Wes walks but has Burnham got the momentum? – The Latest

0:00Lucy Hough:This is The Guardian.

0:12Lucy Hough:It is clear that he is not going to directly challenge the Prime Minister himself, that he believes that the only route to a change of Prime Minister is for Keir Starmer to resign. In the last few minutes, the Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, has resigned, paving the way for a widely anticipated challenge to the leadership of the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer. I think those around Burnham believe that time is of the essence because they ultimately believe he is the candidate who has the most support amongst the party's MPs, has the most support amongst the party membership and, you know, has the most support in the country.

0:46Lucy Hough:Those two things combined, they just don't come around very often.

0:49Jessica Elgot:It's been a question of will he, won't he, but Wes Streeting has finally resigned as health secretary and said it's clear Keir Starmer will not lead the party into the next election. But why has he stopped short of an immediate leadership challenge? And has he left the door open for Andy Burnham? From The Guardian's Today in Focus, this is the latest with me, Lucy Hoth.

1:12Jessica Elgot:Well, joining me from Parliament is Jessica Elgort, The Guardian's Deputy Political Editor. It's been a huge day in Westminster after days of speculation about what we're streeting. the former health secretary was planning to do, whether he would resign and whether he would launch a leadership challenge. He has resigned in a two-page, very eviscerating letter to the Prime Minister, Keir Starmer. What were the contents of that letter?

1:37Lucy Hough:Yes, West Streeting has been keeping all of Westminster in huge suspense over the past three or four days about what he would do after an extremely chaotic night last night where allies of him were on the terrace, speaking to lots of MPs, having a drink in Parliament and trying to persuade lots of people to come on board. Even if they weren't natural supporters of the health secretary, they were trying to get them to sign the papers anyway, just to trigger a challenge. In fact, the Labour rules say you can't do that because you can't transfer your votes to different candidates. They have obviously come to the conclusion this morning that they don't have the requisite numbers to mount a challenge to the Prime Minister.

2:20Lucy Hough:And then actually, if you talk to people around Streeting, they say they probably did have the numbers. But the problem was that so many of them were ministers or people on the ministerial payroll. They thought it was unfair to ask that many people to resign from the government. I mean, look, it depends what you believe or not. Number 10 and allies of the Prime Minister clearly believe that he didn't.

2:41Jessica Elgot:Yeah, yeah. And hearing lots of things on that, but certainly allies of Streeting saying that they felt it would be unfair and it would sort of disembowel the government. at a sensitive time. But crucially, as you say, he has stopped short of launching a full leadership contest. And I think it's important that he said that Keir Starmer, it is clear that you will not lead the Labour Party into the next election. And this needs to be a battle of ideas, not personalities, which implies a longer race and one that has the widest and best possible pool of candidates. Does that imply that he wants Andy Burnham, the mayor of Manchester, to join the fray.

3:16Lucy Hough:Yeah, I think it definitely implies that. I think it also is clear that he is not going to directly challenge the Prime Minister himself, that he believes that the only route to a change of Prime Minister is for Keir Starmer to resign, there then to be a sort of formal, longer, you know, more traditional contest that happens after a resignation. And then you would expect the field actually to be relatively wide. There might be other people who decide to, at that point, try to win the membership. But of course, you know, it's the same kind of language that the Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, has been using a lot.

3:55Lucy Hough:The idea of kind of bringing the party together, listening to lots of ideas across the party. And, you know, lots of, I think, of us have picked up the similarities in that cadence between, you know, the way that Burnham has been talking and the language that Streeting uses in his resignation letter.

4:12Jessica Elgot:Yeah, and that language is so key. He says, where we need vision, we have a vacuum, where we need direction, we have drift. So it's a real direct critique of Keir Starmer and really squarely putting the results of last week's mayoral elections at his door. But it just leaves everything in such a mess, doesn't it? Because there are 150 MPs who've signed a letter saying now is not the time for a contest. Over 90 MPs have no confidence in Keir Starmer. Meanwhile, Keir Starmer has lost the support of the trade unions. It just feels like Labour is about to enter a period of real navel-gazing civil war when we have big issues to look at in this country.

4:53Lucy Hough:Yes, of course. And in the immediate kind of aftermath of this, there's a lot of jubilance from Number 10 and from cabinet ministers who support Keir Starmer. They think they've seen off this immediate challenge. They think they've seen off, you know, a cabinet minister who was plotting against the prime minister for a long time. But, you know, they've also lost one of the government's best communicators. Where Streeting was one of those people who was really effective at putting the government's case across when he was on broadcast media. and someone who commanded the support of a lot of MPs in the party.

5:24Lucy Hough:So, you know, it's a short-term victory, but he is actually quite a significant loss for the government. And, you know, you've got 90 MPs on the record saying they think the prime minister should resign. You've had ministerial resignations. It might not be the end of resignations, actually. You know, we wait and see whether there are more. But, you know, that is not a sustainable position for a prime minister. You know, it's short, short term. Keir Starmer might be able to sort of rescue his position. But, you know, I think that even amongst his closest cabinet allies, very few of them will say that they are convinced that Keir Starmer would lead them into the next election.

