Pax Christi warns against rise in military spend

Pax Christi is among peace groups that are warning against the Labour government’s proposed military spend.

According to figures set out by the Global Campaign on Military Spending UK (GCOMS-UK), the UK’s core military spending rose to £56.9bn this financial year, with an additional £2.9bn announced for next year, an inflation rate of 2.3 per cent per annum.

GCOMS-UK statistics also revealed that core military spending is 4.3 times the budget for overseas aid, and 5.5 times the budget of climate-related pending.

Stuart Parkinson, chair of GCOMS-UK Spending, said: “The government continues to fail to meet the UN target on overseas aid, while climate action also remains seriously inadequate.”

GCOMS-UK’s mission statement is: “We come together, as people concerned with peace, social justice, healthcare and environmental justice, to call for a new approach to our common security that will tackle the real problems of this world.”

Andrew Jackson, chief executive of Pax Christi UK, has also voiced concern over the amount of money allocated to military spending in the government’s recent Budget.

Pax Christi is a Catholic-Christian non-profit organisation which seeks a “world where people can live in peace, without violence in any form, based on peace, reconciliation, and justice”.

Jackson said: “Whilst all the indications had been that Labour would continue the approach taking by previous governments and increase military spending year on year, there was always hope that a Government famously facing a budgetary black hole of billions of pounds, would see the colossal waste of resources that military spending represents and readjust its spending plans to cover the real priority issues that impact our security.

“In the face of a climate crisis that is threatening us all, military spending of 5.5 times the budget of the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero makes no sense.

“For military spending to be 4.3 times the overseas aid budget is immoral not least when the choice could have been taken to restore the commitment to aid spending of a minimum of 0.7 per cent of GDP.

“As Pope Francis said on World Food Day last month, ‘Let us reject the line of reasoning that embraces weapons, and instead transform massive military expenditures into investments to combat hunger and the lack of healthcare and education’.”

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