How New Is Andy Burnham’s Labour?

0:00This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. The series of wrong turns. Political power was centralised. Economic power privatised. The country deindustrialised. Osterity followed, hollowing out councils and depriving them of the agency to act to reverse any of this. Now the 1980s, was that or was that not the moment in our country's history where everything seems to have gone wrong? Is shaping up, is it not, to be one of the big, big lines between the political parties

1:03these days? And I think it was the moment where things started to go right in terms of music and fashion Laura, but maybe that's a different sort of assessment as to the turning point what 40s are also years ago. Well, this week as we get going with this political season, we'll look ahead to a big speech from the chancellor, John Healey, his first big intervention, which is going to happen tomorrow. And we'll be talking about this new politics, or does it feel like the politics have old? Henry's with us too on this episode of Sunder's Newscast. Newscast. Newscast from the BBC. Humanity's next great voyage begin. You know I like my buses, I'll come onto them, especially that he was just a mirror of a town. Oh not not. Thinking about it like a panter helped. Do we play music now, what do we do? And what will you do? Stir it all up. Hello, it's Laura in the studio. It's Joe Pike in the studio and it's Henry at home. Henry at home, I love, we're all reunited, although Paddy still on holiday, what a slacker. But I'm hoping he'll be back here next week.

2:05Shameful, KELOLAR is probably in France. So we will also talk about Nigel Farage. We'll play a bit more of the interview that we did with him at the conference yesterday. But first of all, Henry, this question of Don Healey taking to the podium or lecture or whatever he's going to do tomorrow and set out sort of economic plans. What are you expecting him to say? And is it going to match up with this sort of Burnham vision that we have heard again and again and again and again and again? That the country took wrong turns and he's the one who's going to steer things round. Well that's a such a fascinating question isn't it? Because the clip you played from Andy Burnham just a moment ago, you could have played any number of clips from just his few short weeks as Prime Minister. Because he keeps making this point. He keeps saying that Britain's gone wrong over the past 40 or so years, which isn't really just about factories, also a fairly deft way of him implicitly saying he's breaking with new Labour as well in the 90s and noughties.

3:05But the line I keep thinking of whenever I hear Andy Burnham say anything as Prime Minister is what he said when he became leader of the Labour Party a few days before becoming Prime Minister. This is going to be the biggest change moment in British politics in 40 years. That is quite something to say of your own government. You are going to be the biggest change that Britain has seen in four decades. Now fundamentally that change is going to be delivered or not delivered economically by John Healy, the Chancellor. Has what John Healy has said so far as Chancellor? Quite matched up to the ambition of that rhetoric that Andy Burnham set out as he was preparing to become Prime Minister. I think we can objectively say no. He is trying to give the indication that things are going to be steady, especially in the budget in a few weeks time in late October. But let's see whether that changes in this big speech tomorrow. But John Healy hasn't just given the impression that things are going to be stable and steady as she goes. He's actually said explicitly using the word continuity.

4:06And for me that's quite a contradiction between the two most powerful people at the top of government. The fact that actually Robert Jenric in his speech yesterday at Reform Conference was using the word continuity to sort of batter the Labour government and try and make an argument as to why they need change. I think sort of feeds into that. Also in terms of sort of radical policies, what John Healy has said in the last couple of days to the financial times seems to be about almost during the opposite, managing expectations in particular around the war in Iran. The impact that's having already he argues on inflation on growth on borrowing costs. He has of course indicated that he wants to cut the welfare bill, make some changes to this sort of treasury green book. But nothing he said in that interview suggests that he wants to be or at least match the radical rhetoric that Henry has laid out from his new boss. And of course the backdrop to all of this is that taxes are at record levels. And borrowing is at enormous levels.

