Endgame for Starmer as Burnham storms towards No 10 | The Daily T

It was a great night for our Andy Burnham, a bad night for Keir Starmer, a very good night for Kemi Badenoch, a rather poor night for Nigel Farage.

Our experts give you the inside scoop on what it all means, how Andy won, how he might unseat Keir Starmer, and what it means for Nigel Farage's hopes of becoming the next Prime Minister.

What does Andy Burnham think about China?What does he think about how we should deal with AI, how much does he think we should spend on defence, how does he want to get the welfare bill down, he says he wants to but we don't know how, we don't know what he would cut.All these massive problems that Starmer has had to deal with since the last election, we've got no clear idea about how Burnham would solve any of them.So if I was a Labour MP, I would be sitting there thinking, if we're going to change the leader now, we need to at least know what we're voting for, we need to at least know that there is a solution to these problems.

that politics isn't working.Everyone can feel that the country isn't where it should be.Tonight could, just could, be the turning point.From here on I will give everything I have got to make it so.To ensure the name Makerfield is forever synonymous with bringing about the change this country needs.

Tim, we were up with the lark, with the strains of Wonderwall ringing in our ears as Andy Burnham brings his unique brand of Manchesterism to Makerfield and beyond.

He's bringing back hope.

Is he?Yes.I'm not sure whether you can run a country on hope.But let's see.

We've got no change left, that's for sure.

My main three takeaways are as follows.Yes, it's a big night for Burnham and he's done overwhelmingly well.But is this more about the candidate and his popularity in Manchester, and not necessarily the Labour Party or indeed his popularity in the country?Second takeaway, this is the worst of both worlds for Nigel Farage.He hasn't got within two points of Andy Burnham.He hasn't even got really barely within 20 points of him.

And therefore that is a defeat on the left.And then on the right, Restore at 7 % was something he said would never happen.They're just a protest vote.Well, no, they're not.And terrible for him too, that Kemi Bade -Knox had a revival in Aberdeen.

Yes, yes.Well, I'm wearing an Andy Burnham black shirt, but it's not a statement of sympathy.It's because I'm going clubbing later.Great.

Well, as we've got up so early, you could be in the clubs by noon.

I could be.So my reaction to this is, first of all, let's all be honest.It's a huge personal win for Andy Burnham.Fifty five percent.That's pretty amazing.In the middle of a Labour government that is perhaps the least popular government in this country, in my memory.

Yes.To win that is very, very good.Having said that, reform did very well for a new party.But the problem is, is that this is also their backyard.It's where, if they could beat Andy Burnham or Labour anywhere, it's here.And they did very well in the locals.

And they didn't even come close.No.Restore didn't matter, but at 7 % it's still significant.If that were repeated nationally, it would really hurt reform.And of course, we're still going to be talking about it because that's our job.But really, the most important thing is the Labour victory.

And there's something very frustrating about, I just know we're going to spend the next few years discussing right wing infighting, even though it only accounts for 7 % of the polls.I saw Rupert Lowe having an argument with a journalist saying something along the lines of, you need to ask Nigel that, you need to ask Nigel that.What about the rape gangs?It's all internal beef, and I don't care.But 7 % of the country...

Hang on, we care that the right is tearing itself apart, don't we?

We do, and as a journalist, I'm paid to pay attention.But what I'm saying is, as a voter, what matters is the 55 % that went for Burnham, not the 7 % that went to restore.So can we please, on Twitter and everyone, just not talk about that for a period?Because what matters isthis was a referendum on the Prime Minister.The Prime Minister lost and Burnham now has a massive mandate.

The other thing which you mentioned, you're spot on, very good night for the Conservatives.Who would have thought it?We just weren't paying attention and Kimmy Badenoch, I'm very sorry.I was.We didn't even go.

Tony Diver, who's in the studio with Scarlett Maguire, the pollster, Tony Diver, our political editor, did say some months ago, I think the Conservatives are underpriced.Right.And that is why he is political editor of this great organ, ladies and gentlemen.And why we are not.No, that's right.

We did not visit it.

Hang on, I've been fairly positive about it.I didn't think they were dead and buried.I said they were on life support responding to the drugs.OK, they've responded to the drugs in Scotland.It is extraordinary when you consider...There are a lot of drugs.

Well, Nigel Farage speaks to this.It's extraordinary when you consider that Jeremy Hunt budget absolutely shafted North Sea oil and gas.They slapped a windfall tax.on that whole area.And actually, Scots were said to never forgive them again.Now it seems that they have got the message that they are under new management under Badenoch, whose Scottish name may or may not have helped.

