Andy burnham

Can Andy Burnham actually win Greater Manchester’s mayoral election?

After months of local campaigning, backbiting and press releasing, the Greater Manchester mayoral election has finally piqued the national attention. Andy Burnham’s apparently sudden declaration he will run for the role has thrust the race into the limelight. There may be more than a hint of cockiness to his claim that the competition needs a ‘big name’ to raise its profile, but there is also more than a hint of truth. Unlike the London race, there has so far been little momentum to its poorer northern relative. But for Andy Burnham the question that really matters, given that the Labour candidacy is likely to determine who becomes mayor of 2.5m people next year,

Grim up north? Only if you’re Andy Burnham, say MPs

It’s tough up north. Just ask Andy Burnham. The class warrior has today kicked off his Manchester mayoral campaign with some ‘home truths’ about what it is like to grow up in the north. Burnham says that if you live in the north and consider becoming a doctor, people will laugh at you: ‘It’s hard growing up in the north: if you say you want to be a doctor, lawyer or MP you get the mickey taken out of you.’ Alas this appears to be news to many… northerners. The Guardian‘s North of England editor Helen Pidd is among those northerners surprised by the news. https://twitter.com/helenpidd/status/733252516553625601 So, how have MPs in the north

Burnham makes the case for Labour not supporting the Investigatory Powers Bill

The saying ‘the House of Commons at its best’ is normally a pompous description of parliamentarians agreeing with one another on something it is impossible to disagree on. However, when MPs come together to scrutinise legislation involving the security services, they do come rather close to being at their best, as they grow rather anxious about whether the legislation will actually work. So far the debate on the Investigatory Powers Bill has largely been detailed and thoughtful and without much silly knockabout. But the closest the second reading session has come to knockabout was when Andy Burnham was offering Labour’s response. The Shadow Home Secretary had the difficult job of

Isabel Hardman

Labour unease over Investigatory Powers Bill

The Investigatory Powers Bill has its second reading in the Commons this afternoon, with Labour planning to abstain and make its support for the timing of the legislation conditional on the Home Secretary satisfying a number of concerns that the party has. Separately, I understand that Tory MPs such as Liam Fox are pushing for a generous timetable for the legislation, including committee stage taking place on the floor of the Commons. Fox points out that ‘there’s not much other legislation about’, though this has never stopped ministers giving controversial pieces of legislation very tight timetables for debate. So far, though, Theresa May has been in a very consensual mood

Portrait of the week | 11 February 2016

Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, said that if Britain left the European Union, France could stop allowing British officials to make immigration checks on the French side of the border, and, his spokesman predicted: ‘You have potentially thousands of asylum seekers camped out in northern France who could be here almost overnight.’ Mr Cameron denounced the way prisons are being run by his administration: ‘Current levels of prison violence, drug-taking and self-harm should shame us all.’ Junior doctors went on strike again for 24 hours. Twelve men of Pakistani heritage were jailed for up to 20 years for the rape and sexual abuse of a girl when she was

How far can Jeremy Corbyn go in his reshuffle?

Jeremy Corbyn is expected to carry out his much-awaited and much-briefed ‘revenge reshuffle’ this week. Given he will have to face a shadow cabinet meeting on Tuesday, it would make more sense for the Labour leader to get on with moving and sacking today so that he faces the shadow cabinet he wants, rather than the one he wants to get rid of. But will the reshuffle really give Corbyn what he wants? This morning’s Times carries an intriguing report that Hilary Benn and Andy Burnham have offered to swap jobs so that Corbyn doesn’t have such an obvious split in foreign policy in his top team, while also avoiding

Andy Burnham pinpoints Labour’s problem

Labour is very cross about a knighthood going to the man who ran the election campaign that beat the party in May. Andy Burnham issued a statement about Lynton Crosby’s inclusion in the New Year’s Honours list which was supposed to highlight what his party thinks is an abuse of the system. But really, it just highlights his party’s own failings. The Shadow Home Secretary said: ‘This outrageous award is the clearest evidence yet that the Tories think they can get away with whatever they like. It is a timely reminder that Labour must make it a New Year’s resolution to stop facing inwards and expose them for what they