5:06Borrowing costs for the UK and for another developed countries have also been incredibly high. The highest one day last week I think in 18 or 19 years. So even if he wanted Henry to be dangling all sorts of fancy expensive things that might tickle the fancy of Labour MPs, he just doesn't got that wriggle room. But how do you think in the coming weeks, Barnum and Healy are going to manage this? I mean, a minister just before the break when they just sort of moved in, Minister and Barnum's government said to me, I think Andy's going to vibe left but govern from the centre. But people are going to notice aren't they? I mean, arguably that's the opposite of what Keir Starmer did. Yes. So that one critique of people in Keir Starmer's government was why isn't he shouting more about the progressive things we're doing? People think Labour voters or frustrated Labour voters think that this government is much less left wing than it is. I mean, I think that is an interesting tension for them to manage. As you lay out and we've seen it play out on the global bond markets this week, there are very good economic reasons for why John Healy is trying to project responsibility or

6:13at least bond traders version of what a responsible chancellor would do. It's just that they don't necessarily accord with the prospectus on which Andy Burnham became Prime Minister, or at least what he said to Labour MPs and sort of to the country, even though he never sort of went to the country or even to Labour members. In terms of how they're going to handle it, look, there are things that John Healy will talk about tomorrow, which he will present as a big shift in British politics. Certainly I'd expect him to talk a lot about devolution as Andy Burnham has. And that is something that John Healy was hot on when he was a junior minister in the treasury, under Gordon Brown. It's not just him fitting in with Andy Burnham's agenda. But one thing I think that is worth mentioning on the continuity point is a very newscast point, but the newscast audience deserves this. Did you just say, oh no, young Kate, I'm rage. Well, especially since a scribing massive significance to junior treasury ministers is now in vogue, because that is something that the Labour Party is saying about Andrew Griffith

7:15has come on to talk about. Well look at who John Healy's junior ministers are. Emma Reynolds is number two. Chiefs actually the treasury. She was a junior minister in Rachel Reeves's treasury. Dan Tomlinson remains a junior minister as he was in Rachel Reeves's treasury. Lucy Rigby, a junior minister having been chiefs actually to the treasury under Rachel Reeves. James Murray, a junior minister in the treasury having been chiefs actually to the treasury under Rachel Reeves. I mean, not only is John Healy saying this is a continuity government. He is leading a continuity treasury. Torsten Bell, sorry, I forgot him as well. Also still there. Is that what the group of Labour MPs who wanted Andy Burnham to become prime minister so that he could change the direction of the government in particular economically expected? I don't know. I don't think it is likely to be, but I think this is the big question that's going to be hanging over everything for the next few months actually, not even in terms of the macro detail, but just where are they going to end up when there was a senior figure in the party who was chatting to this week said to be, look, he's going to have to choose between politics and economics.

8:16In the party, lots of people assume that Burnham will choose politics. They were positing that actually he might end up choosing economics because if he doesn't choose economics, then actually the markets come, might come back and give him a big bite on the bar money, might be forced into having to choose economics by which I mean being incredibly careful with money, maybe having to make cuts, looking for savings rather than going around dangling the possibilities of big public spending all over the place. I'm not saying that is what he's going to do, but it's definitely this is where the tensions feel like they're going to be in the next few weeks or so. And what's he doing with the fence as well? Yeah. I mean, that interesting that Andrew Griffith on your programme, which is a new shadow chance to learn. New shadow chance to let replace Maelstride. He mentioned defense, he brought generic in his speech, mentioned defense, so that sort of two main parties of the right seem to be using John Hilly's resignation what three months ago over getting to 3% of GDP on defense spending. And the fact that he's not recommitted to that now he's in the treasury as something

9:19to be with. That needs to be resolved, although the attacks are going to keep on coming shortly. I think it will do. And I think at the moment, though, their current plan is not to resolve it until next year, but that is a bruise that the government's opponents are going to keep battering and quite understandably so because, you know, John Hilly resigned with great fanfare and said, if this doesn't get resolved, the Prime Minister is not keeping the country safe. Now, if he still believes that, and John Hilly is seen by most people to be an absolute man of integrity and a man of his word, if he still believes that, then how does he feel not about not resolving that tension, but ought to be a fly on the wall in the conversations between Andy Burnham and John Hilly when he was being asked to take up that job? We've already walked up the street, hadn't we? Or sort of walked in the side after coming up Whitehall, so awkward if they'd change their minds. And Henry, on the point of attacks on Hilly, what about attacks the other way on Andrew Griffith, because by appointing him, Cemy Baderlock, has brought in somebody who does have a bit of a back history, which is easy for opponents to leap on.