That's true.Also, Kemi has been right on the policy agenda.She was right on defence before the defence review became something we were all discussing.And she's also been right to focus on energy, because that's the issue that tipped that constituency in her favour.So what she will now say in the next few days is if reform could not win make a field.If it couldn't win the Red Wall seat there and if it couldn't stop Andy Burnham there, it can't stop him in a national general election.

Whereas, and she's using a very small sample size here, but she can argue the Tories are a truly national party because we just won Aberdeen South against the evil SNP.So I think it's a very good night for her.

Very quick point on that before we bring in Tony and Scarlet.Last night I was with some Mancunians, some businessmen who know Burnham quite well.and one of them made the point that he is desperate.in quotes, for the Conservatives to be the main opposition again because of his hatred for reform and anything to the right of it.So this is strange, isn't it?That indicated to me that Burnham's attack lines, should he become prime minister, are going to be aimed squarely further right of Kemi Badenoch, which might be convenient to her hopes of revival.

I just want to put that out there because he is a moderate and he thinks that the Conservatives should be treated as the official opposition as they actually are the official opposition rather than reform or any else.Tony D, T to the D. Welcome this morning, having a tea.Do you see what I've done there?What are your takeaways?

Well, I agree with both of you.Clearly, the big story is the fact that Andy Burnham is now marching on number 10.And that's what we're going to be looking at over the next few days.How exactly can he do it?And how does the Prime Minister respond?And his allies are out on the broadcast around this morning saying two things.

Firstly, that he's not going to give up.He's going to fight any leadership contest that comes his way.He's going to wade into, there's reports this morning that he's got £100 ,000 of pledged donations to a leadership campaign.

Doesn't sound like very much.Is it?£100 ,000?

That's quite a lot for a Labour leadership campaign.

Is it?Yeah.Sorry.

I think Jeremy Corbyn won with £5 .50.

That's right, yeah.That's quite fair.And a meal deal from Sainsbury's.

Well, they're saying he's not going to do what Burnham wants him to do, which is agree to a quiet sort of transition of power behind closed doors, and they sort of negotiate it between them.So that's one thing.The second thing that they're saying is that Burnham's policy agenda is so different to what Labour won the election with in 2024.If he was to become Prime Minister, he would have to call a general election.Mike Tapp, the Home Office Minister said that on the broadcast this morning, which when you think about it is a pretty extraordinary thing for Labour ministers to say when the polls are looking as they are.But they're saying that he wouldn't have a mandate and he'd have to call a general election.

and obviously on the current numbers.he would lose by landslide to reform.He has policies.

I was going to say, what does Mike Tapp know about Burnham's policy agenda that we don't?There are no policies.How does he know they're different from the original change manifesto?This guy has campaigned on thin air.He's campaigned on hope.

And in his speech, he said that this was a final chance for the country.

Yes, let's listen to that.

When this borough went to the polls in May, it made a loud cry for change.In this campaign, we have begun to answer that.But I do say to my own party, this is a final chance to change.This is what people said directly to me on the hundreds of doorsteps that I stood on.We must hear it.We must act upon it.

And we must get it right.There will be no second chance.

Well, here's Community Secretary Steve Reid, his best buddy in Cabinet, defending him this morning.

A lot of people hearing what Andy Burnham said will have seen it as a glaringly obvious statement that the change he's talking about is the Prime Minister, is the leader of your party.Can you not see that?

Well, I can see what happened to the Conservatives when they turned in on each other.

No, no, no, I'm asking you very specifically, Mr Reid, the question.A lot of people who said there will be no second chance, this is a final chance to change.A lot of people will see that and go, you don't need to sort of translate that very carefully to think that means change of leader.Do you not think that is what Andy Burnham was saying?

Well, I see what you've used the term to translate there, and you're clearly trying to read the runes.I mean, there are rules to follow.Party, if people want to challenge, there is a procedure that they need to go through to challenge.Do you think that is going to happen?The point I was making is that when the Conservatives turned in on themselves instead of facing the challenges in the country, they ended up not only flatlining the economy and breaking our public services, but they went down to their worst defeat in 200 years.I think Andy is an exceptional talent.

I'm really delighted he's coming back to Parliament because he's got so much to contribute.

With that speech, Burnham made two starmarite mistakes.One was to suggest last chance, with the implication being if he fails, then what comes after that?Does the country shut down?Do we just stop?Hand ourselves over to China?But also the politics of hope and everyone be nice to each other.

is not the reality of partisan Westminster.And as Starmer found, you have to represent your constituent groups, and you have to attack the opposition.So that whole thing, when he walked into number 10, and it was all light a touch upon the country, bring everyone together.That's just not how a parliamentary democracy works.So Burnham is promising something there.Oh, and the third mistake is I'm going to represent Makefield at the G20.

He'll never see the constituency again.

No, he said it's not a stepping stone.It's a touchstone.

