Labour’s Andy Burnham has set up a potential showdown with Keir Starmer after convincingly winning the Makerfield byelection, paving the way for his return to Westminster and a likely tilt at the Labour leadership.
The outgoing mayor of Greater Manchester promised change after winning the byelection in the early hours of Friday morning with 55% of the votes and a majority almost double the size of his predecessor, Josh Simons. The scale of the win has prompted talk among Burnham’s allies that he could replace Starmer as prime minister within weeks, if not days. Much will depend on whether the prime minister decides to fight to retain his position.
Victory Speech and Calls for Change
In his victory speech, Burnham said the result “could be a turning point” and that people had “voted for change, they have voted for more power for the north and everywhere forgotten by Westminster”. He said this was Labour’s “final chance”, adding: “There will be no second chance, but it is a chance now from this result tonight to build a new politics based on unity and hope, turning away from the path that takes us to a divided politics of the kind we see in the United States.”
Senior Labour figures are now urging the prime minister to agree to a process either for a handover of power or an expedited leadership contest. Harriet Harman, the party’s former deputy leader, who was appointed by Starmer as his adviser on women and girls just a few weeks ago, said she wanted Starmer, Burnham and any other potential leadership contenders to agree to put their parliamentary support to the test but without involving the wider Labour membership.
Harman told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “What should happen is that the three contenders – which is obviously Keir Starmer, who’s the prime minister, Andy Burnham, who’s the challenger, and Wes Streeting, who’s also a challenger – should be got in a room by the deputy leader of the Labour party, Lucy Powell, and the chair of the parliamentary Labour party, Jess Morden, to agree a process whereby Labour MPs choose who they want.”
Reactions from Labour MPs
Patrick Hurley, a Labour MP who has until now remained loyal to the prime minister, urged him to step down. “The will of the parliamentary Labour party is obvious and I think that really we need to now see the prime minister set out a transition process,” he said on Friday morning. Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, said on Thursday night: “I’m sure there’ll be a conversation with the prime minister, but that’s not for tonight.”
However Steve Reed, the communities secretary and a close ally of Starmer, said that while he was “delighted” by Burnham’s victory, Labour should now be focused on replacing him as the mayor of Greater Manchester, rather than a leadership fight. “We need to focus on making sure that Reform do not take [Greater Manchester],” Reed told BBC Radio 5 Live. “The damage they would cause to the whole of the north-west of England if they did that would be incalculable.” He also offered something of a rebuke to Harman’s proposed leadership meeting, telling the Today programme after the Labour peer spoke: “If somebody wants to challenge, then there’s a clear process that they need to go through. You can’t just change the rules.”
Election Results and Analysis
Burnham achieved his victory with a majority of 9,231 votes over the Reform UK candidate, Robert Kenyon – bigger than that enjoyed by his predecessor. Labour won 55% of the vote to Reform’s 35%, while the hard-right party Restore Britain secured 7%. Turnout was 59%, six percentage points up on the general election, with 45,510 votes cast. Burnham won more votes than Reform and Restore combined, showing that Nigel Farage’s party would not have won even if they had united the hard-right vote.
Farage said he was disappointed by the “dramatic, emphatic” result, while his deputy leader, Richard Tice, claimed on Friday: “We heard from a number of people in the constituency who said that in order to ensure that we get Starmer out, I’m going to vote Burnham, even though I’m Reform-minded.” Starmer congratulated Burnham on his win, saying: “Voters chose Labour’s campaign of hope and optimism over division and hate”, while Streeting posted that the result “gives us all hope that Labour can still win, but Andy’s campaign is proof that to do so we need to change”.
Return to Westminster
The “King of the North”, who was first elected to parliament almost exactly 25 years ago and served in the governments of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, will return to Westminster nine years after he left. Addressing hundreds of supporters, who cheered him into the Life convention centre in Wigan, Burnham said Makerfield would “never be a stepping stone to me – but instead will be my touchstone; a Makerfield test at the heart of British politics will ensure the places that Westminster has neglected will now get fairness”.
Voters had told him they felt “neglected” and that “the country works for other people and other places but not for here”, he said. “That changes tonight. This result changes that. This result will bring about a country that works fairly for everyone. People here have voted for change, they have voted for more power for the north and everywhere forgotten by Westminster. Now let’s give that back to them.”
Future Challenges
Burnham’s win means Labour faces another gruelling contest against Reform UK, this time to retain the Greater Manchester mayoralty. The poll of 2 million voters will be one of the biggest in British political history, and is expected to be held on 30 July. The Makerfield byelection was triggered when Simons, the then Labour MP, agreed to stand down last month to allow Burnham to contest the seat and mount a challenge to Starmer’s ailing leadership. The prime minister has faced calls for his resignation over the disastrous appointment of Peter Mandelson as the UK ambassador to the US, followed by elections in which Labour lost more than 1,200 local councillors and control of the Welsh Senedd in May.
