There is little to suggest from the speed and brutality of Keir Starmer’s demise and the termination of a sixth Prime Ministerial tenure since June 2016 (by contrast the five previous Prime Ministers spanned a period of over 37 years) that the UK electorate is anything other than impatient and volatile. Andy Burnham arrives on the scene with such exulted expectations, but may soon find to his cost that turbulence is the new norm in British politics.
Aged 56, Burnham was a cabinet Minister during the entirety of the Gordon Brown administration (2007-2010) when he held three roles briefly (at Health, DCMS and as Chief Secretary to the Treasury); he was subsequently defeated twice (2010 and 2015) in attempts to become Labour Party leader in Opposition. Shortly after that second loss (to Jeremy Corbyn in a contest when he had begun as strong favourite) he bowed out of national politics and became the inaugural metro mayor for Greater Manchester. He hails from the North West; this is the location of the parliamentary constituency he represented between 2001 and 2017 and since his sensational re-election for Makerfield on 18 June.
Over the past five years or so I have served on the Board of a public company in Salford. As a result I regularly visit the Manchester business district. The sense of energy there is infectious – infrastructure building continues apace and the sight of cranes as far as the eye can see is matched only in central London. Andy Burnham’s Mayoralty built effectively on the foundations of Manchester’s renaissance under the visionary leadership of Howard Bernstein, who was the council’s Chief Executive for over two decades. Burnham’s executive power (like that of all our high-profile Mayors) has always been strictly limited; he managed a relatively tiny annual budget of £3bn, with little discretionary spending and a heavy reliance on Treasury largesse within the limited constraints of his policy authority. Nevertheless, Burnham was well suited as a figurehead for optimism, municipal pride and enthusiastic hope for the Manchesterism brand. He also used the role as a pulpit to make the populist case that the elites back in Westminster have been are to blame for the UK’s travails. Before long, of course, this will make it all the more difficult to evade responsibility now that he is firmly in charge.
The truth is that from the moment Burnham turned his back on Westminster there was a keen sense that his pursuit of the party leadership was unfinished business. His critics in the Labour Party (a larger group than today’s apparent unity in its ranks would suggest) resent the presumption of Burnham and his team that he alone is suitably qualified to take on the mantle of the highest office. After all he absented himself from the hard graft undertaken by many others on the long march back to electability during and after the Corbyn era and the tough first two years back in government. Skedaddling off on a near decade-long series of photo opportunities as the self-styled King of the North means that Burnham has less goodwill in reserve with his new parliamentary colleagues than is widely assumed. This will particularly apply to those in Starmer’s ministerial team whom Burnham sidelines in creating his own first frontbench now that his putsch has finally been executed. When the going gets tough, as it surely will, the skin-deep, transactional nature of Burnham’s support will matter.
In truth despite the headlong rush to a coronation the Labour parliamentary party remains riven by deep ideological, factional and personal divisions. But in its collective desperation to escape from the grinding malaise of its time back in office and to find an antidote to the existential threat posed by Reform UK, it has latched itself on to what it believes to be a winner. By triumphing at last month’s by-election Burnham established his credentials both as politically courageous and as the only leading government party figure with a track record of vanquishing Reform UK.
It is all uncannily reminiscent of the desperation that Conservative MPs found themselves in as Theresa May’s hapless premiership ran out of steam in mid-2019 amidst deadlock over Brexit strategy. Seven summers ago when the overriding issue in their minds was winning back voters lost to Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party at the calamitous final set of European Parliamentary elections, the Conservatives also promoted from outside the cabinet another former city mayor, Boris Johnson. With one bound their electoral prospects were apparently transformed; in Johnson’s case his limitations were not unknown (and would eventually bring his administration crashing down) but before that year was out he had asserted his authority by calling and winning a General Election. Despite all the assurances to the contrary, Andy Burnham may yet be tempted to take a page from the same playbook in the months ahead if the anticipated honeymoon in the opinion polls gives him that opportunity.
During a political career that spans the entirety of his adulthood, Burnham has shown little evidence of being comfortable embracing the sense of disappointment and accusations of betrayal that come with holding high political office in the social media era. His easy charm and natural people-pleasing personality turns to prickliness whenever he or his record are questioned. Little in his past suggests that he recognises, yet alone has experience of handling, the excruciatingly difficult political trade-offs that he will face from day one as Prime Minister.
For the stark truth is that the UK has run out of money. In such circumstances any new Prime Minister’s room for manoeuvre would be horribly limited; for a Labour premier this presents especial challenges. Deeply engrained in the UK’s political consciousness is that left-of-centre governments cannot be fully trusted with protecting the public finances (one of the reasons why the Starmer/Reeves administration has been so obsessively slavish at following its fiscal rules and keeping the international financial markets on board). Meanwhile embedded in the DNA of most Labour MPs – the 400 or so people who have just elevated Mr Burnham to his current position – is an abiding commitment to enhancing the living standards of the most vulnerable in society. Regardless of the cost to the public purse, because in their world view when it comes to tax, ‘the rich just need to pay their fair share’ and all will be well.