So why is he giving this speech saying that the country is going to change?

But there's a contradiction at the heart of that, because you and I went to Makefield along with the rest of the Westminster lobby.And actually, Makefield's a nice town that isn't doing too badly at all.So this whole notion of him positioning Makefield like it's, you know, completely destitute is not quite right.

And if he's going to listen to Makefield and represent it in Parliament, well, that's a lot of reform voters you've got to represent in Parliament.

Well, you can't reverse a referendum and the constituency is 97 % white.So presumably you've then got to crack down on immigration if you're representing Makefield.Scarlett McGuire also dressed Burnham -esquely, if I may say.with the black t -shirt going on.I've realised his look...

It's not mourning.

Well, yours is collared.His look is very much...I'm a stand up comedian at the comedy club late at night because it's black T -shirt and black jacket.It's not even a collared T -shirt.That's fine.And can I just say you are welcoming a child into the world in the next couple of weeks?

So you're just dressed for comfort and you're dressed very smartly.But that's the Burnham look.He doesn't even have a collar on his T -shirt.Yeah, it's disgraceful.Scarlet.

Yeah, I mean, it was it was it was a fantastic night for Andy Burnham winning winning an outright majority at the moment is rare and it's rare in any constituency.We saw that the last election in 2024.And even when we saw something like the Care Philly by -election, Plaid Cymru did incredibly well there, they didn't get to 50%.So there is clearly a huge personal vote for Andy Burnham in Makefield, which he's managed to draw on from his popularity in the North West.I think it's also interesting because if you look at how reform did, and I think we'll come on to that in a bit, because I do think this is potentially a turning point for the party, but you know, we will see.Reform won a smashing locals campaign there.

across the country as well on the message of get Starmer out.And I think, you know, Andy Burnham was in this fantastic position because he could come as a local.Those accusations of carpetbagging didn't work.You know, we were speaking to lots of voters doing focus groups, etc.They didn't believe that.They didn't think he was just visiting and they thought he was a local person.

His kids went to school there.You know, a lot of them had met him personally even before this campaign had started.So the sort of accusations that he was just swanning in from outside was sort of a no go.He is popular there.He has been.Even reform voters quite like him as mayor of Manchester, even if they don't necessarily I don't necessarily think he would do a great job as Prime Minister.

And I think what you could see was that he was able, again, to run.I did focus groups right at the beginning of the campaign.And even then voters knew that a vote for Andy Burnham was effectively a vote to get rid of Keir Starmer as well.And so, you know, he could be all these different things.He could be the Labour candidate.He could be the Get Starmer Out candidate.

He could be the Stop Reform candidate.And so he was able, he ran what was clearly a very good campaign.And we could see this because the polls were moving in his direction as it travelled.But also he was in, I think he was in a very good starting point from sort of messaging perspective and what he was able to do.

Scarlett, we've seen some of the weaknesses of reform in this campaign.I do want to stress, still did very well for a brand new party.Well, how well did they do, Scarlett?

I'm not sure.So, you know, they actually got fewer votes than they did in the local elections, which I think is not good news for them.You know, the local elections were only a month ago.So I think that does point to some problems.Now, some of that will be put down to Andy Burnham's popularity, but I don't think all of it can be.And again, some of it might be put down to Restore.

But as you said, the math doesn't add up to solely blame this on Restore.And you know, this constituency was in their top 10 performances in 2024, in terms of the vote share they got, you know, one of their best constituencies.As you said, the demographics are incredibly reform friendly.It's in their top 30 target seats for the next election.They only went forward by 2 % from 2024.Regardless of who they were facing, it's not a great result.

But is that a party thing or was Robert Kenyon, bless him, just a disastrous candidate because of everything he'd said about women in the past and his inability to defend that really properly on question time?He looked like he was ill -prepared by their press team, frankly.He looked like a rabbit in headlights most of the campaign, didn't he?

And he spent a lot of it in the van.

Well, he is a plumber.

No, I know.I know.But it did look a bit.He was starting to get the accusation that you're not actually out there.You're just in the van interviewing.famous reformers.

Right.Well, I mean, I think the candidate very clearly had weaknesses.However, again, most of the reform people we were speaking to were very much viewing it through a national lens still.So, you know, the Labour voters we were talking to saw it through a national lens because they were aware that they were probably voting for a new prime minister as well as someone they quite liked.But the reform voters, they were basically saying, you know, actually, the local MP can't do very much for us anyway.This is all about sending a message and trying to get to a place where we have a reform government and then we might see some change.

So, yes, he wasn't a great candidate and maybe.a better candidate that hadn't made some of those errors might have you know, got them up a few percent.It was never going to be a game changer, I don't think, here.

Shall we listen to a very dejected Nigel Farage, who, speaking from a field somewhere in England...