Theresa May has some unusual allies in her fight with George Osborne

Cutting the police was always going to be difficult without a terror attack just before the spending review, but naturally the events in Paris have made it much more difficult for the Treasury to stand up to the Home office in a fight that was going to happen anyway. The leaked letter from one of the most senior police officers to Theresa May warning that cutting police numbers would ‘reduce very significantly’ the UK’s ability to respond to a terror attack is very helpful indeed to the Home Secretary. So helpful that she is unlikely to be the one calling for a leak inquiry. Similarly, Andy Burnham’s original push for

On Question Time, will someone please ask Mehdi Hasan about his views on infidels?

Various readers have been asking if I am doing Question Time, This Week or Any Questions this week. It’s not the BBC’s fault but I’m not able to be in the country at the moment. I am particularly sorry not to be able to do Question Time now that I learn that the line-up includes Mehdi Hasan and Anna Soubry. So could someone else on the panel or in the audience please point out that Mehdi Hasan has expressed similar contempt for us infidels as Isis have? Here is a reminder of a sermon he gave in 2009: ‘The kuffar, the disbelievers, the atheists who remain deaf and stubborn to the teachings of

Theresa May: the Paris attacks ‘have nothing to do with Islam’

On a day when Jeremy Corbyn has been making clear his concerns about both the government’s use of drones and any shoot-to-kill policy for terrorists on British streets, Theresa May’s statement on the Paris attacks was striking for the level of cross-party agreement. Andy Burnham paid generous tribute to the Home Secretary and pledged Labour’s support for her anti-terror crackdown. The only discordant note came on the question of police funding. Burnham aligned himself with Bernard Hogan-Howe’s warning that cuts of more than 10 percent to police funding would make it harder to keep the streets safe. May set out how the police here would ‘intensify’ their approach to big

Isabel Hardman

Burnham attacks May over police cuts at Home Office questions

It was inevitable that Theresa May would face demands to rethink police cuts at Home Office questions this afternoon. And Labour did indeed make this its main line of attack in the Commons, with Andy Burnham urging the Home Secretary to reconsider reductions in police numbers that might be being considered in the Comprehensive Spending Review. Burnham has pursued this issue with some gusto since taking the Shadow Home Secretary brief, as it is the one matter where he can be reasonably tub thumping and Burnhamish. Today he was sombre, but it was clear that May was aware that the Paris attacks have made an extremely difficult set of cuts

Why can’t Labour decide if it opposes the Investigatory Powers Bill?

Last week brought into focus how Labour is in complete and utter disarray. After the Home Secretary’s statement on the draft Investigatory Powers Bill, Andy Burnham wholeheartedly agreed with the government on the need for extra powers for spy chiefs. Then, about five days later, a letter was released by Burnham’s office saying that after closer inspection, he had a couple of ‘concerns’. Whatever you think of the Conservatives, they at least have a principled position on this: anything the spy agencies want, they get — regardless of the privacy implications. The Liberal Democrats on the other hand strongly believe that our agencies must make the case for new powers and

A sugar tax would be (another) tax on the poor

The fat man of Europe is getting fatter. His teeth are rotting from the sugar in his coke and chocolates. He feeds his children bread and pasta instead of quinoa and couscous. It is time to tax the fat man – he must learn to stop eating sugar. And in a long-awaited report, Public Health England has proposed a tax of up to 20 per cent on soft drinks and similarly sugary products – just like that proposed by the BMA. It finds that:- “A recently introduced 10 per cent tax on sugary drinks in Mexico has seen an average 6 per cent decline in purchases in the first few months”. Jamie Oliver

Portrait of the week | 17 September 2015

Home In the shadow cabinet chosen by the new Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, the Exchequer went to John McDonnell, a left-winger who had run his campaign for the leadership. Although Mr Corbyn’s defeated rival Andy Burnham was given the Home Office portfolio, most appointments were from the left. Angela Eagle, the new shadow business secretary, was also named shadow first secretary of state and would perform at Prime Minister’s Questions when the Prime Minister was away. Her twin sister Maria Eagle got the defence portfolio. Even Diane Abbott was given international development. Mr Corbyn had received 59.5 per cent of 422,664 votes cast; of the 105,000 who had paid £3

