Mark it on the calendar. 25th January, 2026. The date the Labour Party called it a day.
I have no brief for Andy Burnham. Politically, he moved from the right of Blairism to somewhere adjacent to the soft left. How serious this was never properly got tested. During the Ed Miliband years he was recognised for championing a national care service and turning against privatisation in the NHS, something his erstwhile chums on the Labour right have never forgiven him for. But also, in the 2015 leadership election, his pitch was all over the shop. Trying to keep the soggy centre moist while appealing credible to Labour rightists, once Jeremy Corbyn entered the fray there was nowhere for Burnham to go. Except for adventures outside the Commons when the Manchester mayoralty came up. But, to his credit, Burnham respected the members' vote. And as mayor, he has delivered a competent administration, not rocked the boat, and stood up to the Tories during their efforts to stiff northern England as Covid raged out of control.
Burnham also has that which many a Labour front bencher aspires to - authenticity. Burnham beats all other Labour figures on approval ratings because, unlike many a member of the cabinet from humble beginnings, he avoids coming across as managerialist, he avoids their practised 10-yard stare, and comes across as genuinely warm and relatable. Something that used to endear Angela Rayner to many punters, until her self-inflicted downfall. He impressed many because he stuck up for Manchester while Keir Starmer tailed the government on pandemic management. And so, when he announced his intention to seek the nomination for Gorton and Denton and return to parliament, he had to be stopped.
The Labour right love procedure when it hides political manoeuvres, which is exactly what they did. Burnham cannot be allowed to run because it would cause an expensive mayoral by-election and the party is brassic. How handy. How convenient. With Lucy Powell the sole voice of dissent and, it appears, the only NEC member with a grasp on political realities, the Labour right, the Starmer loyalists, have declared their party done. They didn't just veto Burnham's eventual leadership bid, they snuffed out the only real chance Labour had of avoiding a catastrophic, historic defeat at the next election. The government can give as many councils permission to cancel elections as they like, the bloodbath this May cannot be avoided. But with Wes Streeting now the obvious frontrunner to replace Starmer, at least most of the Labour right will keep their jobs and prominence for a few more years.
And so, Burnham denied means liquidation is a step closer. A parliamentary seat that, at any other time would be a shoe-in is likely to fall, and Labour's political decay continues apace. With Your Party dead on arrival, the Labour right have gift wrapped more of the party's voters and handed them over to the Greens. Burnham was a chance, the chance to turn things around. Instead, the NEC have engaged full steam ahead toward inevitable disaster.
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Do the backbenchers and "Mainstream" have the balls to do what they have to do now? Surely they realise that without a full change at the top, wipeout in 2029 is nailed to the calendar?
ReplyDeleteW.r.t what they have to do now, it probably starts with lots of coordinated public displeasure at the ENTIRE current leadership team (plus adjacent leaders in waiting). Guarantees of significant backbench rebellion at every opportunity until the parasites are ousted. And coming up with a serious challenger to Steering. Lewis, perhaps? One might guess that he's no stranger to a sense of duty, and someone who can benefit from the pre-war climate that we are now unquestionably living in.
I think it's possible the Greens and Liberal Democrats might have to force a choice. Keep appeasing the right, and we will destroy you... or change the electoral system such that you MIGHT be able to recover, but at least Farage is toast.
ReplyDeletehttps://open.substack.com/pub/ewanhoyle/p/the-greens-and-lib-dems-can-place?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=2u1072
Burnham should join the greens, that would finish stammer off.
ReplyDeleteActually the greens probably should start courting Labour MPs anywhere that they have a serious shot at winning.
DeleteSorry, but at this very late stage of Labour's PASOK - like decline into utter collapse the likes of slippery opportunist Andy Burnham as some sort of " Left Shift Candidate" is just not a runner. Burnham has nothing but rhetoric to offer, and that socialists yet again fall for such a slippery shapeshifter is just sad. As with the current Left delusion in Zak Polanski . We are collectively entering very dark times nationally and internationally, and the socialist Left seems missing in (in)action.