Always a bad look.Politicians do this all the time, and it looks like your car broke down.

Yes, he's just standing in the middle of a field in a double -breasted suit and a tie.

As one does.

But he sounds down, Tony, doesn't he?Let's have a listen.

Well, the Makefield by -election was a dramatic, emphatic win for Andy Burnham, with a vote share that nobody could quite see coming.In many ways, he's a popular local mayor, just as Boris Johnson was a very popular mayor in London just a few years ago.But what really happened here is it was vote Burnham, get Starmer out, which, of course, was our campaign message leading up to the locals on the 7th of May.So we were slightly hoist with our own petard.As for the reform vote share, well, I thought we got 18 ,000 votes.We got just shy of 16.

So I'm disappointed by that.No question about it.But I would say this, there's a couple of thousand voters there who would normally have gone out and voted Reform that voted Restore.And I would say directly to them, what do you want?We are the challenger party to the left in this country.And I would urge you to think again.

I really, really would.

Well, the other interesting thing, Tim, is that he's now in a clip basically begging people not to vote for Restore, when five minutes ago he was saying there were irrelevance and saying Rupert had turned into Hupert, not so much now.

Yeah, it sounds as though he is troubled by him.And that's something which comes across and again, it looks weak on a national stage to be overly concerned about someone who did just get 7%.Scarlett, do you think there's any truth in that, that reform voters were voting Burnham tactically?

I think there would have been some reform voters voting for Burnham, butagain, from the, and we will see how the results look like they play out in the end.I think Andy Burnham's wing came from, yes, a small percentage of those completely consolidated the left wing vote.This has huge implications for tactical voting.If you look at just how poorly the Greens and Lib Dems did, that's actually a very reassuring sign for the left in general, just because the tactical vote was so efficient there.And it also looks like, especially from what some Labour people are saying about the get out the vote data they saw, that he was able to activate huge amount of non -voters, people who'd not voted in the last election, people who'd not voted in the middle election.

So do I think there were lots of reform voters that were sort of voting to get Starmer out by voting?But I'm a bit sceptical about that.

It is interesting that he has won that by election and obviously was blocked from Gorton and Denton.This is another point made by my Mancunian friends at the sumo wrestling last night.If he had won Gorton and Denton and was having to use Gorton and Denton as a touchstone to Westminster, then he'd have to be, his policies would have to be extremely left leaning because of the makeup of that constituency and because of the threats from the Greens.Because the Greens are on nothing in Makerfield.

He didn't have to talk about Israel.

He didn't have to talk about Israel.If he uses it as a touchstone, does he actually naturally have to be more Blairite?Does the makeup of this seat that we've just described actually mean it's probably more likely that he appoints Wes Streeting as his Chancellor?if he becomes Prime Minister and not Ed Miliband.Do you see where I'm going with this, Tony?Because the mood among the businessmen who have got a lot of money and a huge kind of stake in Manchester are, look, we don't like the Labour government.

He's a pragmatic man.He's a nice man.He's the kind of man you can deal with.But we are as yet unsure which direction he's going to go in.Is he going to go blue Labour or red Labour?And if he does the latter, then we're not going to be particularly impressed.

And at the moment, we're guessing is going to do the lap.because of all of this stuff about, well, I don't really know the fiscal rules and I'm not going to be in hock to the markets.But, Tony, there is this mood music around Streeting.I can't work out what Streeting's doing.Streeting must have been promised something.I know we've got this two stories.

Miliband's been promised Chancellor.Streeting's been promised Chancellor.whoever he chooses as chancellor is going to tell us exactly the direction of travel of any Burnham premiership.

Yes, that's right.I mean, and on that, it sounds like there was some kind of secret summit between Burnham and Streeting that happened on Monday when Streeting went out to campaign in a constituency.I was told by two Labour sources that Streeting is pushing for foreign secretary, not chancellor.But it sounds like none of this stuff has been nailed down anyway, and he hasn't made decisions about who he's appointing to the top team.But yeah, of course, whoever the chancellor is, given that so much of what Burnham wants to do is all about economic policy, will massively shape how the government runs.But I think more broadly, there is also a concern, including among Labour MPs, that we don't really know what a Burnham premiership would look like anyway.

And everyone's getting very excited this morning and saying, well, this is it, Burnham's headed straight for number 10.But Starmer said that he'll fight a leadership election.And if that does happen, it may not, but it looks like it will, then we're heading towards weeks and weeks of discussion about which man has got the better vision for the country.And at the moment, we don't know, what does Andy Burnham think about China?What does he think about how we should deal with AI?How much does he think we should spend on defence?

