Burnham’s first speech as Labour leader: “This is a last chance to change”
Key Points
- Andy Burnham has delivered his first speech as Labour Party leader as he prepares to assume the position of UK Prime Minister.
- In his speech, he urged a break with the politics of the past and said this is 'a last chance to change' for the government.
- He decried decades of neoliberalism that had left ordinary working people behind and said his government would focus on addressing this challenge.
- Burnham said Labour would be supported by its own identity, not pander to the politics of the Greens or Reform.
Andy Burnham has been officially elected as leader of the Labour Party and has given his maiden speech, in which he called for a break with toxic politics and the failures of the past.
Burnham began his speech by thanking those who supported him and paying tribute to Keir Starmer, applauding his leadership in Labour’s election victory and his record on the NHS, workers’ rights, renters’ rights, and international policy.
At the centre of Burnham’s speech was the idea that Labour would be couched in its own unique and defining identity, not pandering to the politics of Reform or the Greens.
He said that this generation of politicians have not done enough for working people, and said he aimed to challenge an economic model built on decades of neoliberalism.
“We must recognise that this generation of politicians, myself included, have failed to challenge a political culture and an economic model that simply doesn’t work well enough for ordinary people,” he said.
“Four decades of the neoliberalism that began in the 1980s have not been kind to the places that built our party, nor to the communities across the UK in rural and coastal areas.”
He called for an end to factional politics and the point-scoring partisanship of Westminster, which he said infuriates the general public.
Labour’s last chance to change
Burnham said that he made a break with point-scoring politics in Makerfield, admitting that the government had not been good enough in addressing the issues they cared about, and people listened to him, giving him a fair hearing.
“But let’s be honest, everybody, this is a last chance to change,” he said.
“And we must take it together. Unite it together. Tell people what we will do rather than always going on about others.”
“As your leader, I will set a direction that is distinctively Labour,” he said.
“We won’t try to out-Green the Greens or out-Reform Reform or doing what we’ve done in the past – wearing too many Tory clothes.”
“Let me tell you, I’m quite happy that Kemi doesn’t approve of my wardrobe choices because I’m not keen on theirs either,” he said.
Burnham also addressed the common refrain used by the right wing of British politics: that of ‘taking back control’, stating that the Conservatives were the ones who gave away control of state assets.
“The right use the phrase ‘take back control’, but they are the ones who gave it away in the first place,” he said.
“If local places don’t control something as basic as a bus service, how can they connect people to opportunity and turn things around? And if we don’t have sufficient public control over the cost of the essentials, how can we have control over inflation, public spending, and the rest of the economy?”
Burnham said he aims to be a leader for all places, not just Westminster and England. He said he has not yet made any decisions about who he would like in his top team and cabinet, but that he would announce these soon.
It is expected that on Monday, Sir Keir Starmer will meet with King Charles III to resign his position, after which Andy Burnham will be appointed as Prime Minister.
