Has Burnham’s win in Makerfield sealed Starmer’s fate? - The Latest

0:00This is The Guardian.

0:30This new mission explores what it means to live as a double agent. Twice the lies, twice the risk. The lines between ally and enemy blur like never before, and survival depends on trusting no one. Starring Michael Fassbender, Jeffrey Wright, Jodie Turner-Smith and Richard Gere. Don't miss The Agency. All episode streaming June 21st on Paramount+. I do think that the pattern on the 10th seems clearer than ever. I do say to my own party, this is a final chance to change. What comes next, it's all on the table now. If there is a contest, just to be clear with you, then yes, I will run, I will stand, and I've said repeatedly, I'm not going to walk away from that.

1:32If I was going to make a bet now, I don't think I would be betting on Keir Starmer. From the Guardian's Today in Focus, this is The Latest, with me, Annie Kelly.

1:44So what an absolute barnstormer of a win for Andy Burnham. Pretty seismic. Alexander Tropping, you're a political correspondent for The Guardian. He came in, he won by a majority of over 9 ,000 votes, a really decisive win over reform as well. What's going to happen next? Well, it was a huge night in Ashton and Makefield and I think everybody who's woke up this morning kind of surprised the scale of the victory that Andy Burnham had overnight. I mean, we thought that it would be much closer than it was. There was a real sense in the Labour camp that this was going to be a big moment and it really delivered.

2:25What comes next is really it's all on the table now. There was a sense before this election, this by-election in Makerfield, that if Burnham lost, obviously it was going to be a very different situation, also terrible for Labour, but it would have shored up Keir Starmer's position as the leader of the party. There was another option where if he just scraped through, you know, could Starmer allies position that as actually he is the person to take the Labour Party forward, to take the country forward. But actually what we saw is that not only did Burnham increase the majority, I mean, he almost doubled it.

3:09It was mad. There was this argument before that the Burnham camp thought that they would be in a really strong position. if they could say that Burnham had beaten the vote share that was gained by both Reform UK and Restore. And actually, Burnham didn't only just do that. He got more votes than all of the other candidates combined. Yeah. So he's in a really strong position this morning. But I think we have to remember that this is probably the strongest position he'll ever be in. Yeah, this is it, isn't it? This is the top. This is the zenith. And his team said that this defied their expectations.

3:48Would you say that his path to number 10 is now kind of almost inevitably secured? Nothing is inevitable in this game. But I think his path to number 10 is much less bumpy now than it looked even 24 hours ago, but certainly than it looked several months ago. I think it's actually been an astonishingly quick journey to Westminster. minister. Keir Starmer has said this morning he's going to fight on. I was at the G7 at Evian and he looked very relaxed. He was saying, you know, I will fight. He was saying it in quite punchy terms in a way that we haven't really heard from the prime minister before.

4:28But this morning he will be asking himself those questions. You know, is it the right thing to stay? I think there is going to be it sounds like at least there's going to be a pause in the burnham camp um right team bernham are very much hoping that they can get a coronation rather than a very messy fight which could be very damaging for the party particularly in the eyes of the electorate we saw what happened with the tories and in 2022 you know uk voters do not like um internal fighting and they want people to be getting on with the job. And that's always been Starmer's argument. You know, we need to not have the fight, get on with the job.

5:10And I think people will be saying to him behind the scenes now, if you don't want that fight, if you don't want to tear this party apart, it's time for you to leave. So I do think that the path to number 10 seems clearer than ever. And I mean, what conversations do you think Andy Burnham is going to be having? And who is he going to be having those conversations with over the weekend? I mean, that's what, as political reporters, we're all waiting to find out. They will be confident now that he will get to number 10. Obviously, you know, we're several steps ahead of ourselves there. There may well be a leadership contest.

5:46There's going to be a leadership contest of some sort, you know, even if Starmer stands aside. Will other people stand against him? Will he just, you know, will it be a coronation? That remains to be seen but I think Burnham will be very much setting out his stall speaking to the people that who are already in the cabinet and others that he may want to bring in he'll also be looking to the people who have been at the heart of his campaign like Louise Haig and Annalise Midgley brilliant team behind him they have run an astonishing campaign tell us a bit about them And these are like, you know, these strong northern women who have led this campaign, who have led it with massive efficiency.

6:29There's obviously ongoing dismay in the Labour Party that once again, we're talking about who's going to be the next leader of the Labour Party. And once again, there's no women in the picture. But there are plenty of women behind Burnham who and, you know, Lou Hay being one of them, who is featured prominently. they I would be very surprised if she wasn't taking up a key role um but there'll be others you know Ed Miliband what could he be the next chancellor who Burnham chooses as his next chancellor will be will be key Rachel Reeves and her team will be putting forward an argument that if he wants to keep the ship steady and Burnham's one of Burnham's vulnerabilities is that he made this unfortunate comment about being in hock to the bond market um and he's tried to shore up that actually in the last few days it's interesting he's brought in economic advisors from like Goldman Sachs and former members of the OBR to show that he is you know a serious minded politician who wants to stay within the fiscal rules etc but I think who he chooses as chancellor that will really set out what a Burnham cabinet could look like.

7:36And you've mentioned some of his potential vulnerabilities going forwards do we know how he intends to govern if he does make it into number 10? Do we have any idea of what he would do as Prime Minister to overcome the incredible obstacles that have already tripped up this Labour government? What Benham's been very clear on is that what is happening now isn't working. I mean, and I think everyone really does agree with that. But instead of doing this kind of bureaucratic, step-by-step, Starmer approach to steadying the economy, growing the economy, Burnham seems to want to do something more radical.