How does he want to get the welfare bill down?He says he wants to, but we don't know how, we don't know what he would cut.All these massive problems that Starmer has had to deal with since the last election, we've got no clear idea about how Burnham would solve any of them.So if I was a Labour MP, I would be sitting there thinking, If we're going to change the leader now, we need to at least know what we're voting for.We need to at least know that there is a solution to these problems that the party's facing and we're not heading back into more of the same.

Shall we look at Keir Starmer's tweet, by the way, quickly?Yeah.Congratulations at Andy Burnham, GM, Labour's new MP for Makerfield.Voters chose Labour's campaign of hope and optimism over division and hate.He hasn't gone any further.

The Labour Party is divided and he hates Andy Burnham.But Tony, what some of those backbench MPs will have had in the last few weeks is a rare experience of campaigning somewhere with a candidate who's liked.Yes.And Scarlet, is there any evidence yet that that local appreciation for Burnham stretches into the wider country.

Yeah, it's a complicated picture.So there have been a few hypothetical polls.I don't really like hypothetical polls, because everyone's quite bad at imagining what things are actually going to be like, you know, not just voters, all of us, really, I think it's quite hard to project how you would feel when all these different things change.But in those hypothetical polls, we have seen that amongst some pollsters, Andy Burnham gets a small lead over Reform.That, interestingly, is coming from votes on the left.So I think to Camilla's point about whether Makefield grounds him in a more blue labour sort of stance for government.

It will be interesting then seeing where if there is a poll bounce in his favour, which I suspect there would be.if then they look at the national picture and think, well, hang on, actually, our success is not coming from getting loads of voters from reform, but it's actually coming from consolidating this left bloc and whether then that decides some more of the direction of travel.But no, I think it's a complicated picture, though, because we've seen his trajectory in Makefield has gone like this.If you look at the polls and the data and how they were able to go, it's gone upwards.His trajectory nationally during the campaign has gone down.So his approval ratings nationally have gone down.

He's still much preferred to any of the other Labour alternatives.But it's, you know, it's going in the wrong direction.And there's been another hypothetical poll, which now shows him yes, a labour balance for about six points, but still just behind reform.Now, that doesn't mean that's exactly what I think is going to happen.But it does sort of follow the golden rule of recent British politics is, you know, the more the public get to know you, and the closer you get topower, the less they like you.

The less they like you.

Is there any sign of Southern discomfort?Because we did hear a lot about the North in this election campaign, and that doesn't speak to the entire country.

No, it's a great question.And I think we'll see that when he comes in, where he's able to get those votes from, whether there is any sense that people in the South and previous Labour supporters don't like him.I suspect not.And again, you know, I think he will get people like a winner.There'll be lots of Labour supporters that are so relieved that they have anything that looks vaguely even like a widow.who can point to it.

But again, we're in a world where no one is really surviving contact with SW1.

And what about the Greens?Because they were way up, doing very well at Gorton and Denton, Zak Polanski, very well known.They seem to be coming down.Is that part of that story of the left perhaps coming back behind Andy Burnham?

Also, Polanski's kind of disappeared in the last couple of weeks after the council attacks on the barge problem.

Yeah, I mean, it seems like they barely fought in this by -election.Now, part of that makes sense.The demographics to them were pretty friendly.in Gorton and Denton, very unfriendly, just like demographics in Makefield, very friendly to reform, very unfriendly to this iteration of the Green Party, you know, older, white, Brexit voting, not at all, where they are trying to get voters at the moment.And I think, you know, there is a sense that they sort of stepped back just knowing that it wasn't even worth trying and potentially they wanted an Andy Burnham change in direction as well.So they did fall back.

I wouldn't read so much into the Again, if anything, actually, I would say that the fall in support for the Greens is a very good sign for the left generally, because I think it shows that voters are tactically voting and doing so very effectively.I think it would be interesting to see other tests and whether we continue to see their decline in national polls, though, which we have also seen in the last month or so.

Quick word on the Tories and indeed how that fits in with the reform situation before we move on to discuss, Todi, what happens next in Parliament.You said months ago you thought the Conservatives were underpriced.Do you feel vindicated?How are you viewing this?Or are we all over the place?it somewhat with the Aberdeen result?

It's a very good result for the Conservatives in Aberdeen.It's an area which obviously is heavily reliant on the oil and gas industry, and you would expect their full reform to do pretty well there.But the Tories have taken the seat off the SNP.It's obviously a great result.As to whether or not I feel vindicated, I don't know.But there were two kind of pieces of evidence that I think are important.

when you look at the polling on the Tories.The first is that Kimmy Bainock's personal poll ratings are going up.They have been going up for some time voters seem to like her.

That's the opposite of what you were saying about most politicians funny enough.The more people see Kemi Badenoch, the more popular she becomes.Yes.

