Burnham, whose coronation as Labour leader is all but inevitable given that he is currently the only candidate, also told MPs that he will never use party discipline to “stifle debate” and says they should raise problems and policy ideas “without fear or favour”.

He said he would change the party culture to ‘value every member of the PLP’ and said that he expected all ministers and cabinet members to prioritise engagement with the PLP.

In an attempt to contrast himself with his predecessor Starmer, Burnham vowed to prioritise voting in the chamber as ‘equals’, saying that ‘voting was a core part of the job’.

He also went on to say that he would not use the Whips office to enforce party discipline and that he saw its role as ‘supporting and enabling colleagues to do their jobs well, and to ensure everyone is supported and respected’.

“The Whips Office should be our HR department, not something to be feared or where discipline is used to stifle debate.”

The former Mayor of Greater Manchester also pledged an overhaul in the way legislation is carried out, telling MPs that he wanted a new approach that meant taking ‘more of a partnership approach to policies and legislation.”

“The usual way of Ministers and civil servants drafting legislation and presenting it as a fait accompli needs to end”, he said. 

“MPs and peers have an important role in improving and shaping legislation, and this is what I will demand from the centre.”

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The countdown has begun. In two weeks’ time, Andy Burnham is expected to become the next Prime Minister. Within Labour’s ranks, some speak of him not only as the saviour of their party, but also the man who can renew the United Kingdom. If he is to live up to those expectations and deliver on his promise of growth in every  postcode, his government will need to take a very different approach to politics. Nowhere will that be tested more than in Wales, where the new Prime Minister will on the one hand face significant challenges, while on the other will also encounter opportunities to demonstrate that his long-held commitment to devolution is more than rhetoric. 

For decades Plaid Cymru has argued that Westminster is a broken system. Burnham’s acknowledgement of that reality in his first major speech last week was therefore welcome. Yet his vision appeared largely focused on England’s “regions” rather than the UK nations. Plaid Cymru has been clear that such a London-centric political system does not work for our communities in Wales – and it is becoming increasingly clear that it’s not just us saying that – Welsh voters agree with us. 

The people of Wales elected Plaid Cymru to form the next Welsh Government with a clear mandate. We have consistently argued that Wales needs stronger powers- in line with those of Scotland- so that we can start  building a better future for our nation. This includes control over rail infrastructure, justice and policing, and the Crown Estate. And this isn’t a case of seeking powers for the sake of it, it is a matter of having the necessary  tools and home-grown finance to unlock opportunities and enable our communities to thrive. If Andy Burnham genuinely wants to improve lives in Wales, the starting point must be respecting this democratic mandate that the people of Wales have given Plaid Cymru. Devolution doesn’t work in Wales unless the Senedd is equipped with the tools necessary to do the job. 

The alternative has done Labour no favours. Keir Starmer’s muscular unionism helped bring Labour’s century long dominance in Wales to an end. A leaked memo exposed a mindset that viewed devolution as an inconvenience rather than a constitutional reality to be respected, urging ministers not to adopt an “overly  deferential” approach to the devolved governments because doing so supposedly created political difficulties. That instinct to centralise decision-making reflected exactly the attitude many people in Wales have experienced too often. 

But will Burnham really be any different? Just this week, Wales Online labelled an opinion-piece from Andy Burnham as ‘error-filled’ in which he listed promises about housing, education and transport, even though these are all devolved issues that come under the responsibility of the Welsh Government. Whether this is through pure ignorance or a deliberate power-grab, it is unfortunately a continuation of the Westminster-knows-best  mentality. At the very least, it is evidence of a surprising and unprofessional ignorance, Burnham has also spoken of extending devolution by “taking power deeper down” to cities and communities beyond the Senedd which also raises concerns about decisions bypassing the Senedd and ultimately undermining our democracy. Plaid Cymru has long endorsed subsidiarity, namely the principle of enabling decisions to be made as close as possible to the people affected by them, but the timing of this announcement feels like a political continuation of former PM Johnson’s deliberate attempts to treat the Senedd as something to be bypassed and belittled.

The current Labour UK Government are well-known for their U-turns, and Andy Burnham has already completed his first in relation to fair funding for Wales before even entering No10. During his 2015 Labour leadership campaign, Burnham acknowledged that Wales had received an unfair share of UK public spending – something he saw while he served as a Treasury minister eight years previously. He pledged that, as leader, he would take steps to address that injustice. Yet only two weeks ago he ruled out reforming Wales’s funding system. Plaid Cymru has long argued that the outdated Barnett Formula should be replaced with a funding system that truly reflects Wales’s needs. If Burnham is serious about delivering growth in every postcode, decentralisation alone will not cut it. Democratic institutions cannot succeed without the resources to match their responsibilities. Plaid Cymru will continue to make the case that Wales needs to be funded fairly to bring real change to our communities. 

