“As Andy Burnham takes over a Prime Minister today, CND has written to him urging him to take a new direction to the disastrous path of Starmer.”
The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) has written a letter to Andy Burnham following his becoming Prime Minister. You can read about it and how to lobby Burnham below.
As Andy Burnham takes over as Prime Minister today, CND has written to him urging him to take a new direction to the disastrous path of Starmer.
You can read CND’s letter to the Prime Minister here.
As well as reversing the decision to purchase nuclear-capable fighter jets and redirecting military spending into boosting public services, we are calling on him to end British support for Trump’s deadly wars. Following a collapse of the ceasefire, the US-led illegal war on Iran is now escalating to all-out confrontation once again. Nearly forty Iranian civilians and a number of US troops in Iraq and Jordan have been killed.
We’re calling on Burnham to push for a diplomatic solution to the crisis and ensure Britain gives no support for another illegal war. This means ruling out the use of British bases by the Trump administration and withdrawing all British military presence in the Strait of Hormuz and the wider region.
Write to Burnham yourself, urging him to invest in saving lives, not destroying them.
Letter in full:
Dear Prime Minister,
As you take on your new position today, I am urging you to choose a different path for Britain; one that
puts people before weapons, diplomacy before militarism and brings hope, not fear.
The world is facing the highest nuclear dangers since the Cold War. At precisely the moment when calm
leadership and diplomacy are needed, the British government is whipping up international tensions and
pouring hundreds of billions of pounds into military spending, making us the world’s third-largest nuclear
weapons spender. This does not make us safer. It fuels an increasingly dangerous global arms race while
diverting desperately needed resources away from the urgent task of eradicating social deprivation,
rebuilding our public services and tackling climate breakdown.
The Defence Investment Plan will increase spending on Britain’s nuclear weapons programme by a further
£64 billion over the next four years. This includes the purchase of the US F-35A nuclear-capable fighter jets.
These jets will launch US nuclear bombs believed to be stationed at RAF Lakenheath and tie Britain even
closer to the reckless Trump administration. The expansion breaches Britain’s own disarmament
obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and is driving a new nuclear arms race. Given
the devastating escalation in the Ukraine war, this is only increasing the risk of nuclear weapons being used
in that conflict.
I urge you to do everything in your power to push for diplomacy, reduce tensions and de-escalate the
nuclear threat by actively taking steps to disarm Britain’s nuclear weapons. This means also cancelling
Britain’s replacement of Trident, Britain’s nuclear-armed submarine system, which is now expected to cost
at least £240 billion over its thirty-year lifetime. Britain’s re-armament also exposes its nuclear hypocrisy
and undermines efforts to counter nuclear proliferation.
The US-led illegal war on Iran also risks deepening instability and threatens an all-out war in the Middle
East and beyond. It is exacerbating global economic pressures already being felt by families across the UK. I
urge you to push for a diplomatic solution to the crisis and ensure Britain gives no support for another
illegal war. This means ruling out the use of British bases by the Trump administration and withdrawing all
British military presence in the Strait of Hormuz and the wider region.
If you really wish to reindustrialise Britain, boost jobs and growth, I urge you to reverse the £300 billion
military spending plan over the next four years. Far from kick-starting economic growth and boosting jobs,
the previous government’s own data shows that military procurement creates fewer jobs than health,
education, rail or social care. In fact, research by the Transition Security Project shows that the Defence
Investment Plan will result in at least 10,000 net job losses. This is because double the number of jobs will
be lost by the planned cuts to critical public services to pay for war and nuclear weapons.
Instead, invest in rebuilding hospitals, schools, improving public transport, building new homes and
retrofitting existing ones – and refocus back to the critical work of energy transition. Britain should be
leading the way with a state-backed defence diversification agency to strategically plan the redevelopment,
training and new job creation for areas like Barrow-in-Furness that are currently dominated by arms
companies and suffering amongst the highest levels of social deprivation in the country.
Finally, as Prime Minister, you also have the opportunity to do the right thing for the nuclear test veterans.
I know that you have supported their campaign for justice and compensation for many years. Exposed to
British nuclear explosions in the Pacific Islands, these men had no knowledge of the deadly radioactive
fallout that has poisoned and killed them and continues to poison their families to this day. You have
acknowledged the appalling cover-up by the Ministry of Defence. I urge you to rectify this and issue
compensation now. There must also be an acknowledgement by this government of the overwhelming
evidence that exposure to deadly radioactive fall-out has caused the disproportionate levels of
generational cancers, birth defects, serious medical conditions and premature deaths of the families.
At such a critical time, we need a new direction from the British government – one that invests in saving
lives, not destroying them.
Yours sincerely,
Sophie Bolt
General Secretary
- This was taken from a CND email statement published on 20 July 2026.
- You can follow CND on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter/X.
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