Although I think that there's also something else going on with Kemi Badenoch.So you definitely get that voters like her a lot more.They really do.And you hear them bring them up organically.They weren't really aware of her before.They weren't listening to her.

They still have that sort of view of the party, which is why results like this are significant for parties.They can show they're winning.That matters a huge amount.It's how reform have actually done a lot of their success over the past 18 months.But there is also this other element, which I think is something for the conservatives to think about, which is, I think, part of the reason why Kemi Badenoch has become more popular is yes, has become more well known, but it's not as if people are feeling she's any close to power just because they've written off the Conservatives so much.And so you can sort of see that if you compare people like Ed Davey, or if you go back in time, you know, and people like Roy Jenkins, it's easier for people to be popular when they're not seen as the person that's about to take charge or going to enact any unpopular decision.

So it's a caveat, although I still think she is doing very well.Sorry, the other piece of evidence, Tom?

The other piece of evidence is the economy.Tories outpoll reform on the economy.It's the only thing actually that the Tories consistently outpoll reform on when you look at the breakdown of issues.And the closer you get to election times, the more people care and worry about the economy.

I would just say that they're absolutely right.But increasingly, the public separate the economy from the cost of living.And they prioritise the cost of living, and they give reform the lead on the cost of living, which is not to mean that they're not put off by the idea that reform might have some sort of Liz Truss episode in power and send the whole economy tank in.But actually, like that lead on the economy, when you separate out what voters think about the cost of living the economy, The one they prioritise, which is just their immediate bills and their immediate financial situation, they prefer reform one because I think they think reform are more likely to just give the money off their bills.Right.

Interesting.

But then that in itself is interesting.That may explain why they don't trust them on the economy, because they want the handouts, but they don't want what it brings.

There might be a subconscious reaction against their own bias towards a party that gives them lots of money.But in this election, has this not been a good test case for the vulnerabilities of reform?One, candidate selection.Yes.very difficult for a right -wing party to get good candidates.Two, the split on the right, it didn't make a difference, but they wasted a lot of time and energy fighting each other rather than Labour.

And third, a weakness when it comes to variables in the narrative.They're doing okay, so long as we all hate Keir Starmer, and that's the one narrative.But if you change that narrative in any way, if it becomes, well, now it's a different prime minister, or maybe Kemi Begnok's not so bad, suddenly reform starts to look weak again.

Yeah.And I'd add another layer to that.I think Rupert Lowe is helping Kemi Bade knock out somewhat because I spoke to a Tory big beast last week, and they were referencing the Harborne donation to Nigel Farage and saying this was really helpful for their position because they can then say to the electorate, look, he's just like the rest of them.He's on the take.And actually, of all the leaders, there's even been some suggestions and some reportings about Burnham and lockdown and all the rest of it.All the leaders, Badenock currently looks like the only clean skin and they are holding on to that because they want people to start saying, oh, I don't think he is the next messiah.

Actually, I think he's probably just another naughty boy.Lowe is leaning into that, even though Lowe is an even naughtier boy, because Lowe is also saying to the right wing electorate, he's just like the rest of them.He's pushing in that direction, saying he's justuni -party -ish because he doesn't want to deport everyone that moves.So all of that does help Badenock somewhat, but I appreciate the overall branding issue makes it difficult for the Conservatives to get.

It is difficult, but I think, you know, if you look at reform, they win when they're winning so that their surges have been dependent on wins in polling or wins in elections up until this point, from just before the election until now.My question mark going forward is, do they start losing when they're losing?You know, does this sort of lack of momentum mean that suddenly some of those voters that decided they were the new party of the right start looking at them and thinking, maybe not, actually?And then you could, you just could see, again, at the moment, every time they've had a boost in support, it's because They've had a proof point to say we can win.You know, the momentum's with us.My question is, what happens when that stops?

Which last night it did.You know, it doesn't mean it's permanent stop, but it was definitely going in the wrong direction.

We also ran a very good piece on the Telegraph website about the difference within the party over economic policy.between the more populist and the more Thatcherite wings.And that raised the point that a lot of people in Makerfield were voting reform for a party which they disagree with on almost every single social and economic issue.And so far, Florent's been able to pipe over that crack, partly because of immigration and because of economic anger at the government.But I do believe someday that has to be confronted, that this is a party dominated by men who are philosophically Thatcherite, trying to win votes in part parts of the country.Very rarely, rarely within the UK voted against Margaret Thatcher.

Yes, that's right.What should Starmer do next?Well, this is David Blunkett's advice and he said this to Newsnight.

I think the obvious and most beneficial outcome would be that the change, if there is to be a change, is so obvious that backbenchers are so clear that Keir decides with hisVictoria, that they will decide to go in the interest of the nation as well as the Labour Party.And they do so with with dignity and with the respect of all of us.

