Andy Burnham proved categorically that he is a winner. A challenge to Sir Keir Starmer is now inevitable.
Just after 3 am, the Makerfield count in Wigan fell quiet. Labour had known their candidate was ahead, but there were still some stunned faces as he secured a whopping majority of 9,231 with a 54.8 per cent share of the vote. Burnham, not Starmer, is the electable and apparently unstoppable face of Labour.
Burnham lost no time in setting out his vision for leadership. This is a “final chance to change,” he warned his new colleagues in Westminster in his acceptance speech; it is a “turning point” for British politics.
What happens next entirely depends on Starmer’s reaction. On Saturday morning the Prime Minister is likely to speak by phone to his newly-elected and most troublesome backbencher. Starmer will also pop up on camera with gritted teeth to welcome Burnham. No doubt he will say his rival has a great deal to offer.
At some point the PM will formally offer Burnham a job in his Cabinet, and the northerner will refuse. Starmer will ask his current Cabinet allies for a show of strength, perhaps another round of posts on X that he’s the leader the country needs. It’s doubtful it’ll be enough. Some may refuse.
Those close to Starmer are still saying he won’t offer a timetable for a takeover. “I think the idea has taken hold that you don’t give up your job just because someone asks for it,” a government source said.
But the numbers are bleak for Starmer. Burnham achieved a swing of 23 percentage points in Makerfield from last month’s local elections. In May, voters backed Reform UK over Labour by 51 per cent to 24 per cent.
If the question is who can beat Nigel Farage, Labour found its answer in the early hours of Friday morning on the outskirts of Wigan.
Now it’s up to Burnham to set the tone of how this plays out. There are some MPs close to him who wouldn’t mind Starmer falling fast with no soft landing. But there are wiser heads, including Burnham himself, who see a chaotic blood-on-the-wall Labour contest as unwise both for future party unity and for Britain’s economic stability.
Some MPs say if Starmer doesn’t set out a timetable, his Energy Secretary Ed Miliband – a key Burnham ally – could resign to force a crisis. But some Burnham allies don’t want Miliband to muddy the waters, for fear of creating an alternative focal point.
There is also a question mark over what Wes Streeting does next. The former health secretary’s allies insist he has the 81 MPs required to spark a leadership race. But in Makerfield, those around Burnham speculated his rival’s support has evaporated as ministers would keep their heads down, so they don’t rile either Starmer or his more likely replacement, Burnham.
Some Burnham-supporting MPs have even suggested the soft-left could lend the more centrist Streeting MP support to force an open leadership contest, safe in the assumed knowledge Burnham would see off Streeting and Starmer. An ally of Streeting said it was not a conversation that had taken place.
For the Burnhamites, most hope Streeting will “fold in” with the offer of a Cabinet seat. “At only 43 [years-old] Wes could live to fight another day,” a Labour source said.
In Wigan, council workers dressed in black and white counted papers. Like all good by-elections there was a cast of eccentrics, including Count Binface and an environmentalist dressed as a fox. When alphabetically arranged on stage to hear the result, Burnham was trapped between a fox and a bin like an abandoned kebab.
The Monster Raving Loony Leader, Howling Lord Hope, dressed as a dime stone cowboy, was determined to stick next to Burnham during the acceptance speech. When Burnham spoke of “hope,” the 84-year-old echoed him. “Hope, hope,” he exclaimed.
And while Burnham left to celebrate with supporters, there will be some serious questions to answer at Reform’s Millbank HQ. The party came second with 15,696 votes, 20 percentage points behind Labour. On stage, their candidate, Robert Kenyon, gave a rueful grimace.
Reform couldn’t have hoped for a by-election in a more promising area than Makerfield. In May’s local elections Team Turquoise romped home. There is another stark statistic: of the 90 Labour seats where Reform came second in the 2024 general election, this constituency is the 7th nearest the top of the list of most marginal.
This seat is near the top of the wish list if Farage is to secure a majority. Reform will argue Burnham was a tough candidate to face, with a strong personal brand. That can be true even while the party learns other lessons.
Reform picked a truly dreadful candidate in Kenyon. The jibe aimed at him – “I’d rather have a career politician than a plumber who’s a sexist” – from an audience member in BBC’s Question Time Makerfield special will rank with Brenda from Bristol’s “Not another one” in the pantheon of memorable political phrases.
Refusing to apologise for his sexist comments was straight out of the Donald Trump playbook. But those northern ladies who folded their arms in the BBC studio and shook their heads at Kenyon proves that Britain is not the US. Time for Reform to vet its candidates properly.
Burnham was helped by a split on the right. Restore Britain, the ultra-right party led by Rupert Lowe, won 3,111 votes, just under 7 per cent of the vote.
More worrying for Reform will be the strategic lessons. The left and the right have both squeezed their core offer of insurgency and change. On the left by Burnham for Labour and on the right by Restore Britain offering a truly eye-watering blend of modern online campaigning and bleak ethno-nationalism.
Back in the winning Labour camp, there was a twisted logic to some of Burnham’s jubilant gang of supporters. They argue Makerfield was Burnham’s to lose to Reform, choosing to ignore the fact that the Labour-held constituency didn’t have to have a by-election circus.
But they had a point to prove. Starmerism is over. A determination to beat Farage has taken its place. For the Burnhamites the end justifies the means. Their man took on Reform and won.
“This was not winnable for Labour four weeks ago, but it’s now a blueprint for doing something different and becoming electorally viable again,” a Burnham ally told The i Paper.
The only thing standing in his way is the current occupant of No 10. But they’re relying on that changing remarkably quickly.
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