Anneliese Dodds, the international development minister, announced her resignation following Keir Starmer's decision to reduce the international aid budget significantly to finance a substantial rise in defense spending. She expressed concerns that the UK's withdrawal from global development efforts would inadvertently empower countries like Russia and China. While supporting increased defense expenditures in light of the global landscape post-Ukraine invasion, Dodds emphasized the need for alternative funding sources rather than further slashing aid budgets. She cautioned that Starmer's ambitious defense spending targets might not be met without adequate financial strategy.
In her letter to the prime minister, she wrote: Undoubtedly the postwar global order has come crashing down. I believe that we must increase spending on defence as a result; and know that there are no easy paths to doing so.
Dodds said she firmly believed the prime minister was right to increase defence spending as the postwar consensus had come crashing down after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
She predicted that the prime minister would find it impossible to deliver on his commitment to maintain development spending in Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine with the diminished budget.
Dodds urged the government to look at other ways of raising the money other than through cutting departmental budgets, including looking again at borrowing rules and taxation.
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