Now, before you both come in on this, Tony and Scarlett, I'd just like to read out a great email from a man called Richard who listens to the Daily T. Thank you very much indeed.The polls were correct and Wooden Top Starmer is likely to be replaced by the Clown of the North.But the Burnham or Burning question for Labour is why, despite having an illegitimate mass of silly MPs in Parliament, why they have had to go outside Parliament to find somebody to replace Plank of Wood Starmer?You would think that out of 400 plus MPs, there would at least be one candidate to replace Starmer, now wouldn't you?That is a bloody good question from Richard.I mean, Honestly, no one else in the cabinet seemingly has this man's popularity, even though we know very little about this man and cannot work out for the life of us whether he's a Blairite, a Brownite, a Corbynite or a Starmerite.

Tony, are the Labour MPs embarrassed about this situation?Can they not see that it doesn't look good, that they've had to outsource a Prime Minister or insource?

Yes, I think they can.I mean, there are other potential candidates.Streeting for a long time was the one who everyone thought would replace Starmer and possibly even without Burnham becoming an MP and challenging.That became impossible a few months ago.As Burnham emerged as such a front runner, it was actually felt that it would be kind of illegitimate to hold a leadership race that doesn't include Andy Burnham, in which case, Streeting's got no chance of getting in.

But the scale of the victory now makes it look a bit silly for even Streeting or Al Kahn, who we had on the podcast, who was very impressive.It makes them look, I just think, because of the scale of the victory.It looks self -indulgent from the back.doesn't it, slightly?

I don't know.Well, I mean, I would have thought again, Labour's been so starved of any sort of win.In fact, you know, because there's been a lot of hope.And we saw that Keir Starmer's strategy at the last conference was to paint this as a fight between him and reform.And then any opportunities he had to lead that fight, voters didn't go with him for it.You know, saw that in Gorton and Denton, they'd actually rallied the Greens to stop reform.

And he had no proof points to say that actually the public is prepared to rally behind me even to stop a force that a lot of the public don't like.Andy Burnham is now in a position where again, he can say outright majority in this seat, which was a write -off to reform at the local election.So you can say I can beat reform at the same time as winning votes from the left.And none of the others have that sort of test case.And again, the other ones, it's really quite difficult.People always overestimate name recognition with politicians amongst the public.

The public don't know who Wes Streeting is.The members who do know don't like him.You know, he seems like he's gone in the wrong direction.and quite a lot of people.And then the figures that the public do know, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner, they really don't want.So, you know, it's, I do think it's quite difficult for someone to mount a challenge, at least in terms from just the idea of who could win, you know, who's best positioned to win.

I think it's quite difficult for anyone to mount a case that could beat Burnham's at the moment.

Tony, give us some hypothesis on how this could play out.First scenario, Keir Starmer decides over this weekend, I will go at some point, what then happens?What's constitutionally the position?He resigns, he sets a timetable?How's that likely to play out?

Well, this is what the Burnham camp want.They want a sort of negotiated ceasefire behind the scenes between Starmer and Burnham.And the thinking is that Starmer will be allowed to have the summer basically to work on his legacy, to do some of the international stuff that he's been doing so far.So we've got the NATO summit coming up early next month.And we've got a new EUsummit coming up on 22nd of July.

We've also got the by -election to replace Andy Burnham in Greater Manchester as the mayor, which is going to happen at the end of next month.So there is a feeling that if Starmer agreed to go, he'd be allowed to stay on and do those things.Meanwhile, the Burnham team works on actually setting up a team, a unit, people to work in, people to serve.

He's not got an office in Westminster yet.

Can I just say on this legacy thing, I'm sorry, just speaking for the public here, what an absolute nonsense.Keir Starmer thinks he can go to a few summits and suddenly his legacy isn't going to be 30 resets and 16 U -turns, that his legacy isn't going to be that he's one of the most disastrous and unpopular prime ministers this country's ever had.Good grief, these people are just deluded.Carry on, Tony.

But constitutionally, in terms of the Labour constitution, they can do that.They can sort it out amongst themselves, which is, of course, what Tony Blair and Gordon Brown did.But Starmer insists that's not going to happen.

So scenario two, he refuses to go.How then does an MP bring down an incumbent Labour leader and prime minister?

So, according to the Labour Party rulebook, in order to challenge the leader who doesn't want to leave, you need 80 other Labour MPs.It's often cited as 81, but actually you count as one of them.So it's 80 other Labour MPs that Burnham would need.

But this is where streetings... apparent 81 MPs or I don't know whether it's mythical, you know, Streeting has gone through this whole process saying, I've got the numbers.If Streeting's had a job guarantee, be it Chancellor or Foreign Secretary, he then could feasibly lend his votes to Burnham in order to have a coronation.Couldn't there be a situation where one candidate has got so many MPs to challenge the Prime Minister that the others simply fall by the wayside?

