At the Spring Statement the Chancellor proudly proclaimed the formation of a new “Defence Growth Board” alongside a “new Defence Reform model [which] will begin operation from 1 April 2025.” The board was to be co-chaired by Reeves and John Healey to “hard-wire growth considerations into Defence processes.“ Glowing write-ups abounded…
Labour then admitted this month it would have “no cost associated with its establishment or operation.” Guido’s FOI Unit dispatched some questions at the same time to the MoD asking for the board’s terms of reference and whether any full-time staff were part of it. It’s a no to both. Terms of reference and secretariat support might be helpful if you are trying to orient the entire sluggish defence industry to growth…
Worse than that the board has as of today not even had one meeting at which any minister was present. A potemkin exercise to shove into a thin Spring Statement…
Green Deputy Leader Rachel Millward said:
“The reality is that it’s Zack Polanski who brought the nation, Andy Burnham. And if we hadn’t had the success of the Green Party in this last year since Zack’s been leading, which has been unprecedented, phenomenal success and a growth from about 60,000 members to 230,000, if we hadn’t had that much pressure on Labour, then we’d probably still be in the Starmer regime, which was pretty much ushering in a Reform government with its lurch to the right. So actually, what we’re seeing now is that we’ve set the political agenda and the government is picking that up.”