In what now seems like an inevitability, Andy Burnham not only won the Makerfield by-election, he did so comfortably. After weeks of hearing about how it was going to be a close race between the Labour candidate and Reform’s Robert Kenyon, Burnham triumphed by more than 9,000 votes.
Andy Burnham will now be prime minister. He will likely be as bad at the job as Keir Starmer
Some – including Jawad Iqbal on Coffee House – have pounced on this result as a disaster for Reform. It was unquestionably another example of Reform’s poor expectation management. Nigel Farage’s party approached Makerfield with a sense of entitlement, as if they couldn’t lose. Yet lose they did. Despite this, we might look back on the Makerfield defeat as a turning point in Reform’s fortunes.
It is now highly likely that Andy Burnham will be prime minister within the next few weeks, or even days. As Keir Starmer struggles to cling on to his job, there will be chaos within the Labour party. Expect multiple cabinet resignations, and the grim spectre of Starmer looking increasingly desperate and deluded.
But once he gets the keys to Number 10, Burnham will find his honeymoon to be very short-lived. It will soon become apparent that Labour has foisted on us a prime minister in the middle of a parliament, with no real mandate for anything he does – and no real plan for change.
