How Long Will Burnham Last?

Political Betting is a weekly column by Mark Littlewood aimed at people who like gambling on politics.

Over the past decade our political system has chewed through and spat out Prime Ministers at a faster rate than Premier League football teams burn through managers. As Andy Burnham enters 10 Downing Street, why would we think there is any reason he will do much better – in terms of longevity – than his immediate predecessors? I’m keeping my eyes peeled for a bookmaker offering odds on Burnham being removed from office before the next election rather than at it.

As the Labour Party slowly coalesced around a consensus that Starmer simply had to go there was an oft repeated refrain of, ‘We have to get this right first time if we are going to do it, we only have one chance.’

The theory here seems to be that ditching a leader – however unpopular – and finding a fresh one is not the sort of thing that the electorate approve of. They have passed their judgement at the ballot box and are usually unimpressed when the powers-that-be decide to second guess that decision.

More generally, ditching an incumbent leader against their will gives the impression of chaos and instability. It gives such an impression precisely because chaos and instability are typically what have brought about the decision to make a change.

The circumstances around removing a Prime Minister are always different but can be broadly batched into three categories – they are based on aesthetics, ideology or health. The last two are easier to explain to the public than the first. Margaret Thatcher was removed for ideological reasons – she was unwilling to retreat on the hugely unpopular poll tax and was also pursuing a European policy that a large chunk of her party disapproved of. On the basis of needing to wholly reset our approach to the EU, David Cameron jumped and Theresa May was pushed.

These sorts of switches of leader seem to have a fair chance of working. Indeed, each of Thatcher’s, Cameron’s and May’s successors went on to retain office at a General Election.

But changing Prime Minister just on the basis that the outgoing leader wasn’t very good and without a clear and explicit shift in an area of policy seems fraught with electoral danger. Callaghan and Brown went on to lose elections having entered office mid-term. Both had different approaches to their predecessor but there wasn’t a single, specific and explicable change in policy.

Similarly, the switch from Johnson to Truss and then swiftly onto Sunak didn’t appear to improve the standing of the Conservatives amongst the electorate. In fact, it probably worsened it.

Burnham finds himself in the same vague, messy scenario. He didn’t launch a coup against Starmer because he fundamentally disagrees with him on, say, the war in Iran or Net Zero or membership of the ECHR. Instead, it’s simply based on Labour’s abysmal poll ratings, Starmer’s catastrophic approval ratings and the hope that a fresh approach to ‘comms’ can somehow revive the party’s fortunes.

It’s early days (indeed, we are not yet even in the early days of a new administration as I write these words), but the evidence of recent polls suggests little or no Burnham bounce for Labour. The governing party remains stubbornly stuck on only around 20% in the polls. If there was a wave of national enthusiasm – or even a noticeable trickle – about Burnham entering Downing Street, one would have expected some sort of uplift in the polls in anticipation of it happening. So far, nothing.

Burnham’s supporters will insist – or at least hope – that once we see their man in action as our actual PM the electorate will warm to him. He is certainly a more charismatic politician and a better communicator than Starmer, but I’m sceptical that this will meaningfully move the dial of public opinion.

If our new Prime Minister has a markedly different economic strategy to that of the last two years, I’ve yet to hear it (or at least I’m yet to understand what the various vague analyses and prescriptions put forward actually amount to).

All of this suggests to me that we are likely to continue on the pathway of taxes being dialled up, growth being low, debt increasing and public spending ballooning (particularly welfare spending). I suspect if there is any Burnham honeymoon at all, it will be very brief.

If this is so, what happens if in a year or so the Labour Parliamentary party is still staring down the barrel of electoral oblivion? Having decided to twist rather than stick when it came to Starmer, might the same apply to Burnham? In such a scenario, it will likely be too late to change policy direction in any dramatic fashion – the party will be locked in as a government that seeks to tax and spend to the maximum. However, desperate folk in politics are prone to throw the dice. Having set the precedent of throwing the captain overboard because the polling numbers look bleak it can easily become habit-forming. Historically, the Conservatives have had a much greater propensity for regicide than Labour, but there’s no persuasive reason why the latter couldn’t adopt the same psychopathy.

This is why I’m looking forward to a book opening on Andy Burnham’s departure date, even if it seems a bit mean-spirited to do so right at the start of his reign. If I can find 3/1 or longer that he will be out by the end of 2028, I will certainly be snapping up those odds.

Mark Littlewood is a former director of the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Director of PopCon.