'If Andy Burnham Is The Answer, What Are The Questions?'

With Andrew Gwynne having resigned this week, and round 27 of the ‘will he, won’t he?’ circus that Andy Burnham has fomented fully under way about whether or not he wants the prime ministerial crown, all eyes are on the NEC now he’s thrown his hat in for the Gorton and Denton by-election.

Below are two questions that it would be legitimate and normal to ask a candidate of any party for the top job in British politics and one question specific to Labour. It’s worth pondering if “Andy Burnham” comes into your mind as the answer or as you contemplate the answer.

Firstly, at a time of numerous domestic challenges and heightened global instability, does a leadership challenge help or hinder the British national interest?

Just as the economy is reviving, it shouldn’t be missed that the markets moved last autumn ahead of Labour’s Party conference when Andy Burnham previously tried to flex his leadership muscle. It hit the economy to the tune of half a billion. There was another wobble earlier this week when the prospect of a seat for Burnham first became apparent.

We inherited a broken economy, but there are now signs of progress. Wages rising, inflation coming down, interest rates cut for the sixth time at the end of last year. Should that be put at risk so one man can take a seat on the green benches that he resigned all too readily when the going got tough in 2017?

As the public sip their coffee or tea in the morning, having just about managed to sleep after the latest episode of the reality TV show formerly known as international relations, it’s doubtful that many are thinking “the thing this country really needs right now, as we deal with the numerous challenges domestic and foreign, is a leadership challenge to Keir Starmer as prime minister from Andy Burnham”.

Secondly, which, if any, leading Labour politician is setting out a more effective alternative strategy for the Labour government than the prime minister?

It is tempting to say “none”. But it surely isn’t Burnham. Interesting though his recent speech at the Institute of Fiscal Studies was, it took city or regional issues and extrapolated from them lessons for the whole country. Yet the agenda of devolution of skills, of power and resources more generally, of re-industrialisation in the technologies of the future are already agendas being gripped by the government, not least through the industrial strategy, local government reorganisation, reforms to the skills and education system and more.

Burnham’s ideas and self-defined “Manchesterism” are useful and welcome. Yet despite his clear praise for elements of what the government are doing, his tone implies that those colleagues in government don’t care as much about this agenda, which is self-evidently not the case. It’s the holier-than-though tone that some colleagues have been known to use in round robin letters to the government which suggest both that the minister doesn’t care as much as them or hadn’t considered the idea already.

Would we respect geolocated hyperbole if it came from a Tory politician terming their plans “Essexism” or “Surreyism”? Let’s not even imagine what nationalists might suggest.

Thirdly, if there were a vacancy for leadership of the Labour Party and therefore PM, who would it be?

First and most importantly, there is no vacancy and I hope there won’t be one. But were there to be a vacancy, the answer would not and should not be “Andy Burnham.” This is a PLP filled to the brim with people, newly elected or longer in the tooth, with the energy, ideas, experience and commitment needed to serve at the top of government. It would be good if people would just get on with their jobs and support the PM, but in every conversation I’ve had in the PLP about speculation about leadership challenges, other names are mentioned.

As ‘newbies’, I’m not alone in feeling that those who weren’t prominent or even involved in the project led by Keir Starmer to renew and restore the Labour Party sufficiently to make us electable again, should now swoop back into parliament at the first sign of any vulnerability at the top. Burnham’s career has been stellar. Cambridge University, Special Adviser in the New Labour government, then MP, then minister, then cabinet minister, and now metro mayor. Burnham was successful under successive Labour leaders of different ilks – Blair, Brown and Corbyn. Yet unsuccessful in two previous Labour leadership contests. 

In short, he’s had plenty of opportunities to shape events at the national level in the past. He can and should continue to share with the government any expertise and ideas he has but it should be constructive and aimed squarely at helping the government succeed, because that means helping the country succeed.

We must avoid the view of some that’s akin to how people stood at Jeremy Corbyn rallies, looked around at the adoring masses and concluded that the country was ready for the hard left. Outside the Labour, or Westminster, or Manchester bubble, there is an entire country.

So what questions might generate the answer “Andy Burnham”? Parliamentary colleagues should ponder this before they entertain the thought of encouraging him. Here are a few:

Who has stoked up speculation about the need for a new Labour leader and PM yet hasn’t actually had the confidence to say he wants to challenge for the leadership?

Who is behaving opportunistically?

Who, should they seek to return to parliament in a by-election would stoke instability within the Labour Party and government?

Whose leadership bid, should it happen, would demonstrate to the public that Labour is focused inward on itself not outwards on their needs?

Whose bid would undermine a Labour PM just as we’re turning a corner and delivering more and more for the British people?

But these questions aren’t solely for Andy Burnham. They’re for all of us. We should ask ourselves: is what we’re doing supportive of the Labour government and the leader of our party who got us elected, who is doing a difficult job at a very difficult time and needs and deserves support and loyalty?

Leadership speculation is damaging enough, but a full-blown leadership challenge would be very destabilising. You might expect me, as a Labour politician, to be worried about this from a narrow partisan, self-interested perspective. Quite the contrary. My concern is that the national interest, the economic stability we have created, our standing globally and more, would be jeopardised. We would have returned, within twenty months, to a state of venal, inward looking, ‘party-first, country-second’, politics. A return, in short order, to the chaotic days of the Tories.

The country deserves better.

We didn’t put ‘Ego First’ on our Labour Party membership cards; we put ‘Country First’. Now’s the time to prove that we meant it.