Burnham and Benn take Shadow Cabinet jobs

In the past few minutes, more details of Jeremy Corbyn’s Shadow Cabinet team have been announced. Andy Burnham is the new Shadow Home Secretary, and is replaced by Heidi Alexander in the Shadow Health Secretary. This is intriguing, as Burnham has quite different views on immigration to Corbyn. Hilary Benn is the Shadow Foreign Secretary: a boost for Corbyn given Europe will be such a big issue in the next few years. Lord Falconer is the Shadow Justice Secretary and Shadow Lord Chancellor, while Yvette Cooper will chair a taskforce on refugees: something she will bring a great deal of passion and expertise to. What these announcements do show is

Corbyn and the austerity argument

Until recently, the Tory leadership has been reluctant to plan how they would respond to a Corbyn-led Labour party. They just couldn’t believe that Labour were actually going to elect him. At the Cabinet’s pre-holiday get together at Chequers, the conversation about how to take on the new Labour leader was premised on the idea that either Andy Burnham or Yvette Cooper would win. But now the Tories are working out how they would tackle Corbyn. (Though, two Cabinet Ministers have told me this week that they expect Cooper to pip Corbyn at the post). The Tory leadership is keen to avoid sounding triumphalist about the prospect of facing the

Andy and Yvette — a tale of two ‘Anyone But Corbyn’ strategies

Who has the best chance of beating Jeremy Corbyn: Andy Burnham or Yvette Cooper? The Burnham and Cooper camps are vying to be the clear ‘Anyone But Corbyn’ candidate, and trying to grab as much of the low-hanging ‘soft’ Corbyn vote as possible before the ballot closes on 10 September. Burnham is most blatant in his adoption of the ABC strategy. For example, in an op-ed for the Independent today, he says ‘I believe it has come down to a straight choice between Jeremy Corbyn and myself’ and outlined five policy areas he will pursue if elected leader to build a ‘bolder, more principled Labour party’. On housing, Burnham said he will oppose the extension of

As a northerner, I’m fed up of Andy Burnham’s northern stereotypes

Northerners are easy to stereotype: working class, beer, flat caps, Labour, trade unions and football. In the same way all southerners aren’t stuck-up opera-goers and every Scot isn’t a miserly chip-guzzler, this portrait of a typical northerner is insultingly inaccurate — but it is one that some love to propagate. One of those people happens to be Andy Burnham, who is running for Labour leader. As a northerner, I’m not sure that I can take much more of his schtick. It is frustrating to listen to how much of his leadership has been about being northern. Sure, Liz Kendall frequently namedrops her Watford upbringing but Burnham’s whole persona is based on his Liverpudlian

Harriet Harman: we are not purging Corbyn supporters

The summit on the integrity of the Labour leadership contest is over and interim leader Harriet Harman described it as a ‘routine’ and ‘useful’ meeting. Although she is ‘confident that there won’t be questions over the integrity of the result and there aren’t any bases for legal challenges’, some of the numbers released on the number of infiltrators are pretty high. 3,000 ‘cheats’, as Harman described them, have been excluded from voting so far but the final number could be substantially higher. Harman has suggested the selectorate would be ‘fewer than 600,000. It will be over half a million’ — meaning there are tens of thousands of rogues still to be weeded out. Around 60,000 people are expected to

Steerpike

Andy Burnham: Labour will have a female candidate when time is right

Andy Burnham’s leadership bid hit a stumbling block this morning. Burnham — who bills himself as both the anti-Westminster candidate and the candidate who can unite the party in Westminster — made a slip when asked whether he agreed that it would be great for the party to have a female candidate. Speaking on Radio 5 Live, he responded that it would be ‘when the time is right’. Liz Kendall was quick to offer him a role as her deputy, given that the time is right. A point that was not lost on listeners: https://twitter.com/nickfthilton/status/636097107204698112 @derekrootboy Does anyone know what he stands for #AndyBurnham-lost all respect 4 him-his attitude 2 women