As EU leaders dine, 70,000 voters in the north of England pick a new UK PM

On Thursday (18 June), as the 27 EU leaders meet in Brussels, Britain will elect its next prime minister.

Not strictly true, but don’t panic – you haven’t missed some snap general election on the Brexit island.

What is, in fact, happening, is a local by-election in a place called Makerfield, halfway between Manchester and Liverpool, where Labour’s current Manchester mayor is standing to become an MP (Again. He already was an MP from 2001-2017, before he stood down from Westminster to run as a regional mayor).

Normally, a local byelection in the UK would not be earth-shattering news in Britain – let alone in Europe. This one could be the most significant in half a century of British political history.

Because Burnham is not hoping to simply become another one of the 650 MPs in London, but to immediately challenge the incumbent prime minister, Keir Starmer, for the Labour party leadership, and thus become, by default, British prime minister by the end of the summer.