It is reassuring that the MP for Makerfield wants to reach out to other parties and the leaders of the devolved  nations to get our politics working again. Constructive relationships are key to making devolution work, with governments approaching each other with mutual parity of respect. Wales’s First Minister, Rhun ap Iorwerth, has also made clear that he stands ready to build a constructive relationship with whoever occupies Number 10. That willingness for a positive and open dialogue should be reciprocated. Otherwise, Westminster’s habit of pernicious adverserialism will continue to work against co-operation. 

So, while we have reasons to be hopeful of the prospect of this new pro-devolution Prime Minister, our  reservations have yet to be proven wrong. The real question for Andy Burnham is whether he can be trusted to approach devolution in the spirit of respect and remain true to what he has championed for years, or will he repeat the mistakes of his predecessor and lose sight of his principles once in power? We live in hope that it is the former, for the sake of our communities.

Image credit: Scottish Government – Creative Commons

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As Burnham prepares to become prime minister in the coming weeks, MPs have urged him to make it an “immediate priority” to introduce proportional representation, rather than waiting for the next election to include the policy as a Labour manifesto commitment. 

The letter was signed by Green MP Ellie Chowns, Lib Dem MP Lisa Smart, Dave Doogan MP, leader of the SNP in the Commons, the leader of Plaid Cymru in the Commons, Liz Saville Roberts MP and Sorcha Edwards MP from the Alliance Party.

The MPs argued that the public’s trust in politics has been eroded, and say proportional representation would help ensure every vote counts at the next election.

The letter states: “We know you have committed in recent months to making proportional representation a future Labour manifesto commitment, but there is no time to lose.

“If we want to ensure our politics is not hijacked by those who seek to divide us, rebuilding trust through a more representative voting system is vital.”

The MPs referred to Burnham voicing support for electoral reform less than two months ago, adding: “You must make clear as Prime Minister that this remains an immediate priority and is front and centre of your plans to restore trust in politics.”

The letter also welcomed Burnham’s support for establishing a national commission on electoral reform, and urged him to set one up soon after becoming prime minister. 

During the Makerfield by-election campaign, Burnham restated his support for changing the voting system to proportional representation.

However, he said in a recent interview with the Observer that he would seek a “popular mandate” to enact voting reform by including the pledge in a manifesto at the next election.

Emma Harrison, the chief executive of campaign group Make Votes Matter, recently told Left Foot Forward that Burnham could change the voting system without a manifesto commitment or a referendum.

Harrison said she understands there is “a question of public legitimacy” but said that is why Votes Not Matter supports a national commission on electoral reform, an independent review which would seek evidence from experts and the views of voters.

She also said while it would be “great” if Burnham puts proportional representation in Labour’s next manifesto, “the urgency is greater than that, and I think the public would agree”.

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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It comes after Keir Starmer announced he would be  stepping down as Prime Minister, with Andy Burnham’s coronation as Labour leader looking increasingly inevitable.

In recent weeks, Burnham has been setting out his policy vision and platform for the country, including greater devolution to regions and mayors as well as the establishment of a ‘Number 10 North’ at the centre of a “rewired Britain”.

He has also vowed to bring water and energy back under public control and to take immediate steps to help families struggling with the cost of living.

And according to the latest Westminster voting intention poll, carried out by Ipsos, Labour is up four points to 24%, while Reform are down one point on 26%.

The Tories meanwhile are on 18% while the Greens are on 13%.

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According to The Telegraph, Burnham is currently reviewing the government’s artificial intelligence strategy, and an aide said he thinks “unfettered tech boosterism” is turning off voters.

The article also notes that during his time as Manchester Mayor, Burnham did not grant the US tech company any contracts.

Palantir has contracts with the Israeli military, which has used its software for its military operations in Gaza, and also with Donald Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the US, which uses it to track and deport people.

In 2023, NHS England awarded a £330 million contract to Palantir to build a data platform to reduce NHS waiting lists.

Multiple figures on the right have reacted furiously to the news that Burnham is looking at scrapping the contract.

Tom Harwood, deputy political editor at GB News, said it was “absurd” and “insane” that Burnham is considering putting a stop to Palantir’s involvement in the NHS.