10:20Absolutely. And we've seen it again and again just in the short week or less since he's become shadow-chancellor. So, as I alluded to earlier, he was a junior minister in the treasury during Liz Truss' mini budget. He certainly does come from that wing of the Conservative party, the sort of free market, low tax, smaller state wing of the Conservative party, came into politics as a big supporter of Boris Johnson, having briefly worked in his downing street before becoming an MP, stayed loyal to Boris Johnson, and then like many of the Johnsonites went in with Liz Truss, rather than with Rishi Sunak, look, it's going to be a challenge for him for sure. He was making the argument to Laura, as we've heard him make several times this week, which is a sign of this attack line's prominence, that he was just the junior treasury minister and didn't have that much of an involvement in the budget. I think the reason Cemy Baderlock has appointed him though is something else that he said in the interview. He kept talking about his business experience as compared not just to John Hilly, but to the entire

11:21Labour cabinet. Andrew Griffith probably had the most distinguished business career, or a certain kind of business career, if anyone in the House of Parliament, seems the chief financial officer of a FTSE 100 company. At a very young age as well. And my ears also picked up when he said something else on the programme this morning. He was talking about this big economic picture, and he said for decades there'd been a lack of honesty about what really needs to happen in the economy. And of course I said, well, do you include lots of your former Conservative colleagues, Jeremy Hunt and Philip Hammond? And he basically had quite a pop, but successive governments, including Conservatives, for not really getting to grips with the fundamentals of the economy, which he sees overall as a massive leap to big state that's grown and grown, and questions about welfare and debt that haven't really been resolved. Self evidently, this has gone back a number of periods over a number of different governments of a number of different flavours. The Conservative Party is under new management. We're being really honest about the challenges that the nation faces. Many of the Conservative

12:21governments do really good things, so don't get me wrong. But when it comes to the big macro, the big picture about how we get jobs for our young people, how do we deal with the level of the public finances, how do we get great infrastructure? I think your viewers will see that. They'll see when they go abroad. We're not as prosperous as we once were as a nation. It's not uniquely confined to the United Kingdom. You would see the same sort of issues in France and Germany, other big Western economies. We can change this. So we're seeing pretty similar tactics from Andy Burnham and from Andrew Griffith, both wanting in different ways, from different parts of the political sphere, trying to distance themselves from previous governments, including ones they served. Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it? And I think this is going to, in a way, it feels like there are some new battle lines being drawn up between the parties. That doesn't necessarily change what's happening in the country, but in terms of the political argument, you do get a sense whether it's real that there's more distance between the red and the blue

13:25than there has been for a while in terms of the rhetoric. And I think they're both happy to use a terrible modern phrase. They're both happy to lean into that, to really accentuate those differences. I think they calculate, suits both of them different politically. But for Andy Burnham's government, there might be quite an early test of what they really mean about things like greater public control. They talk about an active state, you know, taking more control, helping the economy, reindustrializing. So it seems that, and this hasn't been confirmed explicitly yet, but there is reporting, and I've been told this too, that as many as 4,000 jobs are at risk at Jai Kira Land Rover. It's a hugely important company. Kira Starmer used to visit it all the time. He boasted that he protected them from Trump's tariffs, but a combination of tariffs, high energy costs, and also the push to electric vehicles. All are to reasons why that business is, to some degree, in trouble and maybe looking at restructuring. The unions are very,

14:28concerned about it. Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary told us on the program he will be meeting with the boss of the company in the next few days. And he suggested not that there would be direct bailout. He said, I wouldn't bail out a private company, but he did hint that there could be some forms of support in that, you know, the kind of public things that politicians say in terms of, I, yes, supporting long-term investments or whatever. So I felt, I don't know what you two felt, that he was hinting that the government might be willing to take some steps, not writing a big check, but might be willing to take some steps and including maybe softening the regulations on the motor electric vehicles. Isn't there a sort of quite a big irony that we are talking about a big enormous manufacturing business Henry at the same time as Andy Burnham is talking about the last few decades and de-industrialisation, the sort of, the very narrative that Andy Burnham is saying is, is using to explain how some communities far outside London have been sort of