ReplyDeleteBurnham is too slippery, Polanski is a delusion. Where is the true Left Messiah? Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Are we still humming that tune in 2025? Seriously? What is the matter with you? Nobody is coming to save you. Either you go with what there is, or you get out there and put yourself forward. Show us your policies. Show us your genuine, to the core, authetic socialist heartbeat. But please, please do not moan endlessly on about how nobody is good enough for you. Don't you get it? Nobody ever will be. It's not them - it's you.
DeleteDear me, Sean; you have really learnt nothing fron the endless line of opportunist fakers the Labour Left in particular, and the Left in general, have pinned their hopes on over the many decades. Andy, ex Blairite minister, Burnham, and ex Lib Dem, ex hypnotherapist, Zak Polanski of the Greens too . Really, you think we should give them a go now because of some pseudo Leftish verbiage ? Recognising reality, even very dark reality, is the first step to useful political action surely. Pinning your hopes , again, on obvious fakers simply guarantees more betrayals of the Left voter, and eventually lets in the neo-fascist radical Far Right.
DeleteOh look, it's "dear me, dear me" guy!
DeleteWho has rather missed the point. Nobody here - and explicitly not our blogger - was pitching Burnham as some kind of saviour of the left. Of course he was never that; he's merely the only person (that anybody's talking about) who had a hope in hell of rescuing the Labour Party from its grim trajectory following the Tories into the abyss. If it wasn't for the presence of the horrifying ghoul messiah who might well be elevated to Prime Minister by Labour's McSweeney-induced suicide, many more people who consider themselves socialists might now be looking forward to seeing the demeaned husk of this once great Party finally put out of its misery.
Wouldn't you like to be inside the mind of THE GENIUS Chief of Staff and hear his reasoning on why this decision was the best possible one which would do the most good for Labour in the North West. let them focus on winning the by-election and stop a psychodrama. And poor Douglas Alexander, Secretary of State for Scotland is sent on to promote the decision as the best in all possible worlds - he seems to be the go to man to dissemble to the media. Must be the Renfrewshire accent.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, just as we saw Mike Amesbury's punch in Frodsham as the blow that led to Reform soaring in the polls so we may see the humiliation of Burnham as prefiguring the second collapse of the Red Wall. There may even be questions about the genius of THE GENIUS.
In other news. The Trump regime appears to be encountering a difficult moment, and will surely be desperate for foreign distractions. Their bomb testing run in Iran begins shortly.
ReplyDeleteOops, Nige seems to have spied an opportunity to put egg on your face. His door wasn't firmly closed to Sewer Ellen at all.
ReplyDeleteIs it a sign of overconfidence brought on by Labour's public self-destruction? Or perhaps shamelessness born of knowing that his party's ascent to power is pre-ordained by the backroom kingmakers?
nigel farage wouldn’t have won clacton and be putative prime minister if labour hadn’t upped stakes there come last years election. so it’s revealing that they deny burnham the opportunity. labour right has more faith in reform to at least stick to the orthodoxy than anyone to it’s left however nominally like burnham.
ReplyDeleteThe only beneficiary from this Labour right stitch up will be Nigel Farage.
ReplyDeleteIt was predictable. Of course the PLP heirachy weren't going to allow a threat to their cushy existence. If Burnham did oust Starmer he'd be pushing McSweeney and a lot of others out the door with him. They couldn't have that. Better everyone go down together in 2029, than they go sooner. If its country or them, they are always going to choose them. As for party - who cares.
ReplyDeleteAs suicide notes go, Starmers is getting longer and more rambling by the day. Surely any idiot can see he has to go? Even he must be beginning to understand that. In some ways it adds to the whole surreal circus that politics here and internationally has become.
Suella and Farage - a match made in hell. I can't imagine them not falling out. The Reform basket is filling with increasingly venemous snakes and it's impossible that they won't start biting each other.