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Burnham to say his government will be ‘unashamedly Labour’ in first speech as party leader
Good morning. Today the Labour party is going to formally announce at a “special conference” that Andy Burnham is its new leader. We will get a speech from Burnham at that event, and then he is expected to give another speech at an event later this afternoon.
As Kiran Stacey and Rowena Mason report, in his special conference speech Burnham will say he will lead a government that will have the “courage to fix the big things that politics has neglected” and the “conviction to argue for our plans”.
According to an overnight briefing, Burnham will also promise that the party under his leadership will be “unashamedly Labour in our priorities and in the decisions we take, putting people and places at the heart of everything we do”.
But Burnham does not actually get to start forming his government until Monday, when he will be appointed prime minister, take over in No 10 and start appointing his government.
Burnham’s communication via social media has been excellent in recent weeks and we saw another example last night when he posted video of himself in Cardiff holding an “Ask Andy Anything” event, sitting on a chair on the main pedestrianised shopping street and speaking to people passing by. “Ask Andy Anything” is not an invitation he has extended to journalists like Nick Robinson or Beth Rigby recently (he has done very little media as he has been planning for government), and if anyone did ask him who he was going to appoint as chancellor, the answer did not make it into the final video.
But there was a tantalising hint as to one of his priorities when he asked about social care. Burnham said that his father has Alzheimer’s and that as a result he was very familiar with the problems in the social care system. “If there’s one area that I’m going to expend quite of a lot of social capital [on], it’s going to be on social care,” he said.
Here are the key timings for the day.
Noon: Labour holds its special conference to announce Burnham as leader. Lucy Powell, the deputy Labour leader, Shabana Mahmood, chair of the national executive committee (as well as home secretary, and possible next chancellor), and Hollie Ridley, the outgoing general secretary, are all due to speak as well as Burnham.
2.30pm: Burnham is due to give a speech in the south-east of England.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (between 10am and 3pm), or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary.
I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.
Key events
A handful of pro-Palestine protesters gathered outside ahead of a special conference to officially make Andy Burnham Labour leader, the Press Association reports. They held up a banner reading “stop arming Israel”.
Burnham says his premiership will be about ‘changing how Britain is governed’
Andy Burnham has been posting on social media.
He posted this a few minutes ago.
The next few days are about more than changing who governs Britain.
They’re about changing how Britain is governed.
And then he posted a link to a livestream of the special conference, saying:
This is our chance to put power back where it belongs.
Here is the scene at Labour’s special conference, where journalists are waiting for Andy Burnham. In their London Playbook briefing for Politico, Sam Francis and Megan McElroy report.
Playbook is told today’s crowd will be rather smaller than the one Labour once imagined, back when officials were considering hiring Burnham’s beloved Everton FC’s ground to announce his victory. The guest list has not been released, but one absence is confirmed: Keir Starmer. Downing Street says the prime minister will not make it back in time from Ukraine for the official handover.
Labour on course for easy win in Greater Manchester mayoral election, poll suggests
When Andy Burnham first tried to return to the Commons, by applying to be Labour’s candidate in the Gorton and Denton byelection, Labour’s national executive committee blocked him – in part because, they argued, Labour might find it hard to hold the Greater Manchester mayoralty in the byelection caused by his resignation.
When he next applied to be a candidate, for Makerfield, the NEC no longer felt able to say no because the results for Labour in the May elections were so bad that the case for having Burnham in parliament became overwhelming.
There was still, though, a fear that Reform UK could win the mayoralty.
Not any more. Today YouGov has published polling that suggests Labour is on course for a big win.
The byelection is on Thursday 30 July.
It looks as if Keir Starmer has started moving out. A removals van has been seen at the back of Downing Street.
Burnham to argue Britain has been on wrong path for 40 years
The Telegraph live blog is normally a pretty good read (although not as good as ours, obviously). But today Andy Burnham may want to give it a miss. At the Telegraph they don’t seem very enthusiastic about a Burnham premiership, and here is a selection of the blog headlines: ‘Burnham is coming for your home’; Burnham could crash the economy, claims Truss; Burnham accused of ‘waving away’ scrutiny on path to power; ‘Burnham is already a global laughing stock’.
Still, the main headline, Burnham to blame Thatcher for Britain’s problems, is spot on.
This is what Burnham’s team told us in their overnight briefing about what he will say today.
The new Labour leader will say that ‘Britain took a series of wrong turns in the 1980s’ when ‘political power was centralised and economic power privatised’. To build an economy and a country that works for all people and places, Andy will say that it requires ‘a new path to the one we’ve been on for the last 40 years’.
This is an argument Burnham has been making for some time. There is a long extract here setting out his thinking on this in more detail. It is from Burnham’s speech at the Great North Investment Summit in May.
Andy Burnham will reportedly allow more drilling in the North Sea when he becomes PM.
