Starmer’s slashing of aid is not just a betrayal, it’s a choice. A wealth tax could easily reverse it
By: Jonathan Stevenson
Date: 26 February 2025
Campaigns: Aid
Keir Starmer just made a terrible choice.
Ahead of his meeting with Donald Trump tomorrow, the prime minister has announced that he will cut the UK aid budget by 40%, in order to spend more on the military. Aid has been repeatedly cut in recent years, but will now fall to a miniscule 0.3% of GDP, the lowest level in a generation.
We don’t know how the government’s new defence budget will be used, but we are worried. The arms industry is already the most subsidised part of the global economy, and arms investors are making a fortune from the public purse here in Britain. So far, this is just a big number to try and impress President Trump.
But even putting aside how the defence budget is spent, you cannot help build a safe and secure world by cutting the aid budget. Keir Starmer talked in the House of Commons about the “courage” this political decision took. But cutting funds which are all about giving people the prospect of a better life, or resolving conflicts, or reducing the impact of climate change, is not courageous, it’s wrong.
The prime minister could have announced a wealth tax, instead of cuts, to fund new public spending. That would have taken real courage. Instead, he’s making the poorest people in the world pay the price.
At a time like this, we need to stand up for internationalism, for Britain contributing its fair share to tackling the world’s common problems like poverty and climate change. And we need to stand up for progressive taxation at a time when cuts like these are presented as unavoidable, even courageous.
Who pays?
Momentum is building for modest wealth taxes that could raise far more than Starmer wants to cut from the UK aid budget. A 2% tax on extreme wealth – on those who own assets worth more than £10 million – could bring in up to £24 billion a year in the UK, according to Tax Justice UK. A group called the Patriotic Millionaires is even calling on the government to introduce it.
The Spanish government recently introduced a “solidarity” tax on wealth, which could raise $31 billion per year if a version was applied in the UK. And G20 finance leaders recently agreed to cooperate on a tax on billionaires that could raise £200 billion a year if chancellors like Rachel Reeves get behind it.
There are plenty of other demands for increased public spending – from support for pensioners in fuel poverty to investment in the green transition – that look unlikely to be met in the spring statement. That’s why it’s vital that the government starts taking a wealth tax seriously.
Global Justice Now has never been an uncritical cheerleader for aid. We have only ever seen aid as one part of the solution for economic justice – a stepping stone to wider structural change.
And we’ve campaigned to stop the aid budget being hijacked to spend on handouts for private companies and – ironically – trumped up military projects with no impact on the fight against poverty.
But this isn’t just a retreat from aid. It’s a retreat from the idea of internationalism. It’s starts with Trump and his billionaire ally, Elon Musk, and it ends with a prime minister who promised ‘change’ announcing that he’s balancing the books on the backs of the poorest people in the global south. This isn’t the change we demanded.
Just last week the foreign secretary, David Lammy, said Trump’s own aid cuts could be “a big strategic mistake”. The same must be true of these wrong-headed cuts to UK aid today.
As Starmer prepares to try and cosy up to Trump tomorrow, we need to make our voices heard for a change of course.
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Photo: Prime Minister Keir Starmer calls President Elect Donald Trump in November. Credit: Simon Dawson/No 10 Downing Street (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
