To think Andy Burnham is doing a decent job so far?

By refusing to rule out more tax hikes? You might be happy with that. The hard workers and achievers are about to be hit again.

Firstly, I really don’t think it’s true that any politician can make themselves popular by promising to spend more money: Boris Johnson promised and spent massive amounts of public money and it didn’t make him popular. And more importantly - as posts like your own demonstrate - promising to spend lots of money automatically makes you UNpopular with huge swathes of fiscally conservative voters.

The art of politics is first identifying and speaking to the public’s concerns - and then actually solving those problems, in a tangible way. After a week, Andy Burnham’s clearly only at the first part and I - and a lot of other people, across the political spectrum from what I’ve seen, to be fair - think he’s doing an exceptionally good job of reading and speaking to the public mood, and communicating his response.

Obviously, the true test will be actually delivering - and doing so without triggering unexpected tax or debt crises. But we just do not know whether he can do that or not yet, therefore claims he definitely won’t be able to are - by nature - hypothetical.

I have no interest in Reform, but if you simply wish take a negative for them as a positive for Labour, you might be disappointed.

I don't know!

Did they offer?

Did she invite them to work with her?

I think you might be wrong. Farage's inspired 😃 move to call a by-election, the ongoing investigations into his and Tice's financial affairs and Reform's slow slide down the polls are all good news for Labour.

Interesting times.

I have never particularly liked Andy Burnham , and I don’t like how he became PM, AND I didn’t actually vote Labour in the last GE… but I am agreeing with a lot of what he has been saying , and the decisions made so far seem sensible and in line with a just left of centre government, which is what I think we need.

So yeah, I (somewhat grudgingly) do think he is doing a decent job so far!

Any politician can make themselves popular by promising to spend more money to solve everyone's problems. What we've heard nothing is how he plans for fund the extra spending at the same time as dealing with the country's enormous 3 TRILLION pound debt and 120 billion annual interest payments (more than education budget). It's a double whammy and needs to be paid for somehow.

Had Labour and the Libdems worked with Teresa May in 2017, the social care crisis may be solved by now.

Well, yes but I think that’s because a lot of the negativity and criticisms on this thread are - at the moment - hypothetical. He might end up being bad at some of the things people are suggesting he’ll be bad at - but we haven’t seen that yet.

His job right now is to show the public who he is and what he stands for, and get buy-in to his political vision, in order to shore up as much good will as he can, to make the policy shifts he wants and needs to make.

And if I’m honest, I’d say he’s doing a fairly indisputably good job at that.

I like the idea of more cross party working - less point scoring and more problem solving.
Number 10 North is an interesting idea - I’m not against it, but I’d like to be reassured that Burnham is also considering the interests of other regions - and understands that their needs are very different to Manchester’s.
I didn’t like the way Starmer was pushed out and I thought it was unnecessary but it’s already obvious that Andy Burnham is much more charismatic and skilled at PR. He has reinvigorated politics and has already suggested some good changes eg to education and drilling in the North Sea. Appointing Healey as the exchequer was an excellent idea. I don’t like the sound of Ed Milliband as foreign secretary though - it would have been far better to leave Yvette Cooper in that job.
Personally, I welcome no VAT on electricity and £2 bus fares but they do look a bit like stunts/bribes to win over voters. He needs to show us how he’s going to pay for it all and most importantly how he is going to drive economic growth.

As I’ve already tried to point out, no work has started. He just has a commitment from others to collude in seeking some alleviation to the current issues. All ifs and maybes.
Note I say alleviation - thinking a total solution will be achieved in deluded.

I hope he fixes it. My point was any policy where the biggest winners are wealthier families and the losers are less wealthy families is going to be a hard sell to get though. Care is one area where because it is paid directly it is very obvious that people pay different amounts for the same service. But the same applies to most services the wealthy pay far for the benefit of the NHS than those who don't work, yet get the same service, but if you put forward a policy that said lets balance that out would be uproar.

There is no solution to this that will not cost money and that the public (or should I say anti Labour press) will not therefore dislike. He is at least conducting a formal consultation with other parties to reach a consensus in a bit to stop short term ism on this subject.

As for Streeting would anyone like to comment on the Omni Shambles that is the NHS restructuring with the removal of NHS England, and its impact on commissioning services?

But is that going against the manifesto which got Labour into power?

I liked Starmer and think given time he would have proved his worth, indeed he was in many ways, it just wasn't reported.

It feels too easy to just jump in with all these unfunded ideas and the hints of tax rises (the old "difficult decisions" quote yesterday screams of that) - Starmer could have done that but he was sticking to the manifesto pledges.

I find it annoying because all it will mean in the long run is that Labour will become unpopular again & will lose the next election when we could have been a bit more considered (which Starmer was) & been in longer.
I fear Burnham will be popular for a short time but as soon as it hits people in the pocket, which it will have to with all his plans, then it will be a different story.

But I would love to be wrong.

Teresa May was not in a position to do much about it as she was battered by Brexit shenanigans. Let’s give AB a decent run at it before dismissing him.

Too early to tell how he's doing when it's unfavourable feedback. Not too early to tell when it's favourable. I'm not surprised at the vote.

He’s clearly very likeable and competent but not sure he’s PM level competent, and I don’t want to go back to 1970 (and nobody outside of his constituency voted for him).

Ten percent tax blanket tax on inheritance won’t really hurt anyone? Agree on Starmer though he was doing a good job . I like AB too that said.

Numerous PMs have been talking about it. Teresa May lost her majority because she made fixing it a core manifesto pledge.

The best summary I heard so far is that current model means care is paid for at the cost of inheritance rather than shared by everyone. It is essentially an inheritance tax but the amount you pay depends on how much you need care. This means that any change to widen the funding means it is whose who might inherit (who by definition are the better off) who benefit and those who wouldn't inherit that will be worse off. Labour will stuggle to solve it since any solution will be less "socialist".

Hear hear or here here ( I never know which one it is ) totally totally agree !!
they should all be ashamed that nothings been done and not have petty arguments now so it draws out forever.

Tbf I was specifically asking the person who said reform should be there. I'd love to know who from reform she would like to see there.

I see in the news this morning hes postponing anything to do with assisted dying bill until the social care system is sorted out. So, thats been kicked into the never never then.

Social Care is devolved so no point including the Scottish or NI parties.