A story for Bloomberg says:
Officials are working on a range of options. They include signalling willingness to approve new oil and gas fields at Jackdaw and Rosebank, and an expansion of so-called tiebacks which allow further drilling on or near existing fields.
No final decision has been made on what form the North Sea announcement will take, but Burnham is likely to indicate he is in favour of more drilling, the people said.
A complicating factor is that public consultations have been launched on Jackdaw and Rosebank it’s hard for him to formally approve them before they have finished. Government officials expect him to ultimately back at least Jackdaw.
And today the Financial Times is reporting:
Burnham has told Scottish Labour MPs that he will make an early visit to Aberdeen to underline the importance he attaches to the North Sea oil and gas industry.
Gary Smith, leader of the GMB union, and Sharon Graham, leader of Unite the Union, have slammed the Labour government’s policy of ending new exploration licences in the basin on environmental grounds as “economic madness” and “an act of self-harm” respectively.
Burnham has not said that he will change his position on the ban, which was in the 2024 Labour manifesto.
But he is expected to signal other ways in which the government can allow more drilling to take place in the North Sea, including greater use of “tiebacks” that allow further drilling next to existing fields.
The government is already committed to allowing “tiebacks” in the North Sea. A “tieback” is the term for when drilling is extended into a new area, but without the need for new surface infrastructure (ie, a new rig) being built. This explainer describes it as like having a garden hose extension.
Greater use of “tiebacks” sounds quite similar to allowing new oil and gas fields to be developed. But of course we have not seen the details.
Here is a Guardian interactive exploring what some of the options are for Andy Burnham as he forms his cabinet on Monday.
Anyone who thinks Burnham just like Starmer only better at communication ‘absolutely deluded’, says close ally Steve Rotheram
Anyone who thinks that Andy Burnham as PM will be just like Keir Starmer only with better communication skills is “absolutely deluded”, Steve Rotheram told the Today programme this morning.
Rotheram, the Liverpool city region mayor, is a close friend and ally of Burnham. Together they wrote Head North two years ago, which remains the best guide available to Burnham’s political agenda. Rotheram was speaking this morning in an interview on the Today programme.
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Rotheram said that a Burnham government would “shake things up” and be significantly different from Keir Starmer’s. He was not asked about Zack Polanski’s comments this morning (see 8.43am), but he could have been referring to Polanski when he said:
If people believe that Andy Burnham is being made the prime minister so that he can communicate the same message just in a better way or a better form, then they’re absolutely deluded. Andy wants to go in there and he wants to shake things up.
And, looking ahead, he said:
People will start to see what Andy Burnham wants to do. But he’s not just there to be a better communicator than Keir Starmer was. There’s going to be people who are into a very rude awakening if that’s what they believe.
Of course there’s a plan. And there’s been a plan being worked on for many weeks and months now. As soon as it could look likely that there was going to be a byelection, then those gears started to click into motion.
Rotheram said Burnham set out his overall approach in his speech at the People’s History museum last month. With regard to specific policies, he said it made sense not to set them all out at the same time. “What you don’t do is you don’t put everything out there in one go,” he said.
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Rotheram implied that Burnham might favour small tax rises. He said he and Burnham had both raised taxes as mayors, saying the “small increase” in Manchester has improved public transport. He added:
Nobody really complains about a small increase that allows you to do something that’s popular.
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Rotheram rejected criticism of Burnham from the Labour MP Graham Stringer. In a separate interview, Stringer, MP for Blackley and Middleton South in Greater Manchester, complained about Burnham not having a plan. He said:
Andy hasn’t told us what he’s going to do. He’s not explained any plan, or any details, about policy on immigration, the economy, energy, a whole series of major policies are still a mystery in terms of what he will do about them.
Effectively nominating him would have been giving a blank cheque. He owes it both to the parliamentary Labour party and the country to be more explicit.
Rotheram said he had known Stringer for a long time and regarded him as an “old curmudgeon” who would not get excited about anything.
This morning the Times has splashed on a story claiming Andy Burnham is facing “a revolt from his core support on the Labour left over his plans to appoint Shabana Mahmood”.
The only MP quoted on the record in the story criticising Mahmood is Rachael Maskell, a prominent leftwinger who is comfortable speaking out against the leadership. She told the paper Ed Miliband would be a better chancellor because he “has Treasury experience and he’s been able to bring our party together around some very difficult issues”. She criticised Mahmood’s record on immigration and said Mahmood “hasn’t got the level of skill and experience to provide the leadership that is needed in the Treasury”.
Even though there may not be many other MPs speaking out publicly like Maskell, that does not mean there aren’t some who agree in private. The Times story quotes two of them speaking anonymously. It says:
A senior ally of Burnham said: “Shabana has no sense of the economics. It’s just not something she’s ever spoken about. She’s not collaborative. It’s not clear how she would drive the machine.”
Another Labour MP said: “It’s baffling a lot of people because nobody knows what her views are on the economy. Does she even have any? She’s never done a speech or intervention. It’s just absolutely bizarre and I can’t see her as a sensible appointment.