6:01Lucy Hough:And you've only got to look at the polls to see that. You've only got to look at the results of last week's local elections to see why they believe that. And of course, you know, what's the driving thing behind a lot of this? Kind of a terror of a reform government. That is the thing that's driving the motivations of so many of these Labour MPs who see, you know, the state of the polls. And it's not just that they're worried about their own seats. And of course, they are worried about their own seats. But they also were worried about a reform government and what that might mean for the country.

6:28Lucy Hough:and that is what is driving them to act and you can see it in West Street Team's letter he talks about the lack of vision, the lack of boldness the lack of rising to the challenge and mistakes which he pins directly on Keir Starmer whether that's the winter fuel allowance or the island of stranger speech

6:45Jessica Elgot:Yeah and the candidate who polls best against reform is Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Manchester he is on the lookout for a seat that would enable him to return to Parliament But that is a process that could happen as early as today. We're speaking as sort of as late as we possibly can to get this episode out on time for our dear listener and viewers' commutes. But there could be an announcement today.

7:08Lucy Hough:Well, obviously, in many ways, West Streeting's announcement has bought him more time. And he has, you know, he clearly, I think those around Burnham believe that times are the essence. I don't think there's a desire amongst them to, you know, sort of wait out his term as Greater Minister Mayor, come in in 2028 and try and replace him just before the next election. There's some people who would like, you know, some people who believe that that's actually a better tactic. But I think that's not the thinking of people around Burnham at the moment and that they would like to see him return to Parliament as soon as possible.

7:43Lucy Hough:Because they ultimately believe he's the candidate who has the most support amongst the party's MPs, has the most support amongst the party membership. and has the most support in the country, a very Labour politician. And those two things combined, they just don't come around very often. And that, I think, is what makes him the most obvious person to be the next Prime Minister, even if he doesn't have a seat.

8:05Jessica Elgot:But another really key player in all of this, Jessica, is Angela Rayner, the former Deputy Prime Minister, the former Housing Secretary, who was forced to resign from her position in September over unpaid stamp duty or wrongfully paid stamp duty and she's been in this investigation process with HMRC. She's now been cleared of wrongdoing, which both paves the way for her to turn potentially to a ministerial role in cabinet, but also potentially to throw her name in the ring as a possible leadership challenge. But the messaging from her has been quite confusing. This was a big scoop from our political editor, Pippa Creera, this morning.

8:43Lucy Hough:I think, you know, what is, I think, implicit in what Angela Rayner is saying is that she is prepared to stand in a leadership contest, but it seems very unlikely that she would stand against the Prime Minister or launch a challenge against the Prime Minister. She's always said that that is not what she would want to do. I think if a streeting had launched a challenge against the Prime Minister, you would see Angela Rayner be a candidate in that. I think it's questionable if Keir Starmer had stood in that contest as well, whether Angela Rayner would have entered the race. Some of her allies say she would.

9:15Lucy Hough:Others are sort of less sure about that. But I think she's unlikely now to sort of launch a challenge of her own against Starmer. And I think we'll wait and see, you know, what plays out, you know, whether eventually there is a timetable for Keir Starmer's departure or whether, you know, there's other candidates she feels that she can back. But she would be a formidable candidate on her own terms.

9:37Jessica Elgot:Historic events. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you. That's it for today. My huge thanks again to Jessica Elgott, The Guardian's deputy political editor. You can keep up with her reporting and our Westminster team over at theguardian.com. And don't miss today's episode of our sister podcast, Politics Weekly. Pippa Carrera and Kieran Stacey will have more analysis on the decision of West Streeting to resign, as well as Pippa's Angela Rayner tax scoop. Thanks for listening to this episode of The Latest. Today in Focus will be back in your feeds as usual tomorrow morning. The Latest will be back tomorrow night.

10:09Jessica Elgot:This episode was presented by me, Lucy Hoth. It was produced by Sam Gruet. The senior producer was Bryony Moore. the lead producer was Zoe Hitch.

10:20Jessica Elgot:I'm Kai Wright. I'm Kari Sherman. And we are here to tell you about our new show, which is rooted in this feeling that at least I have, I know you have, where, you know, it's kind of like when you wake up in the morning and you pick up your phone and you're just hit in the face with a fire hose of news, right? There's war, there's authoritarianism, our planet is burning. I could go on and on and on. And on and on and on. But like we're trying to figure out how to manage it, right? Like how do you manage it? I manage it by leaning in and trying to learn more and trying to figure out, okay, how can I be smarter about this particular topic?

10:57Jessica Elgot:And who can I talk to that's going to make me feel better about it? And who can tell me who's responsible for the mess that I'm reading about? So that's our mission. That's the show. Welcome to Stateside with Kai and Carter. We're a new show from The Guardian. We're talking to big thinkers and the best journalists just trying to understand the world through smart conversation and honest reporting. We don't have billionaires telling us what to say. Stateside with Kyan Carter is out now every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Follow on Apple Podcasts or catch us wherever you watch or listen. This is The Guardian.