In a post on X, Harwood said: “This is absurd. Palantir tech saves lives. If the NHS can’t interpret its own data well it will continue to deliver substandard care.

“In Florida, Palantir software has more than halved sepsis deaths. Down 68%. It spots trends early that humans can’t. Abandoning that for ideological reasons is *insane*.”

The owner of GB News, Paul Marshall, owns a hedge fund, Marshall Wallace, which has a stake of over £400 million in Palantir.

In addition, claims that Palantir software cuts waiting lists have also been disputed.

A recent investigation by The Londoner newspaper found that the waiting list at one particular NHS trust, Chelsea and Westminster NHS Trust, has risen by 20,000 despite claims that Palantir’s software reduced it by 183,061.

Susan Hall, leader of the Conservative group at the London Assembly, also defended Palantir, stating: “Why? Palantir are supposed to be the best in their field?”.

Likewise, the director of Thatcherite think tank the Centre for Policy Studies, responded to the reports on X by saying: “Who cares about saving lives when you can pander to the left?”. 

As one X user put it, “Why are the British right always America first?”.

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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Lewis said that Miliband’s appointment is seen as “critical” to Burnham’s government delivering a more progressive economic agenda. 

He told Left Foot Forward: “Most on the Labour left think his appointment is critical to any kind of broadly progressive economic policy that’s going to make the changes Burnham promised in Makerfield on abandoning 40 years of neoliberalism”. 

Burnham, who is expected to take over from Keir Starmer in the coming weeks, is reported to ber considering replacing Rachel Reeves as chancellor.

Shabana Mahmood and Wes Streeting are rumoured to be potential contenders to replace Reeves, but several Labour figures, including Burnham ally Lucy Powell and Baronness Harriet Harman say Miliband should take on the job.

Lewis even suggested Burnham may have chosen James Purnell, who was an ex-minister under Tony Blair and a former corporate lobbyist, as his chief of staff to “placate certain sectors”. 

He said Purnell’s appointment “was an interesting one, not one I would have made”.

However, Lewis stated: “You just don’t know what the tactic is. Is the tactic to placate certain sectors and big corporations, to make political space for Ed Miliband?”. 

“If the roles were reversed and I was there, I would be thinking very carefully about how I made sure there wasn’t a run on the pound and a gilt surge. How do you do that?”.

The Norwich South MP said it would be a different story if they put Purnell as Burnham’s chief of staff and then Wes Streeting was appointed as Chancellor.

“Then you’d start asking questions,” he said, “but we’re not there yet.”

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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The Labour MP for Norwich South made clear that Abbott “should not still be suspended”.

“She should be brought back in,” he said, adding that Burnham “has been clear that Faiza Shaheen and I believe Diane Abbott, that they should be back inside the party if they want”. 

Abbott was suspended for the second time by Keir Starmer in July last year over comments she made about how people of colour experience racism “all their lives”, and that it is different from the “prejudice” experienced by Jewish people, Irish people and Travellers.

Abbott told Channel 4’s Matt Frei that she would like Burnham to reinstate her as a Labour MP. The Hackney North MP has separately said she thinks Burnham should hold a leadership election, instead of just taking over a prime minister. 

Lewis thinks that Burnham should ask Jeremy Corbyn if he wants to rejoin “give his service” and “if that becomes a controversial issue, then ask the membership”. 

The Norwich South MP said he is “pleased” that Burnham said in his speech on Monday that while the “destination” of his government would not be up for discussion “how we get there” is. 

Lewis said Burnham’s approach to party culture is “a sea change from the draconian top-down authoritarianism of Starmer”. 

He added: “That kind of implies you’re not going to be kicked out for discussing things like Gaza or other issues which have been shut down inside the party under the current leadership.”

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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Everything now points towards Andy Burnham becoming Britain’s next Prime Minister within weeks. The real question is no longer whether he gets the keys to Number 10, but what he does once he has them.

From that moment onwards, the countdown to 2029 begins.

The next general election must be held by 2029. Burnham won’t have won a general election. He will have inherited the office of Prime Minister at one of the most turbulent moments in modern British political history, with around three years to convince the country not simply that Labour deserves another term, but that he deserves to remain in Number 10 in his own right.

By the time he walks through that famous black door, he will become Britain’s seventh Prime Minister in just ten years. David Cameron. Theresa May. Boris Johnson. Liz Truss. Rishi Sunak. Sir Keir Starmer. Andy Burnham.