15:30denigrated is sort of coming to reach the headlines at the exact moment he's sort of making those arguments. Yeah, absolutely. And so I think this is a big question for the government over the coming week, not just because it's Jaguar Land Rover, that's a big British brand with which everyone's familiar, not just because it's lots of jobs, but also because it does get to the core of those questions about what our industry looks like, heading deep into the 21st century. By the way, just on Johnny Reynolds, just to return to the continuity first change question. Yes, he said something in the middle. Well, no, I was going to say, who was the first, obviously this was the first Sunday with Laura Kuhnsberg of Andy Burnham's government. You know, of course, who the first government guest of Sunday with Laura Kuhnsberg of the Kierstarmour government was. It was Johnny Reynolds. It was the business of Henry T. Johnny Reynolds. It was also, of course, another Labour guest, which was the mayor of Greater Manchester. I don't know what ever happened to him. I know. I just was watching it thinking, oh, I think so. Here we are again. And I did remember, because I remember still that we can't, when they just won the election, being absolutely flabbergasted that the Prime Minister

16:35didn't want to come on the programme and say, hooray, I've just won the election here all the exciting things I'm going to do. We were, of course, very glad to have Johnny Reynolds, the business secretary in the studio. We're always very glad to have whoever our guests are. But I do remember having some quite interesting conversations with some of the summer's team about this is probably the moment when you would really, really, really want to do an interview when you've just won a massive election victory. Anyway, there we are. Let's move on. But I think it's fair to say, Johnny Reynolds is happier as business secretary able to give interviews than he was as Kierstarmour's chief whip, which cannot have been responsible for party discipline in an incredibly unhappy period for the Labour Party. I think there are, I hope he wouldn't be offended by saying there are a few more grey, flex of grey in the beard of Johnny Reynolds after having the in-chief whip for a while.

18:15We're going to fight in elections and fight in non-alaction periods with social media spending. They don't want to necessarily talk about it publicly. Leaders don't want to talk about it, but this is a big part of trying to get into power or hold on to power. Yeah, and obviously in election campaigns there are strict spending limits, but there are different rules in different periods. I mean, I was just struck watching the interview at full a length. That's not only is this as you guys talked about, rippetingly yesterday, a party in crisis, but that crisis is writ large across Nigel Farage's demeanor. I mean, part of what I think has fueled reforms success over the past couple of years is that Nigel Farage has so often looked like he's having fun against rival politicians who've looked utterly miserable and sounded miserable. He's not having fun at the moment, is he? And it may well be true when he sort of talks about

19:17some of the challenges that reform UK are dealing with being related to challenges faced by other political parties, but this is a man whose entire pitch is that he is completely different and operates in a completely different way to the traditional political party. So I'm not sure it's the most comfortable argument for him to be making. I think that's right. To say I'm like all the others, as you say, is the opposite to what he's always been telling people for years and years. That's just how I listened to how he said that. It wasn't okay. It wasn't okay. Why did they say that comments were injudicious at best and why it's subject to an investigation? And by the way, this looks bad. As does the sale of peerages, as does government contracts for donations, we are not the first people to be involved in a row over donations. And he's right that they're not the first, but it is there are sort of four big parts to the financial problems that they are facing as a party. He wanted, of course, his conference to be a turning point. This weekend to be a turning point. A bit like he wanted, I think the Clackson

20:20by-election to be a turning point. I don't think he's managed to sort of turn the page or draw a line under any of this. Perhaps done the opposite. But what really fascinates me is what happens now in particular Dan Jukes, one of the people involved in the undercover filming. What happens now, he's sort of out of the picture. One person in reform I was speaking to last night was saying he is Nigel Farage's or was Nigel Farage's closest friend. They think together, this person said, it's a father and son dynamic. And of course, there are questions. And maybe some of the things that Tim Montgomery, the former reform member and formerly a conservative member, of course, has been sort of touching on about not necessarily having the right people around him. It is odd if you're trying to professionalize to sort of maybe mix the personal and mix the professional. Now Jukes out the picture, or will there be somebody who we see like more like a normal chief of staff? Well, possibly. And I think in any small organization, which essentially reform was a small organization, it wants to be an enormous organization. So the charitable way in a sense as