8:15You know, he talks, his big picture idea is Manchesterism, where he said it's not about party, actually, it's about place. And he wants to take that into Westminster, working with business, working across party, perhaps, you know, bringing the best and brightest together. But it's also significantly to the left of Starmer. I think, you know, Burnham is talked about nationalizing utility companies. You know, I think we may well see the quick nationalization of Thames Water and maybe other energy companies. That stuff is very expensive. So just quite how he'll pay for it remains to be seen. But I think this sense of the state playing a bigger role, but working hand in hand with business has been the image that he's projected in Manchester.

9:08And of course, transport is a big one. The thing that we all know Vernon for is that he's got the B-networking buses in Manchester. So I think that's the type of thing that he would like to see on a wider picture. But it's much easier to do that in a place like Manchester, where you've got the control over those things than it is. And seeing whether he can deliver in Essex or in Kent or in any of these places outside of Manchester as well. And that would be interesting to see if he can extend that out on a national level and appeal to voters. 100%. And just going back to Makerfield by election, I mean, it was just such a stunning victory for Burnham for all the reasons we've discussed.

9:47But has it done something else as well? Do you think it's shown that there is this emerging formula that tactical voting does have the potential to beat reform? I think it really does. I mean, I think we saw tactical voting in Denton, but in a slightly different way, Gorton and Denton. And I think we saw that again here. Now, Labour supporters who are getting extremely excited about this by-election victory and, you know, let's give them their moment. They have to remember that this is a very specific place and Burnham is a very specific person for that place. You know, he literally grew up down the road.

10:21He's the mayor of Manchester. Everyone knows who he is. He's got this kind of star appeal around there. He is an extraordinary candidate for that by-election. So, you know, to mangle a football analogy, we've seen him do it on a rainy night in Stoke. But can he do it on a sunny afternoon in Islington? Right. Does that appeal work as well as in Manchester and the surrounding area? Does it work throughout the rest of the country? Also quite extraordinary to see, you know, Tory voters switching over and voting for Burnham over reform. Yeah, I think the size of the minuscule amount of people who voted Tory is really key.

11:01It was obvious that there was tactical voting going on in Makefield. On the doorstep, our correspondents were saying that they were talking to people saying they just wanted to keep out Nigel Farage. And in Gorton and Denton, people were kind of angry at Labour and angry at the non-reform candidates because it's like, who should we vote for? Who do we vote for to stop Farage? And I think we've seen that happen again in Makerfield. And I think that will happen again in the next general election. people will be looking to make unusual choices that they may not have done before, like Conservative voters voting for Andy Burnham because they didn't want the reform candidate.

11:41And I mean, Nigel Farage, what about him in all of this? He was kind of weirdly absent from Abyfield, wasn't he? He kind of left before the results were announced. He's done this very kind of subdued statement this morning. Do you think that this kind of shows that his sheen might be wearing off on voters? Maybe the impact of things like, you know, the five million pound gifts is starting to take effect. I really think that the Guardian's reporting has shifted the dial on this. I mean, I would say this and it's talking to our reporters. But, you know, we reported about this huge gift from this crypto billionaire to Nigel Farage, Christopher Harborne.

12:18And since that point, Farage just went missing. You know, as political observers, we're used to seeing him on a weekly basis. He takes as many questions as you want. He loves being in the limelight and he's been nowhere to be seen. I think that the sheen may have come off reform slightly. You know, you've seen a situation in Gorton and Denton where it felt like they very much chose the wrong candidate. Again, in Makerfield, there was huge problems with the reform candidates' past remarks about women and just quite obviously sexist and horrible remarks that he'd made. So I do think it's really exposed some real fault lines in reform.

13:03And they've seen a kind of attack from their right, from Restore, which did eat into their vote to a degree in Ashton-Makerfield. I mean, it didn't actually emerge to be this huge surge. It wouldn't have mattered, would it? It wouldn't have actually mattered even if those two votes were put together. But it could matter in other constituencies where the electorate is far more to the right. I mean, let's not forget that Makerfield is like a solid Labour seat. It should be somewhere that Labour wins. So, you know, Farage will point to that this morning. But he did seem quite crestfallen, didn't he?

13:41Yeah, I was just really surprised by how kind of downbeat the whole thing was. He wasn't coming out swinging at all, was he? and Lexi if you were gonna I mean this is a kind of you know it's a difficult question to ask so early on but if you're going to put your money on what happens next what would you what would you say is going to emerge? Oh no you put me on the spot. I actually don't know I'm I've been an outlier in our office because I have said that I think it's still worth putting a bet on Starmer being in place by the end of the year that seems increasingly unlikely I didn't actually put that bet on, which is probably for the best.

14:15If I was going to make a bet now, I don't think I would be betting on Keir Starmer still being there. What the Burnham camp really want, I think, is a kind of change, a fairly orderly changing of the guard and perhaps with a coronation of Andy Burnham at Labour Party conference. Fascinating times ahead for sure. Thank you so much, Leslie. Thanks for having me. That's it for today. My huge thanks again to political correspondent Alexandra Topping and thanks for listening to this episode of The Latest. Today in Focus, we'll be back with you as usual on Monday morning and the latest will be back on Monday night.

14:52This episode was produced by Leo Schick and Jacob Antiga. The senior producer is Ryan Ramgobin and the lead producer is Zoe Hitch. And the presenter was me, Annie Kelly.

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