Approval of Estimates

One of Parliament’s longest standing functions is the consideration and authorisation of the government’s spending plans, requiring the government to obtain parliamentary consent before spending public money. Estimates, sometimes known as Supply Estimates, are the documents presented to Parliament setting out the government’s plans for spending for a given year. The process of obtaining Parliamentary approval to those plans is known as Supply. With a few specific exceptions, the government is required to obtain authority from Parliament through the supply process before it can spend public money.

Following the debate, the House will vote on whether to approve the Main Estimate for the Cabinet Office for 2026/27.

For more information about the 2026/27 Main Estimates, see the Library briefing: Main Estimates: Government spending plans for 2026/27

UK security and resilience policy

According to the government’s National Security Strategy (NSS) 2025, national security is the government’s “first responsibility” and means:

protecting the British people, promoting British interests and making the country stronger, more sovereign and more competitive in the long-term.

The government argues that the UK must adapt its approach to address both external and domestic threats, with decisions on issues such as Ukraine, migration, alliances and emerging technologies likely to shape national security outcomes for years to come.

In line with other NATO countries, on 23 June 2025 the Prime Minister confirmed that the UK would commit to spending 5% of its GDP on national security by 2035, split into 3.5% towards “core defence” and 1.5% towards “resilience and security.” The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has reported that Government announcements on the 1.5% target imply that this spend will be reached by the 2027-28 financial year. Speaking to the wider 5% target, the IFS added that the increase in defence spending to 3.5% “will put considerable additional pressure on the public finances and the size of the state in the coming years.

NSS 2025 sets out a strategic framework built around “three pillars”:

(i) SECURITY AT HOME

  • Defend our territory
  • Make the UK a harder target
  • Build resilience to future threats

(ii) STRENGTH ABROAD

  • Bolster collective security 
  • Renew and refresh key alliances
  • Develop new partnerships in new domains 

(iii) INCREASE SOVEREIGN AND ASYMMETRIC CAPABILITIES

  • Rebuild our defence industrial base

  • Identify, nurture and protect other sovereign capabilities

  • Pursue asymmetric advantage

NSS 2025 aims to bring together the various strands of work relating to national security including the government’s resilience strategy.

The UK Government Resilience Action Plan (UKRAP, updated 2025) sets out the government’s plan to strengthen its ability to anticipate, prepare for, respond to and recover from major risks, including pandemics, cyber attacks, climate impacts and geopolitical shocks. It adopts an “all hazards” approach “to improve the general resilience of the nation to all risks”.

UKRAP treats security as integral to national resilience:

“Security at home”, including domestic resilience, which this action plan focuses on, is a fundamental element of our National Security Strategy. 

It identifies three main objectives:

  • Continuously assess how resilient the UK is, to target interventions and resources
  • Enable the whole of society to take action to increase their resilience
  • Strengthening the public sector resilience system

Overall, UK security and resilience policy reflects a shift towards a more integrated and anticipatory approach that embeds domestic resilience at the centre of national security strategy. NSS 2025 and the UKRAP together emphasise the need to address a wide spectrum of risks through strengthened institutions, improved risk assessment, and greater whole‑of‑society engagement.

Contents of the Cabinet Office’s Main Estimate

The Cabinet Office has produced an explanatory memorandum, which sets out the details of its initial spending plans for 2026/27. This contains its spending broken down by Departmental Expenditure Limits (DEL) and Annually Managed Expenditure (AME).

Spending can be further broken down into four categories:

  • Resource DEL (planned day-to-day spending): this is spending on staff and other running costs, on goods and services and grants.
  • Capital DEL (planned investment spending): this is spending covering the purchase and sale of assets, loans, investments and capital grants.
  • Resource AME (demand-led day-to-day spending): for the Cabinet Office tends to relate to provisions for compensation schemes and technical accounting adjustments.
  • Capital AME (demand-led investment spending): for the Cabinet Office tends to relate to compensation payments

Security specific spending

Due to the limited information available within the estimate memorandum, it is not possible to determine precisely how much the Cabinet Office expects to spend on security and resilience. However, Cabinet Office’s budgets are further broken down into subheads for different policy areas of Cabinet Office spending. Most relevant to security spending is the subhead ‘Keeping the country safe’, on which the Cabinet Office intends to spend £203.6 million of Resource DEL (up from £72.3 million in 2025/26) and £25.1 million of Capital DEL (up from £10.0 million in 2025/26). This subhead includes the funding attached to the Machinery of Government change bringing the Integrated Security Fund under Cabinet Office management from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office from 2026/27.

There may be additional spending on security and resilience within other subheads. For the full breakdown of Cabinet Office spending by subhead, see table A of the explanatory memorandum.

The sections below outline the key changes in each of the Cabinet Office budget categories covering all Cabinet Office spending.

Day-to-day spending (Resource DEL)

CO has set its Resource DEL budget to increase by £338.4 million (+42.5%) from £795.3 million to £1,133.7 million. This is driven by increases of:  

  • £580.2 million from a machinery of government change transferring the UK Integrated Security Fund (UKISF) budget from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) to the Cabinet Office. 
  • £35.0 million for the European and Global Issues Secretariat. 
  • £34.0 million for the test Learn and Grow programmes. 
  • £28.0 million for the Infected Blood Compensation Authority for increased legal and financial support for claimants. 
  • £25.0 million for G7 and G20 Presidency funding. This is supplemented by £10.0 million budget cover transfer from the FCDO. 

These increases have been partially offset by a decrease of £433.1 million due to outgoing budget cover transfers for the UKISF. 

Investment spending (Capital DEL) 

CO has set its Capital DEL budget to increase by £122.2 million (+23.5%) from £521.0 million to £643.2 million. This is driven by increases of:  

  • £68.0 million as a return of Capital DEL funding took place in 2025/26, which has not been repeated. The underspend was against IFRS16 charges in the prior year. 
  • £37.8 million for increased departmental activities set out in the Spending Review. 
  • £28.0 million for development of the ROSA secure IT system. 
  • £12.7 million for the Queen Elizabeth II memorial. 

These increases have been partially offset by a decrease of £31.7 million for Cabinet Office central agency funds, included in the Spending Review. 

Demand-led spending (Annually Managed Expenditure)  

CO has set its Resource AME budget to decrease by £1,952.8 million (-1,048.0%) from £186.3 million to -£1,766.5 million. This is driven by a decrease of £2,205.9 million for the provision for Infected Blood Compensation Payments as payments are made to claimants. This decrease is partially offset by an increase of £254.5 million due to technical depreciation changes. 

CO has set its Capital AME budget to decrease by £590.0 million (-21.6%) from £2,730.0 million to £2,140.0 million. This is driven by decreases of:  

  • £807.3 million for an expected decrease in the level of payments for the Infected Blood Compensation scheme. 
  • £30.0 million for the cancellation of an impairment to IFRS16 assets within the Government Property Agency. 

These decreases are partially offset by an increase of £247.3 million as a lower amount is to be transferred to the Department of Health and Social Care for Infected Blood Support scheme costs. 

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