Labour MP stands aside as Andy Burnham eyes return to Parliament

[Twiglets1]

A scandal-hit Labour MP will give up his seat to make way for Andy Burnham, in the Manchester mayor’s first step to challenging Sir Keir Starmer for No 10.

Josh Simons, a former minister, said on Thursday that he was “standing aside so that Andy Burnham can return to his home, fight to re-enter Parliament, and if elected, drive the change our country is crying out for”.

It will trigger a by-election in the Greater Manchester constituency of Makerfield, which has been held by the Labour Party since it was created in 1983.

Mr Simons is a former minister who was forced to resign over his involvement in a smear campaign against journalists carried out while he ran the think tank Labour Together.

“It is my unwavering belief that nothing short of urgent, radical, courageous reform will make a difference,” he said. “That must start with a change in leadership.”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/05/14/keir-starmer-live-rayner-wes-streeting-leadership-contest/

Actually no, not yet. But he will need to change job and become an MP before he can launch a leadership challenge against Starmer.

Which he won't necessarily win but must be pretty confident he can win, to give up the Mayor job.

This is a very clever move by Burnham and Labour.

Internal polling suggests he's going to win - so he'll be able to show the country that he can beat Reform.

That's important.

If Maggie Oliver goes for it (as have seen mentioned elsewhere today) would be a very interesting contest between the KotN who has done nothing for the protection of all those exploited and abused working class girls, and Maggie who has worked relentlessly and tirelessly to get justice at enormous personal and professional cost to her.

Maggie Oliver as a Reform candidate, or as an independent?
Either way, I think Burnham is weak on women's issues. Not just his failure to address the rape gangs but he's a 'trans ally' etc. Which is another Labour Achilles heel and voters are sick to the back teeth with it. Reform could do worse than run a high-profile woman in the by-election who is prepared to speak out on these things. Matt Goodwin was a daft choice for Gorton and Denton.

If I remember rightly, they tried to oust John Major in a similar way.He famously told them to put or shut up.
He carried on until the next GE , which Labour won.

If Labour think that moving more to the left is a good thing then they are clearly tone deaf.

There is a silent majority that want common sense when it comes to trans women, the boats crossings , the rape gangs.

Simply ignoring these issues doesn’t work anymore. Thats why Reform are doing well and you have the likes of Tommy Robinson with mass followers.

If Labour think they can ignore these issues they have learnt nothing and don’t deserve to be in government.

Most of what you are talking about here are issues made up to appeal to thick fascists or caused by the very people complaining about them in the first place (Brexit). Most people who are not easily swayed by social media dog whistles are interested in Education, Health, and the cost of living, like they always were. Any party is going to have to worry about that while operating in the current international climate, like they always did. I for one would rather that we spend money on ensuring the social safety net is more secure when the world gets less secure. I think this Andy Burnham stuff is a distraction based on in-party fighting and is very tiresome but I don't think that because of AB's left wing views.

Agree with this. Very silly games and political manoeuvring. Dirty business.

Surely Streeting doesn't have 81 backers? Presumably people can only back one person? Burnham would be taking a huge risk if Streeting already had the numbers.

I'm Team Starmer in this whole sorry debacle.

I guess we will find out who has which backers.

I think it's conceivable that both Streeting and Burnham could get 81 backers.

Streeting and Rayner have said now that they're backing Burnham. (In the by election). The whole business looks as if it's been cooked up to depose Starmer as quickly as possible. Yet I don't think he's Labour's biggest problem somehow. I don't think we've learned anything since Johnson - another popular mayor, clubbable charismatic type who didn't have what it takes to be PM.

Oh have they? I went out and things seemed to have changed ...

Are you saying the rape gangs were made up?

Neither are the other things you mention made up, just because you don't deem them important.

I am surprised Streeting can get even 1. It appears online that he is backing Burnham himself.

I'm saying that Reform has made up the causes of them and dressed that cause up as an issue to appeal to racists.

Think you're allowing your own feelings towards Streeting to affect reality that he does have lots of allies.

According to the BBC, Streeting backs Burnham for the by-election in Makerfield saying he has "the best chance of winning."

You'd have to have been living under a rock to know why the truth about the rape gangs was suppressed for so long! I don't under the point you are making.

What’s your feeling on Burnham winning? It’s interesting to hear from someone who’s actually in the area.

What has Reform made up about the causes of the rape gangs?

They can only back one person but they can say they’ll back more than one person. MPs will hedge their bets until the last minute as they will want to back the winner with an eye to positions in government. A lot probably won’t care who the best person actually is.

I’m a Labour supporter and from an area near to Makerfield - I think the timing and method of this is reckless. Burnham has done great things in Greater Manchester, but let’s also remember he has previously lost two party leadership elections. He also voted for the Iraq war and against an investigation into it; I think there are many voters who will never be able to reconcile their vote with that choice.

By-elections should be done out of necessity not as a stepping stone to power. Aswell as being an expensive and risky process, what about the commitment he made when he chose to run as mayor? There’s an arrogance in this and a sense of Labour politicians taking votes for granted, which has made people in former Labour strongholds angry for a long time.

Burnham may well be judged to be the best candidate to lead Labour into the next election, but this route has done him no favours, and it’s damaging to both national interests and the party to do it now and in this way.

There must be a lot of fascists, as your call them then because Farage’s party did rather well recently.
Many polls suggest that if there was a GE now, Reform would be the largest party but not a majority.

Regarding the cost of living, this has been going on since Covid , it’s a red herring. There isn’t a cost of living crisis any more, it’s the new normal.

Food and goods are more expensive, it’s not going to get better. A tin of beans that was 25p for example is now 50p.

Fuel prices will remain high aslong as there
is unrest around the world , which won’t end anytime soon.

A crisis would suggest a short time shock - I don’t men it anymore it’s just a soundbite.

Things are dearer , they’ll never change , we have to get used to it.

And I don’t think any better right or left will change that anytime soon.

They have vastly simplified it into a race war. Anyone who has done any work at all on this knows that it's a really complex issue and both victims and perpetrators are all sorts of people.

I realised I'm simplifying it myself in my previous posts. My view is that Reform is using those victims' suffering for their own racist purposes. I'm not sure it's worth my time getting into it on here anyway to be honest. I certainly don't have time to do justice to it now.

I think you're skating on very thin ice referring to the victims as "all sorts of people".

The sort of people they are in the context of gang rapes is victims, and that's all that matters, not making judgements about the sort of people they are.

Wasn’t it Blair and Brown that brought in privatisation in the NHS? Andy Burnham was health secretary during some of that period.

Wouldn’t that make Burnshm partly responsible then for NHS privatisation?