King's Speech Motion for an Address: amendment (o)

Parliament voted on 20 May 2026 on a Conservative amendment to the motion formally thanking the King for his Speech, which sets out the government's legislative programme. The amendment called on the government to introduce a Defence Readiness Bill, publish its delayed Defence Investment Plan, raise defence spending to 3% of GDP by the end of the Parliament, and abandon plans to restart inquests into Northern Ireland veterans by dropping the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023 (Remedial) Order 2025. The amendment was defeated by 317 votes to 104. The vote matters because it touches on two separate but connected questions about national security. The first is whether the government is moving fast enough and ambitiously enough on defence spending and military preparedness, given the conflict in Ukraine and wider European instability. The second is how the state should handle legacy prosecutions of veterans who served during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, with the Conservatives arguing that restarting inquests would damage armed forces morale and recruitment. Defeating the amendment means the government faces no formal parliamentary pressure to accelerate the Defence Investment Plan or to protect veterans from renewed legal proceedings, though the debate itself places those issues firmly on the public record. Labour MPs voted unanimously against the amendment, while Conservatives voted unanimously for it. Reform UK joined the Conservative side, with six of its MPs voting Aye. The Greens and the Social Democratic and Labour Party sided with the government, voting No. Five independent MPs voted Aye and three voted No. This was one of several opposition amendments debated on the same day: a Liberal Democrat amendment on a separate topic was defeated 408 to 78, while a Reform UK amendment was defeated 316 to 104. The main motion thanking the King for his Speech passed 307 to 171. Taken together, the day's divisions reflect the conventional pattern of King's Speech debates, in which opposition parties use amendments to put their own priorities on record before the government's programme passes comfortably.