There is no golden economic or fiscal legacy for Andy Burnham.
The prospective incumbent of No 10 will need all the emotional intelligence he can muster to convince voters and the markets that he has the right stuff.
It doesn’t help that the fiscal inheritance from Rachel Reeves, whose days as Chancellor look numbered, is rotten.
Despite £75billion of tax increases since July 2024, when Labour was elected, public finances are on a knife edge.
Burnham has never fully retreated from his provocative view that Britain is ‘in hock to the bond markets’. The latest budget data shows the difficulty he will face as he seeks to implement business-friendly socialism.
