The chancellor says her Spring budget will include a £2.2 billion boost to defence spending. Rachel Reeves adds this has been funded by "reducing what we spend on international development". Report by Brooksl. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00I'm going to set out in the Spring Statement increases in defence spending for next year
00:06worth £2.2 billion as we take defence spending as a share of our economy to 2.5%. The world
00:14is changing, we can see that before our eyes, but we're not a passive government, we're
00:18an active one, stepping up our defence capability to keep our country safe and secure because
00:23a strong economy depends on strong defence, but as we invest in our defence we can also
00:30bring more good quality jobs, paying decent wages to communities across our country. We
00:35can see that the world is changing and part of that change is increased globally in the
00:40costs of government borrowing and Britain has not been immune from those challenges.
00:46The Office of Budget Responsibility will set out their verdicts on growth and on the public
00:52finances today, but we will continue to meet the fiscal rules that I set out in the Budget
00:58next year. Economic stability is non-negotiable. I will never play fast and loose with the
01:03public finances like the previous Conservative government did. I have returned stability
01:09to the UK economy and I will continue to do so. We have increased defence spending by
01:14reducing what we spend on international development. That is a straight swap in what we are spending
01:21on international development currently and putting that into defence spending because
01:25as the world changes we need to respond to that. But it's also important that we reform
01:29our welfare system. Today one in eight young people are not in education, employment or
01:34training. I don't believe that we should be writing off an entire generation of young
01:39people without giving them the support to fulfil their potential. And so my basic principles
01:44are that we should protect those who need our support, but for everybody who can work
01:49we will give them personalised, targeted support to get back to work, to fulfil their
01:53potential, to contribute to their family finances as well as contributing to the public finances
02:00through taxation too.