Pause and think about that for a moment. That is the story of a country that has spent a decade searching for stability and, so far, failing to find it. Pivoting from statesman and woman to clowns and frauds. Never to find a solution.

In many respects, merely surviving until the next general election would already place Burnham among the longer-serving Prime Ministers of the past decade. But nobody remembers the politicians who simply keep the seat warm. History remembers those who persuade the British people to renew their contract with them, and if Andy Burnham wants to be spoken about in the same breath as Tony Blair rather than Theresa May, Boris Johnson or Rishi Sunak, then the challenge before him is not becoming Prime Minister. It is winning the country.

And that, I would argue, is where the really interesting question begins.

For the best part of a decade, Andy Burnham has built something in Greater Manchester that very few politicians have managed to achieve anywhere in Britain. He hasn’t simply overseen transport reform, secured devolved powers or championed regeneration projects. Plenty of politicians have delivered individual policies. Burnham has done something rather more significant.

He has built a recognisable political identity around a place.

People often describe it as “Manchesterism”, but I think that slightly misses the point. What Burnham has really created is a politics that feels rooted. It is visible. It is tangible. It is about buses that turn up, town centres that matter, neighbourhood policing, decent housing, culture, football, local pride and civic confidence. Whether you agree with every decision he has taken is almost beside the point. People know what he stands for because they can see it reflected in the place he governs.

That is an increasingly rare quality in modern politics.

The challenge, however, is that Greater Manchester is not Britain, and governing the country is a very different proposition from governing England’s most successful combined authority.

The temptation, of course, would be to try and export Manchester wholesale, but that would be a mistake. The South of England is not crying out to become the North, nor should it. Yet if you spend any time travelling around Essex, Kent, Hampshire, Sussex or the commuter towns surrounding London, you quickly discover that many of the frustrations sound remarkably familiar. Young people wondering whether they will ever own a home. Residents watching high streets slowly lose their identity. Parents struggling to secure NHS appointments. Businesses frustrated by transport networks that simply don’t connect. Communities increasingly feeling that the people making decisions about their future have never really spent any meaningful time there.

Those frustrations are not northern grievances. They are English grievances.

That is why I suspect Burnham’s next political project cannot simply be Manchesterism. It has to become something broader: a modern English politics built around civic pride, local power and visible leadership. Not because every place should look like Manchester, but because every place deserves leaders who care about it as much as Burnham quite obviously cares about Manchester.

There is, however, another challenge waiting for Burnham if he walks into Downing Street, and it has nothing to do with buses, devolution or even Greater Manchester.

It is about Labour itself. Because after years of internal arguments, electoral setbacks and the understandable caution that comes with trying to rebuild credibility, I sometimes wonder whether Labour has forgotten that people don’t simply vote for competence.

They vote for hope. They vote for ambition. They vote for governments that appear willing to reshape the country rather than simply administer it.

People want Labour to be Labour again.

They want the party that founded the NHS when many insisted it could never work. The party that built the New Towns to tackle Britain’s post-war housing crisis. The party that expanded educational opportunity, strengthened workers’ rights, created Sure Start, passed the Equality Act and invested in programmes like Building Schools for the Future because it believed government had both the responsibility and the confidence to improve people’s lives.

Those were not cautious governments.

They were transformative governments.

They were rebellious governments.

They were Labour governments.

They were brave enough to ask not simply what was politically possible, but what Britain actually needed.

Somewhere along the way, Labour became so focused on proving it could be trusted to manage the country that it sometimes forgot people also want it to change the country.

Perhaps that is the lesson for Burnham.

The temptation in Westminster is always to become a different version of yourself. To soften the edges, to speak in ever more carefully tested language and to allow advisers to sand away the very qualities that made people notice you in the first place.

Maybe the trick is simply to let Burnham be Burnham.

One appointment already hints at that possibility. Bringing James Purnell into the heart of the operation is no small decision. Whether you agreed with every aspect of his political career or not, Purnell has long been regarded as one of Labour’s most serious strategic thinkers; somebody who understands both how government works and how political coalitions are built. It is an appointment that speaks of intent rather than inertia, confidence rather than caution. It suggests Burnham understands that winning the leadership is one thing; building a government capable of winning again is something altogether different.

There is another reason why all of this matters.

The next general election will not be won in Manchester, Liverpool or inner London. Labour already knows how to win those places. It will instead be decided in towns that often feel politically homeless; places that are neither metropolitan enough for one political tribe nor rural enough for another. The commuter belts. The coastal towns. The market towns. Places like Basildon, Swindon, Peterborough, Medway, Milton Keynes and dozens more besides, where people are less interested in ideological purity than they are in whether politics can once again become useful.

