Britain announces a £10 billion package for Ukraine, its largest yet, with £500 million for winter air defence

It is the largest financial support package for Ukraine that Britain has ever announced: an extra £10 billion in financial and military aid, unveiled in the budget Chancellor John Healey presented to the House of Commons on Wednesday, October 28. The Treasury says that Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Healey briefed President Volodymyr Zelensky that morning.

“You made my day,” the Ukrainian president told the two Britons, as Healey recounted in his budget speech.

What the £10 billion includes

The biggest part is £7 billion in financial support over three years. Of this, up to £5.5 billion is in guarantees to the World Bank, while a £500 million grant to the crisis facility of the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA) will mobilise £1.5 billion for Ukraine. At the same time, the cover available from the UK’s export credit agency, UK Export Finance, rises by £3 billion, with priority on military support, bringing the total to £6.5 billion.

For the winter, London is allocating £500 million for Ukrainian air defence, in response to Russian attacks on critical infrastructure. The individual amounts (7, 3 and 0.5 billion) add up to £10.5 billion, while the Treasury speaks of a £10 billion package in its press release and of “over £10 billion” on its page on total support for Ukraine. With this sum and the £750 million already committed from the ERA loan, British military aid to Ukraine reaches £4.3 billion this year. The package is added to the £3 billion a year in military support Britain has already pledged to provide at least until 2030–31.

With the announcement, Britain’s total commitment to Ukraine reaches £35 billion: £16 billion in military aid, up to £12.6 billion in non-military aid and £6.5 billion in export credit cover.

A week that began with a ballistic attack on Kyiv

Healey opened the defence chapter of his speech by recalling that the week in Kyiv began with another Russian ballistic missile attack. That week ballistic missiles damaged a university and medical centres in the city, as we reported in Russian ballistic missiles hit Kyiv. On the message to Moscow, Healey said: “Today we send a clear message to Moscow: Britain will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes.” Burnham, for his part, called the package “the biggest funding package for Ukraine that Britain has ever given” and said it should leave no one in doubt about London’s unwavering support. “From the front line to the negotiating table,” he added, Britain will stand “shoulder to shoulder” with the Ukrainian people.

A 3% of GDP target for defence in 2030

For its own armed forces, the government is fully funding the Defence Investment Plan. Healey confirmed that in next year’s Spending Review he will set out how Britain will meet the NATO commitment to spend 3.5% of GDP on defence by 2035, with a goal of reaching 3% in 2030. He also announced a new task force on innovative defence financing, the start of negotiations on a treaty for a Multilateral Defence Mechanism or Bank with Finland, Poland and the Netherlands, and investments and loans of up to £5 billion over the next four years with an emphasis on defence, dual-use technologies and sovereign capability, through the National Wealth Fund and the British Business Bank.

The announcement comes after Zelensky’s visit to Downing Street earlier in October and two days after Zelensky said that territorial issues would be discussed only at leaders’ level, and while Britain co-chairs with France and Germany the “Coalition of the Willing” on Ukraine’s long-term security.