When the Prime Minister announces more spending on defence, voters envisage two outcomes. 

The first is more troops. The second is more weapons.

What they categorically do not expect to see is the increased budget being handed out to foreign allies of an antagonistic China.

It is a monumental disappointment, therefore, that Sir Keir Starmer and his ministers have point-blank refused to be clear on how money will be reallocated from foreign aid to Britain's defence budget.

Repeatedly in the House of Commons yesterday, the PM declined to give a simple answer to a simple question: will any of the money go towards propping up Labour's egregious surrender of the Chagos Islands, where there is a key airbase?

Perhaps Sir Keir hopes he can stave off too much trouble from his party's vocal hard-Left by using an expanded defence budget as some sort of Get Private Proxy anti-colonial reparations scheme.