Starmer's Burnham 'Blunder'
In the latest Byline Podcast, Adrian Goldberg talks to Byline Times political editor Adam Bienkov, who argues that the Prime Minister should have welcomed his potential leadership rival into the fold
Has the Labour Party made a major strategic blunder by blocking Andy Burnham’s candidacy in the Gorton and Denton by-election? Byline Times political editor Adam Bienkov makes a compelling argument in favour of allowing Burnham to stand, on the latest episode of the Byline Podcast.
Bienkov draws a parallel between David Cameron’s premiership when Boris Johnson was seen as a potential leadership challenger ahead of the 2015 election. Rather than obstructing a rival, Cameron welcomed him back into the fold.
“David Cameron knew that Boris Johnson wanted to become Prime Minister,” Bienkov recalls.
“Johnson was Mayor of London at the time, [but Cameron] actually encouraged him to return, and said ‘we want you to be on the team. We want you to be fighting for the Conservatives’.
“Obviously Johnson was not the most reliable person once he returned to government, but he was never any serious threat to Cameron.”
Bienkov said: “Starmer could have done something very similar with Burnham. He could have said to him, ‘yes, you can come return to Parliament. You can fight this by election. We can win it together. That’s good for the Labour Party, but the trade off is that there is not going to be any attempt to overturn my Premiership.’
“If Burnham had betrayed that agreement, I think that would have weakened him and made him look dishonest and opportunistic.”
As it was, Labour’s NEC rejected Burnham outright, arguing that if he was selected, it would have created unnecessary expense for taxpayers, by forcing a new election for his replacement as Greater Manchester Mayor.
Bienkov believes they may live to regret that decision, especially if Labour loses the seat, vacated by Andrew Gwynne, who has stepped down citing poor health.
“It’s pretty clear to me that Andy Burnham would have won that by-election,” Bienkov said.
“Not only is he more popular than the Labour Party nationally, he’s a relatively popular local figure. I think he probably would have been able to beat the Reform candidate and the Greens – so by blocking him, it looks much more likely that either Reform or the Greens are going to win.
“If and when that happens, the calls for Starmer to stand down and for there to be a leadership contest are going to be much greater than would have been the case had they simply allowed Burnham to return.”
At the same time, Bienkov argues that Burnham himself hasn’t always been tactically astute in his navigation of Labour’s internal politics.
“Most famously, in 2015, he was beaten by Jeremy Corbyn, who, at the time, nobody had heard of. Burnham was the absolute racing favourite to win that contest. So to manage to lose that contest, I think tells us a lot about the internal Labour Party political skills of Andy Burnham. So I think he hasn’t played this particularly well. I think he probably came out too strongly as a critic of Keir Starmer in recent months; he made it quite easy for them to block him.”
All the same, he says, the so-called ‘King of Manchester’ can’t be dismissed as a future party leader, despite this latest setback.
“I think Burnham probably has missed his moment in the short term, but I wouldn’t rule him out. He’s a very impressive politician, a good communicator and he definitely has popularity in the country.”
You can hear more from Adam on the Byline Podcast talking to Adrian Goldberg about Starmer’s trip to China, Reform’s Tory ‘retreads’ and a threat to Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch from the left of her party, courtesy of Andy Street and Ruth Davidson. Listen to full episode here.