Whilst no-one wished to replicate the period of political paralysis that afflicted the nation during 2022 when the then Conservative government was convulsed following the defenestration of Boris Johnson, the protracted leadership contest which produced Liz Truss and within a further seven weeks her replacement by Rishi Sunak, the absence of a fully-fledged national contest this time round has deprived party members, voters and business of scrutiny of Burnham’s and rival programmes. By the same token the international financial markets would probably have taken fright as ever more reckless promises about public spending deigned to appeal to Labour Party stalwarts risked being made alongside threats of wealth taxes, rent and price freezes, further strategic stakeholding in business and an array of other leftist populism.
However, any prospective Prime Minister ideally needs the time and space to prepare a considered programme for government over several months rather than being rapidly thrown into the maelstrom of brutal 24/7 political scrutiny. The accelerated timetable means that the towering and excessively optimistic expectations that surround Andy Burnham will not have been dialled down as he assumes office. He brings fresh energy, drive and a renewed sense of hope; in contrast to his predecessor, he is a skilled communicator, comfortable with modern social media. But the underlying challenges facing the nation remain brutal. If in the months ahead he is seen to offer only continuity and further decline there will quickly be a doubling down of the existing sense of public anger and dismay.
That is not to say that his team lack the determination to hit the ground running. A new devolutionary statement is designed to reduce the London-centric dominance of the UK state; in repudiating the last 45 years of Thatcherite economics, selective renationalisation and the imposition of windfall taxes will be the order of the day. Over the past two years the Starmer administration has been more left-wing and redistributive than many people realise – or at least those who have not already left these shores; if Burnham is true to his word he will double down on this. His natural interventionism will extend to trying to square the circle of urgent demand for more defence spending by creating a new class of bond. Whilst the government’s fiscal position is already close to the edge of market tolerance, they will give him certain leeway even with a radical, redistributive agenda provided it is accompanied by convincing programmes for economic growth and keeping welfare spending in check. But the suggestion from one of his most prominent parliamentary supporters that ‘the markets will have to fall in line’ would be laughable if it were not so serious. Nothing summarises more succinctly the utter disconnect between the political class and the real world of business (and so much else) beyond.
Burnham’s choice of Chancellor is the key indication as to whether he genuinely seeks to implement a long overdue rebalancing of power away from Whitehall towards the regions or if the stifling influence of Treasury orthodoxy will once again win through. In truth in this day-one decision he will demonstrate whether his warm words on the campaign trail are matched by a sense of purpose and ruthlessness. Nevertheless, the parlous state of the public finances have been highlighted by dire borrowing figures in May, pessimist outlooks over recent weeks from the OECD and OBR and the realisation that much of the fiscal impact of the war in Iran is still to land. So take with the usual pinch of salt any reassurance that there is additional ‘headroom’ within the public finances – this is only ever achieved by sleight of hand in forecasting figures four or five years hence rather than reflecting the fiscal here-and-now.
I wonder too whether he will seek to emulate Gordon Brown’s initial Big Tent approach by reaching out to figures across traditional party lines in order to de-stabilise further the Conservatives. Watch as leading figures from the Cameron-era who have recently organised in the Prosper UK ginger group are picked off to take on advisory, commission and perhaps even Ministerial roles.
What I fervently hope and expect is that we will soon hear more about plans to enhance further the UK’s place in the global AI eco-system. The opportunities here remain immense; our approach should have more in common with the American passion for innovation and even with China’s current drive towards open source than with the EU’s more regulatory model (another reason why talk of a return to the bloc is both unrealistic and unwise). Much of the security, scientific and technology platform behind key AI models has been initiated and adapted in UK universities and spin-outs. Worryingly Burnham appears to pay undue attention to siren voices from trades union leaders about the threat to jobs from Big Tech and the undesirability of datacentre development; yet for all the talk of the UK creating its own ‘AI sovereignty’ the fact is that within this critical economic, military and security sector interdependence of risk and regulation will have to be skilfully negotiated. However, only a robust mix of public and private investment in this sphere has the capacity to deliver the levels of economic growth that underpin many of the spending commitments that ministers in the new administration will enthusiastically introduce in the months that lie ahead.
But what does yet another change at the top of government tell us about public life in modern day Britain? I fear that the role and typical tenure of a Prime Minister today speaks less to that of international statesman than of the beleaguered manager of a struggling football club with its impatient owners and fanbase baying for instant gratification and success. The fault, in truth, lies with us all; we need to recognise that the prospects for this country are bleak unless we break out of this destructive cycle.
Written on 16 July 2026 by The Rt Hon Mark Field, former Member of Parliament (MP) for Cities of London and Westminster and Consultant at Buchler Phillips, an independent boutique firm with an impeccable Mayfair London heritage, specialising in corporate recovery, turnaround, restructuring and insolvency.