Andy Burnham, United Kingdom's prime minister-in-waiting, vowed on Monday to deliver radical change to the nation's politics, pledging to give away a chunk of his power by handing greater autonomy to local leaders in a "circuit-breaker" for the sclerotic British state.
In a speech at the People's History Museum in Manchester, "one of my favorite places on earth," Burnham offered some detail of his plans if, as expected, he becomes Britain's seventh prime minister in a decade next month.
The former mayor of Greater Manchester also said he would move part of the prime minister's office from London's 10 Downing St. to northwest England as part of "the biggest rebalancing of power our country has seen."
"Growth cannot be ordered from the top down. Instead, it can only be nurtured from the bottom up," Burnham said in the speech aimed at bringing voters, Labour Party colleagues and financial markets up to speed with his economic vision.
Burnham is the strong favorite to replace Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who announced his resignation last week.