“Ed would have been a much more experienced chancellor because his original background was in finance. He was central to Gordon Brown’s team. It doesn’t bode well for the fundamental rethink of how we actually do government.”
A note to readers
I’m afraid I have some bad news; from the end of next week, we will no longer be opening comments on the Politics Live blog.
This decision has not been taken lightly. Politics Live has been running since 2010, and your comments have been part of what has made it a success. I myself have always found them helpful, both as a source of information, and for challenge and criticism that have made our journalism better.
But having comments open on a blog like Politics Live, which regularly attracts more than 4,000 comments a day, is extremely, extremely resource-intensive. Comments need to be moderated and, as the Guardian’s online content has expanded over the last 16 years, there are more and more places elsewhere on our website where moderators are also needed. We have now got to the point where we can’t keep comments open here and do all the audience engagement that we want to do across the site as a whole.
It is important to stress that closing comments does not mean we don’t want to hear from you. If anything, it’s the opposite. Recently the moderators have been focusing more on Conversations, our new Q&A series where Guardian journalists answer reader questions. These are producing really good, informative engagement and we will be doing more of them. If you have not engaged with them already, you should; they’re excellent.
I did one myself earlier this year and, with comments closed, I will be doing them regularly within the blog, every few weeks.
I also want to carry on hearing from you every day and, to allow that to happen, we are setting up a new email address for the blog. I will give details on Monday 27 July, when we start the no-comments regime. I would like you to use it to pose any questions you have, either for me to answer in the blog or privately. I will be monitoring it closely, as will the other reporters who write the blog when I’m away.
I know this will come as a shock to those who are very regular readers and contributors of BTL comments. I know you will miss your regular fix, and I’m sorry about that. But the relationship’s not over; it is just changing, and hopefully getting an upgrade.
Zack Polanski says progressives worry Burnham looks like ‘Keir Starmer with different face’
Zack Polanski, the Green party leader, used to be relatively positive about the prospect of Andy Burnham becoming Labour leader. More recently he has sounded less enthusiastic, particularly after the reports saying Burnham is going to appoint Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, as his chancellor.
In an interview on Sky News this morning, Polanski said he was worried that Burnham could end up like Keir Starmer “with a different face”.
He said:
Let’s see what [Burnham] does as prime minister. And if he does bring in the wealth tax, if he does build council homes, I’ll be the first to applaud that.
[But] I think people who are on the left or who want to see progressive politics are looking at Andy Burnham and going, this looks a lot like Keir Starmer with a different face.
Polanski also argued that, if people wanted progressive politics, they could get “the full version” with his party.
I think we’re still going to see [under Burnham] a party where inequality gets wider, where we’ve seen them apologise for Labour’s history in Gaza, but he’s still not signalled that he’s going to stop selling arms to Israel.
I think again and again we’re going to hear rhetoric which is more in line with what the Green party are saying. But why have semi-skimmed when you could come to the Green party and actually have the full version, where we’re both saying and doing things?
Burnham to say his government will be ‘unashamedly Labour’ in first speech as party leader
Good morning. Today the Labour party is going to formally announce at a “special conference” that Andy Burnham is its new leader. We will get a speech from Burnham at that event, and then he is expected to give another speech at an event later this afternoon.
As Kiran Stacey and Rowena Mason report, in his special conference speech Burnham will say he will lead a government that will have the “courage to fix the big things that politics has neglected” and the “conviction to argue for our plans”.
According to an overnight briefing, Burnham will also promise that the party under his leadership will be “unashamedly Labour in our priorities and in the decisions we take, putting people and places at the heart of everything we do”.
But Burnham does not actually get to start forming his government until Monday, when he will be appointed prime minister, take over in No 10 and start appointing his government.
Burnham’s communication via social media has been excellent in recent weeks and we saw another example last night when he posted video of himself in Cardiff holding an “Ask Andy Anything” event, sitting on a chair on the main pedestrianised shopping street and speaking to people passing by. “Ask Andy Anything” is not an invitation he has extended to journalists like Nick Robinson or Beth Rigby recently (he has done very little media as he has been planning for government), and if anyone did ask him who he was going to appoint as chancellor, the answer did not make it into the final video.
But there was a tantalising hint as to one of his priorities when he asked about social care. Burnham said that his father has Alzheimer’s and that as a result he was very familiar with the problems in the social care system. “If there’s one area that I’m going to expend quite of a lot of social capital [on], it’s going to be on social care,” he said.
Here are the key timings for the day.
Noon: Labour holds its special conference to announce Burnham as leader. Lucy Powell, the deputy Labour leader, Shabana Mahmood, chair of the national executive committee (as well as home secretary, and possible next chancellor), and Hollie Ridley, the outgoing general secretary, are all due to speak as well as Burnham.
2.30pm: Burnham is due to give a speech in the south-east of England.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (between 10am and 3pm), or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary.
I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.
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