Listen carefully to what people in those communities actually talk about and it is striking how little of it resembles the arguments that dominate Westminster. They want safe streets. Reliable transport. Homes that their children might realistically be able to afford. GP appointments that don’t require weeks of waiting. Town centres they can once again feel proud of. Above all else, they want somebody who appears to understand the place in which they live.

Burnham instinctively understands this. His politics has always begun with place before party, community before ideology. That is one of the reasons he has become Labour’s most effective communicator since Tony Blair. He speaks like somebody who genuinely enjoys the company of ordinary people rather than someone who has spent too long surrounded by advisers trying to perfect the next soundbite.

Which brings me to Nigel Farage.

Farage’s greatest achievement has never simply been persuading people to vote for him. It has been persuading millions of people that politics stopped listening to them altogether. That argument cannot be defeated by telling voters they are mistaken. It can only be defeated by making it obviously untrue.

Burnham is perhaps uniquely placed within Labour to do exactly that because he is comfortable talking about England, comfortable talking about patriotism and comfortable talking about local identity without ever allowing those conversations to descend into the grievance politics that has become Farage’s stock in trade. He understands that people can be proud of where they come from without believing somebody else has to lose.

If he can take that language into every corner of England, Farage’s politics begins to look less like an unstoppable force and more like a symptom of problems that are finally being addressed.

Of course, none of this will happen through personality alone. Tony Blair’s success was never simply Tony Blair’s success. It was the product of an extraordinary team who complemented one another, challenged one another and understood that government is a collective endeavour. Burnham and Purnell were themselves, advisers in Blair’s Downing Street between 1997 and 2001. Burnham will need exactly the same discipline. He will need advisers prepared to disagree with him, ministers chosen because they can deliver rather than because they happen to be loyal, and mayors and council leaders who feel empowered rather than managed from Whitehall.

Because if there is one lesson from the past decade of British politics, it is surely this. Governments do not fail because they run out of slogans. They fail because they stop building.

Seven Prime Ministers in ten years tells the story of a country still searching for stability.

Andy Burnham’s opportunity is not simply to become the seventh name on that list.

It is to become the first in a generation whose name stays there long enough to change the country.

If he can take the confidence of Manchester and turn it into a new English settlement built on civic pride, devolved power and a Labour Party unafraid to be transformative again, then becoming Prime Minister will simply be the beginning.

Winning the 2029 general election is the moment that will define whether Andy Burnham merely occupied Downing Street…

…or whether he became the first Labour Prime Minister since Tony Blair to build something that truly lasts.

Image credit: Scottish Government – Creative Commons

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It comes after Keir Starmer announced this week that he would be stepping down after pressure from MPs and members of his cabinet, following Andy Burnham’s resounding victory in the Makerfield by-election.

The SCG grouping writes in Trbiune that a ‘change of Labour leadership will happen soon, but that alone will not be enough. Labour needs a fundamental change of direction’.

So what are the SCG demanding? Here’s a list below:

• Equalising Capital Gains Tax and introducing a 2 percent levy on assets worth more than £10 million
• Bringing water and energy into public ownership
• The scrapping of plans for PFI-style schemes to fund new NHS health centres or other public services.
• An emergency package of measures to protect living standards, including a genuine freeze on energy bills, universal free school meals and the expansion of affordable public transport
• An Employment Rights Act 2.0 to ensure the complete delivery of the New Deal for Working People
• A large-scale council house building programme and introduction of rent controls
• Scrapping plans to double the time migrant workers already in our country need to secure settlement
• Oppose any new oil and gas licences and invest in the transition to renewable energy needed to cut emissions,

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Polling firm Find Out Now carried out the poll from 24-25 June in the immediate aftermath of Starmer’s announcement.

The poll found support for Labour is up substantially on a week prior.

The full results of the poll were as follows:

• Reform: 24 per cent
• Labour: 21 per cent
• Tory: 18 per cent
• Green: 15 per cent
• Lib Dem: 12 per cent
• SNP: 3 per cent

That might not seem to be too positive for Labour at a first glance. However, the 21 per cent for Labour is up six points on the 15 per cent Find Out Now had the party on just one week ago.

Reform are down three points on the previous week, the Greens down two points and the Lib Dems down one.

It remains to be seen whether this poll is an outlier or instead part of a wider trend.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

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