or health or environment or transport.
So that's why you call it agony, is it? Because you had been a very strong. The first duty of government, any government, and the test of any wannabe government, is can people have the confidence in you as a party of the armed forces and a party of defence? So why the certainty that you were right to resign?
Is it something you've been contemplating for a long time? What was the moment that you thought, no, I really do have to go?
The certainty was recognizing that we faced rising demands on defence, growing threats, uh increasing commitments we were rightly making for Britain to lead allies. And in those circumstances the funding proposed by the Treasury and by Dumberten to support the defence investment plan just fell well short. And I knew I had to take a stand. I could not Stand behind that funding to support what is basically a sound plan that was many months in the making.
Yeah, it was many months and it was constantly postponed, wasn't it, the publication of what was called the DIP, the Defence Investment Plan.
Yeah.
Did Keir Starman know that if you didn't get what you thought was necessary you might quit or did it come as a shock to him? No, of course he didn't.
Did. Oh, you'd warned him. Of course, of course. The really detailed work, all the financial figures, the trade-off options, the challenges, were worked out with some excellent cross-government work during the late autumn. It reported jointly to Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves, and myself. So by December-January, reinforced by 40 hours of a deep dive led by the Cabinet Secretary. we knew what the challenges were, we knew what the financial options were. It then became a matter for number ten and number eleven, number ten and the Treasury to work out the funding to support the Defence Investment Plan and we waited weeks, we waited months. And Keir Starmer knew what defence needed. He knew what the country needed.
He made that really important speech in Munich at big security conference in February where he wasn't just talking about the funding for the defence investment plan. He made the argument, uh, without making the announcement for three percent of GDP funding on defence as part of the commitment that he had made on behalf of the country quite rightly, as part of also NATO's commitments to each other.
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