To ask if you watched Andy Burnham’s bloody good speech?

[Househunt2026]

As in actually watched it and didn’t just doom scroll the commentary? It was bold and honest and pragmatic and actually made me hopeful that we have someone at the helm with a vision for a better tomorrow who has Britain’s best interests at heart.

The National Care Service is a masterstroke, paid for out of scrapping the triple lock and the very real savings of reducing NHS bills on A&E and hospital beds for elderly who should be in care but have nowhere to go.

Scrapping right to buy and increasing council control of housing, boosting the technical education track for young people, pushing renewables, nuclear and energy sovereignty, public control of key utilities for water to get bills down and reduce pollution, investing in people & getting them back to work, leasehold reform by Christmas and everyone’s energy bill will be reduced by fast tracking decoupling energy prices from global gas pricing and by having no VAT on energy bills by TOMORROW!

You can watch the whole thing here and be directly informed instead of getting your perspective filtered through all the bots and misinformation peddlers online m.youtube.com/watch?v=jyjTT_55Gi0

This isn't actually about 'Ethel' anyway. If she needs to move out of her home because her needs can no longer be met there, she has no further need for it. The vast majority of people in care homes are within a few years of the end of their lives, or have very limited capacity, and are sadly are no longer able to benefit from their wealth. The main priority is a system that provides comfort and safety for the remainder of their lives.
The push back about using assets to pay for care isn't to protect older people who've worked all their lives, it's to protect their beneficiaries.
So the question really should be, should the current generation of tax payers pay for care, so that some people get a windfall that they haven't worked for at all?
This is a discussion worth having, but it should be framed honestly in terms of who we're really protecting.

Well he had to make his first speech as the PM at conference. In the city his father grew up in. Three days before his funeral.
Speaking on an agenda that his father strongly believed in.
To not mention his father would be weird.
Any which way I liked most of what he had to say and as a floating voter, am currently much happier with the current government than I have been for a very long time.

Sure, I remember it well (I was celebrating at the time!), but Thatcher had nothing to gain from it. Most people can tell (or at least sense) when another human’s behaviour is performative. As I said, some people will interpret Burnham differently and that’s ok.

She was leaving.

By definition, she had no political power with the public at that point.

How on earth does that compare with Burnham crying at his first ever national speech as PM?

I remember. I howled with laughter.

To not mention his father would be weird.

It really wouldn't.

Like many others, I want my political leaders to make decisions with cold hard reason, not emotion.

Either you disapprove of public displays of emotion or you don’t. 🤷‍♀️

Or perhaps it’s a bit more nuanced than that.

To show no emotion is 'robotic' to show emotion about a parents death is 'unprofessional'.
For those who hate the government/Labour/Burnham no behaviour will fail to provide grist for the mill. So these comments are of little value in an assessment of the quality of the speech, and its reception amongst the general public who haven't strong bias. Which has been very positive.

Theresa May cried too.

The disapproval was not of public displays of emotion.

It was of a public display of emotion used in order to influence voter behaviour.

Margaret Thatcher had no influence over public behaviour to achieve political aims at that time. What Burnham did was not in any way comparable with Margaret Thatcher crying in a car driving her away from her political life.

And so did Keir Starmer, or very nearly. All three when leaving office.

Of course it wouldn’t be odd to not mention it. It works in the speech for some, not everyone.

Many prime ministers cry when they deliver their leaving speech. In most cases I think it’s from relief! Starmer looked like the weight of the world had been lifted from him.

Cameron went off whistling (or something like that, can't quite remember) after leaving us all in the shit. What a fucker.

I don’t truly understand the constant look-backs to Thatcher etc. When will it end?

Her tears were self-indulgent but predicated on being removed from office i.e. they were self-pitying and she wasn’t try to make policy or manipulate voters.

Tell me you can discern the difference with Burnham’s theatrics?

Starmer - the PM that never was.

I’m no fan of Cameron, but I think the famous humming incident was a sign of relief. His tone was very different when he actually announced his resignation.

I think that was the public. Re weight being lifted plus relief.

I disagree and particularly in comparison to his recent predecessors.

I maintain that Starmer was wholly unsuited to being PM - his record, tenure, lack of narrative support that.

Those same posters who are now banging the Burnham drum, do so partly on his supposed oratory skills. Coming after Starmer, the most taciturn speaker would look favourable.

It was the same for Starmer anyway, apparently he wasn’t going anywhere and was great.

He was a coward who went off to "put his trotters up" as someone famously once said.

Having said that, he was a better Tory leader and PM than those who came after him.

^This 💯. His dad had just died and he had just become PM. Quite frankly I’d be amazed if he didn’t feel emotional at that moment, as he’s human.

It also isn’t something that I’ve spent a lot of time mulling over since then, tbh.

The difference for me is that one was a woman who stood there like a stone when faced with all sorts of suffering on the part of others, the only thing moving her to tears was her own loss of power. So while not 'performative' demonstrates character.
While the other is clearly a man given to displaying a more emotional side in general. We have seen his frustration, anger, warmth, excitement, concern, passion and now grief. Whether this is genuine or a curated persona, it's shown consistently and clearly who he is/intends to be. And some people like that a lot.