21:22another senior reform president seems to me this week is like, this is like growing pains. This is part of the journey and the people who are alongside you on the way up aren't necessarily the same people you need to get all the way to the top. I'll just say there are some new people expected to go into reforms of HQ in the next few weeks. I was told one of the names of them might be quite surprising. I know nothing more than that. Who knows? Maybe it's the Dalai Lama. You've also got the finance and defense people, these sort of spokespeople that everyone is talking up. They say they didn't want to announce them this weekend because they only had, I think, we should chat about yesterday a couple of news cycles. They didn't want to put all their good headlines out. But they claim these people are going to impress us and have interesting backgrounds. They do. But remember also this time last year, reform was talking about having labour politicians coming across. There has still hasn't been a labour defection. Maybe who knows? I mean, we just don't know. And when political parties, not just reform, but perhaps particularly reform. Quite often they will talk up, talk a big game about something that might become out.

22:25But I suppose if the big question is how can they move on from this, I think it's really challenging because they've got a lot of bits of process in this. There might be an electoral commission investigation into this. The police are still looking at other things. There's a parliamentary investigation. All of those things, whether you think they're fair or not, are the kinds of process-y stories that Westminster absolutely gorgeous itself on. And for Nandio Farage's opponents, it gives them many weeks, if not many months, more of a sort of drum beat of these stories coming back and back and back and back and back and back. Is there any way Henry for them to try and regain momentum? It's not necessarily happened at conference. It's not happened in Clackton. Is there something that Nandio Farage can do? Or is this just a matter of time and waiting for these investigations to pass? Well, this is the thing, isn't it? Is that, I mean, let's not lose sight of the greatest significance potentially of this channel for news for bait and media investigation, which is that whatever the political ramifications for Nandio Farage,

23:27some of the people involved may have broken the law. They deny having done so, but it seems likely there'll be at least some sort of investigation that may well take some time, and it could result in very serious adverse findings, it might not, but either way, it will take some time to get to whatever that conclusion is. And you've seen with the £5 million gift from Christopher Harbourn how long procedurally some of these things can take. So I do think it is hard for Nandio Farage to find immediate, quick ways of grabbing back momentum. His favourite method of doing so is sort of eye-grabbing announcements delivered at a press conference where he takes 20 odd questions afterwards. Well, we know what those questions are going to be, whatever the policy he announces at such a press conference might be. And I think also, just to bring us back to what we were talking about earlier, House Striking, it was to me on Tuesday and Wednesday in the House of Commons, that Andy Burnham and Kemi Baytonock, both of them barely spoke about reform. They were trying to sort of shut them out. Kirsta, I made a big strategic

24:28judgement call a year and a half ago, reform with the opposition now. The next election was going to be Labour for the reform. He'd get questions from Kemi Baytonock, PMQs, and he'd use them to talk about reform. Andy Burnham got questions from Kemi Baytonock and used them to talk about the Tory party and the government, the traditional red-blue dividing line. And I think this might all bolster the sense that in both of those parties that they can actually do that and shut reform out of the debate, even though they are still polling pretty well. And that's then we touched on it briefly yesterday, as I think given how februaryl everything is, it would be nuts for the two traditional big parties to go, oh fine, it's all over for Nigel Farage, we don't have to worry about it anymore. Absolutely. However, as you say Henry, in terms of the debate in Parliament and this sort of where reform is in the conscience of the two big parties, they're probably a bit adjacent right now rather than being right in front of their faces. And people in the Tories, Laura, think it sort of game on. And if you talk to pollsters, they argue that the real moment of danger and jeopardy for

25:33reform is around Tory waivers who really want to stop labour getting into government again. And they will vote tactically, a lot of pollsters say, for whichever right-wing party looks like they're in the lead and in the polls. And if Kemi Baytonock somehow manages to overtake reform, that could look more likely now. It's sort of not clearly happening yet. But the 15 months of reform being consistently in the lead has ended. And there are sort of other dynamics too. The thing the Tories are really worried about, which is possible, certainly the next election, is losing the dispatch box. Kemi Baytonock knows, as you've sort of intimated then, Henry's intimated about what he's won Parliament this week. Her having that platform be able to stand at that box to look like a primacy, waiting potentially. And also force herself on radio bulletins and on TV bulletins. That is such a key part of her pitch. And if she loses that, that is a real worry. Yeah, it would be a big structural change. And they wouldn't, you know, it would be a big dilemma

