UK to spend £5 billion on drones in delayed defence plan

Britain’s delayed Defence Investment Plan will finally be published on Tuesday, 1 July, with more than £5 billion earmarked for drones and autonomous systems across the Royal Navy, British Army and Royal Air Force. The package has slipped by around nine months from the original timetable, and the Ministry of Defence says it is the largest ever drone investment in the UK Armed Forces.

The four-year programme is also meant to fund new technology and infrastructure, not just battlefield hardware. The delay has already fed frustration across the defence supply chain as firms waited for contracts to move. The industrial cost has been visible at the smaller end of the market, where some suppliers have collapsed, others have put off investment and many have expanded abroad instead of waiting at home. The latest package still falls short of what is needed by about £28 billion over the next four years, leaving a gap between the new announcement and the costs forecast for the Ministry of Defence.

John Healey resigned as defence secretary on 11 June 2026, saying the Treasury would not commit the resources needed and that the coming plan fell well short of what was required. The government's wider commitment, announced on 25 February 2025, is to lift defence spending to 2.5% of GDP from April 2027, with an ambition to reach 3% in the next Parliament if economic and fiscal conditions allow.

The shift reflects lessons drawn from Ukraine and from fighting in the Middle East, where drones and autonomous systems have become central to modern combat. It also builds on earlier investments this Parliament, including more than £4 billion for autonomous systems and nearly £1 billion for directed energy weapons, among them DragonFire. DragonFire is on course to become the first high-power laser capability from a European nation to enter service, with the first Royal Navy Type 45 destroyer due to be fitted in 2027.