Andy Burnham’s coup

[Sandysandybeaches]

I’m feeling increasingly annoyed and worried about this.
He seems like a decent chap and clearly popular in Manchester but it feels increasingly ‘off’ that he is arriving like done kind of messiah to save us all. It feels like an arrogance and very undemocratic. Were there really no Labour mps up to the job?
His aims and vision sound great but there was nothing about how he’ll actualy achieve it and I worry that people will soon feel let down and the trust in mainstream parties will be broken even further.

Thr focus on Manchester I find worrying from someone who wants to run the entire country. How does an extra layer of admin in other place help everyone else who still lives somewhere peripheral? No offence to Mancunians but they’re even further from me than London and I am not interested in the place, in fact it sounds like rural areas, the south west and north east will be even more ignored.

It does feel increasingly like a bloodless coup.

'The media' is the usual answer.

This exactly.

Realistically any such effort would have to be in an already big and well connected city. Leeds might also be feasible, Rotherham and Hull no. Newcastle is an interesting idea. But I think the idea is that if the UK is to become less London centric, that's more likely to work by concentrating some things in one other location big enough for them to have a cumulative impact, rather than spreading them too thinly and diluting the effect.

Fwiw I'm in GM and I wonder whether this would just get in the way!

London, it’s great thanks. Is that all Labour acolytes have left?

What a shame for them.

I haven't always voted Labour but I am idealogically left leaning so have voted for them more than anyone else.

I hate this. I hate that Starmer wasn't given more time. I hate that the party allowed itself to be told he was doing a bad job by the press. It's clear he made mistakes but on balance, I think he was doing pretty well, espcially on foreign policy and immigration, although you'd never know it from the reporting.

I hate that this man is being annoited, when he has previously insisted unelected PMs have no manadate and there should be a GE. If he can be so two faced about that, what else will he be dishonest about? And I hate the fact that for personal gain, he abandoned his role in Manchester, and that the sitting MP in Makerfield "volunteered" to step down. It doesn't feel like democracy, and I wanted to believe they would be better than the last lot.

Apparently Labour have nothing to do with ousting their own leader.

’lol’ as @patootieswould use.

Opposition politicians are constantly whining about the need for an urgent general election. It's arguably their job.

I don't see much point in either paying attention to it, unless it does reach such a point that they might succeed, or in expecting consistency from any of them. I'm not saying every single MP who's ever been in the Opposition then governing party has done it, but enough of them have.

@Beamsss I hate that this man is being annoited, when he has previously insisted unelected PMs have no manadate and there should be a GE.

Has anyone seen any proof that Burnham has done this? I have seen evidence of Rayner's SM but no proof of Burnham - I think he should be challenged on that if it is a fact.

That chart is really fascinating, but I don't think the Labour leader is beholden to what policies IPSOS do or don't think are major - they are beholden to the principles outlined in the manifeso their party was elected on, and the word devolution really does appear in the 2024 manifesto A LOT of times.

I'd love to see Andy Burnham call - and win - a general election in the near future, but in the meantime, my personal belief is that under our current political system - where we vote for governing parties rather than Primeministers, and where the party's manifestos serve as the core agreement between them and the electorate - he does have a mandate to pursue the vision he has set out.

Well yes. It’s an endless game along with “the Minister should resign!”. Opposition doesn’t have many tunes to play. And you’ve heard them before.

Andy Burnham is at least shrewd enough as possible Labour PM to have a big policy for his opponents to attack rather than the man himself, which is what happened to Starmer. Thing is, he doesn’t have very much time to deliver.

He is being challenged on it, all the papers have it over the last couple of days. There is more, but here is his Tweet from Jul 2022, when Johnson became Conservarive leader.

But if there's no change to the manifesto i.e. he's not going to do anything different, why change the leader? Or, how will changing the leader make a difference?

I suppose we will have to agree to disagree. I don't believe he has the mandate and I think most of the population will agree with me.

I actually believe he should call an election for his own sake too though. You can't make out that you are a candidate for change with a new bold vision for the country and then pretend it all can be delivered on the old mandate. It makes no sense. It will get people's backs up and he will get attacked from all sides. He won't be able to go far enough for his supporters as he will face constant criticism about the lack of mandate but any changes he does make will be instantly called undemocratic. The property tax in particular will be hugely unpopular and will cause all the a London voters and Labour MPs a great deal of pain. It's hard to do that when you have been voted into power but much harder when nobody actually voted for you or the policy.

Part of me would be interested to see what would happen if a GE were called now! With Reform struggling a bit, there's a parallel universe where Burnham does it soon and gambles that he'll get 5 more years as PM in a coalition because anti-Reform tactical voting continues.

But I guess a lot of people just want a bit of stability, which is understandable! I think a common normie position is probably not a fucking nother PM how many is that now could it not all just go away for a bit.

That’s a good question - and I don’t have much skin in the game, I’m not a Labour Party member and didn’t have a strong opinion on whether they should change leader, although I personally prefer Andy Burnham to Starmer.

I guess the hope he is a much more convincing orator and better able to connect with the electorate. I also get the impression Starmer had “lost the dressing room” - he’d lost the confidence of his MPs in a way that makes it impossible to drive change.

House prices and rent costs are either frozen or falling across the UK, after their historic peak in recent years.

The jobs market is suffering from the wider economy being impacted largely by both fuel prices going crackers and also overpopulation (mostly immigration driven but also due to centralisation of most wealth) of most of England, which is reducing vacancies and driving down wages of middle earners.

If it is not broken do not fix it. Do not let a lot of people who oppose you how to fix things. This is how power is lost. Andy Burnham is not stupid. Some of his opponents seem to be, however

I'm not saying he will do it!

My Dad, who is a stereo typical grumpy old man who has moved further and further right as he's got older, thinks labour will win because all the left leaning parties (Greens, Lib Dems, Labour) will conspire to keep Reform out....and that will be anti democratic.

What gives you that idea (on both points)?

He wanted to be PM well the job is and always has been in London , all this moving up North will be huge added expense and layer of bureaucracy.

That shouldn’t be allowed . He wants the top job but to remain Manchester nope that’s not how it works.

I’m not convinced by him at all he wouldn’t take questions yesterday; I think he’s bitten off way more than he can chew.

"He as thick as two short planks. Thankfully be a general election soon or we are all doomed."

Well that's not true. I don't like what he's doing but he's clearly not thick. He's managed to get himself in this position for a start, and he went to Cambridge from state schools.

It is a worry how many people seem to assume working class northern accent = thick. Or even working class accent. Even the working classes seem to subconciously think power should sit wit posh people.

Look the thick comment reflects more on the poster who made it than Andy Burnham, I feel.

I can certainly see a 'leftish' coalition happening.

The job market is fucked because of regulation and tax/NI burden on employers increasing.

Govt were warned.