26:36for them. So shall we conclude at the beginning of this new political season? We've had the first few days back. It's going to be incredibly big few weeks. I think what we're saying, I'm feeling I'm sort of doing a paddy sum up. He always does this. I'm obviously missing. He goes, so what we can say in newscasters is, so maybe what we're saying, nobody's ever been impression either. We've normally had at least six by now. As we were saying, as we head into this political season, is that there are politics feels competitive. Very competitive. There are three parties all vying around the sort of 20% ish mark. It feels like it is all to play for. You've got a big biolaction which could be interesting for the Greens. And could be very embarrassing and awkward for Andy Burnham. He's meant to be the one who can print unite the progressives except, oh, oops, if Kierstammer left him as a leaving present of the Greens being able to win a biolaction. That whole Oh Andy Burnham can unite the progressives. So politics is very competitive. There are contradictions in this new government. I think we're saying that too.

27:43And the 19 ACs were good and bad and the political party is going to keep arguing over that. I think that seems like an accurate, what do you think Henry? That seems like accurate summary to me. It's like paddy isn't on holiday uncanny. Uncanny O'Connell. Well, we look forward to paddy being back with us next week. It's been very nice to have the two of you here this weekend. It's lovely to have you in the chair, even though paddy is not here. It's delightful. Lovely to have you Henry at home. And Joe, I did say fashion and music was best in the 80s. So this morning on the program, we played the number one of six of September, 1986, which was, don't leave me this way by the coming hours. Yeah, of course. Of course. One of one of one of whom is of course, Reverend Richard Coles. Reverend Richard Coles, no stranger to this parish. You're like to say that about a man of the club. But when you said better choices, what were you, what were you thinking? You know what? I mean, Henry wasn't, I don't think even alive in the 80s. I was just a totalist. So maybe you should, you should lay out what was better fashion and music was. Well, my first love, Morton Harcett,

28:47right? Aha. Obviously. Ticony. Who's aha? I wonder who aha is. Morton Harcett was the lead singer. I knew Morton Harcett, Joe. Come on. Okay. We'll see that later. Wasted your ideas. So talk here in the 80s. Fashion, I'm not so sure. Nineteen eight or the massive shoulder pads. Crystal Carrington and Joe Mark. Some of that coming back. Oh, I think Crystal Carrington and Alexis. I mean, dynasty. There's massive hair, shoulder pads, all of that back combing. Big cat. I mean, I am a big, big hair, big fan. Yeah, absolutely. Higher the hair, the closer to God said, Goli Parton, rest in peace, along many of our big, big, big lines. That's a great line. You're hair is quite high, too, to be fair. It is now. I mean, it's just growing by the second, up my height while it stays. Prime Minister's a fan of 80s music. Is he? Yeah. Yeah. One of the things that happened when we went to number 10, Norris, for our interview. To guitar. No, he showed me his gold disc from the Smiths, which is on loan from Johnny Marr, and he's like, oh, I have to give it back to him. And I thought, oh, yeah, just casually drop that one in while the camera is running. Man, the man is just a person. In its roots.

29:50Actually, shameless plug. I would say that interview with Andy Burnham, where we sat down with him for half an hour. That's still on I-Pleur if you want to watch it again. And I think if you're trying to understand what's going on in this new government, I think it is still. If you haven't seen it, you can listen to it on BBC Sounds and it's on I-Pleur if you want to go back and see. Definitely. Shall we say goodbye? Let's. Bye for now. Goodbye. Bye-bye. Newcast. Newcast from the BBC. You've come to the end of newscast. Some people, and you know who I mean, might say you ooze stamina. Can I encourage you to subscribe on BBC Sounds? And you can get in touch with us anytime. Email us at newscast.pbc.gov.uk. You can watch us on O-W-3-O-1-2-3-9-4-8-O.

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