Well, yes, that is possible.But under the rules, the incumbent is automatically on the ballot.

Oh, right.So it's always Starmer versus either Burnham or Burnham and others.Interesting.

Starmer's there.Unless he...We could be in a situation where 380 MPs say that they're backing Andy Burnham and Starmer still says, I'm going to fight it and I'm going to take it to the members.Wow.

Dicking in.But how about as well, mass resignations?next week, over the weekend, even earlier perhaps, forcing Starmer's hand.Is there any likelihood of that?

Well, I think that's what some people on Burnham's side think will be the thing that changes Keir Starmer's mind, because he may well not want to hand over the leadership without a fight.But if his cabinet starts resigning, then he might be forced into doing that, or at least they hope.Some debate about the timing of that, though, because some people think it could happen, you know, as soon as next week.It seems more like the Burnham team want a bit of time.And so they're, you know, according to one report, they're actually urging ministers not to resign because they don't want to destabilise the government too much.

Who is going to resign?I mean, Lisa Nandy's obviously very close to Andy Burnham.She might resign, but not if Andy Burnham's saying don't resign.Bridget Phillips is not resigning.She thinks that this is all the stuff of nonsense.Dan Jarvis isn't resigning.

He's only just got the job.Rachel Reeves isn't resigning.

We've seen this before with the Tories, haven't we?We've been at this rodeo many times.And part of the problem with Wes Streeting's resignation was it was just him and a house of cards, it seems, can withstand one joker falling over.Right.But it's when you get a lot of them going at once.That's when it's curtains.

And Scarlett, my final question for you.I'm sorry to hear here, Labour MPs saying things like, I think this could be good.It's time for a conversation.We need a debate.And we're looking forward to a reset.And my experience of the Tory races is they always say that and some of them actually think it but actually the public watching just thinks you're idiots.

you're chaos, you've lost control.

I think it's all fine to do that in opposition.It's terrible to do it when you're in office, basically.I think that's the, you know, so if there is a handover of power, by far the best thing for the Labour Party is that it's smooth, that it's clean, that it doesn't set off lots of conversations about the direction the party should be going in.You know, I think this battle of ideas stuff, I think, you know, Yes, Labour probably does need to have one, but it should have had one before the last general election.

It's had 14 years to have one.Another reset.

But to your point, Scott, this is what Dominic Cummings always used to say, no one knows who you are.Likewise, politicians always think that the voters have an investment in their conversation.They don't.

They absolutely don't.

They just want you to govern.

And again, what the public wants in some ways is quite simple.You might say it's quite complicated to get to the simple things they want, but actually voters don't want any of this.So there was a sense that voters were quite excited in Mayfield that they got to choose the next prime minister and that it all felt very big.And I think that's why you saw very, very high turnout, by the way, in this by -election.But in general, voters don't want any of this.They don't want to be listening to us.

They don't want to be listening to the politicians debate any of this.They want to be able to get on with their lives, just to have someone in charge that can deliver even just vaguely on the things they want to happen and forget about it all.

Can I just correct you on one thing?1 .5 million people listen to us every week.I know what you mean though.Westminster bubble.Well, there you have it.Tony Diver, Scarlett Maguire, Little Maguire.

Good luck in there.Good luck coming out of there.Tim, what a week we've had.You're off clubbing.I've got a Sunday showdown with Aaron Bastani, which is great fun.Luxury communism versus luxury capitalism.

I do like Pina Colada.I thought you were going to say something else there.And I do like dancing in the rain.

Do you?

You know what I'm referring to, don't you?Oh, yeah.

I like Pina Colada.Is it Barry Manilow?

No, it's not.No, it was a one hit wonder.It's a joke single.It's not.

OK, well, you head down to wherever you...

You're thinking of Coca -Cola.

no oh yes I am I am not to be confused with the Wham song what's the Wham song?Club Tropicana our producer says I tell you what I need a fruit punch after all this so listen we are back on Monday 5 p .m.Who's going to be the prime minister?Hotel from Hell.

It's like an Indonesian prison cell.I had Yvette Cooper at the front desk begging for clemency.

I'd been at the sumo wrestling and I thought, am I actually in Japan?Because it was like being Clive James in one of those pods in our hotel.

Yes, straight from the bed into the toilet.Everything's tiny.

Everything was tiny.Anyway, that's our overnight of accommodation.This is the pains we go to, to produce this podcast.

Enjoy this.We're back on Monday at 5pm but before that is my ding dong with the lefty Aaron Bastani and that's out on Sunday.And don't forget the weekend tea tomorrow with Poppy and Michael.So much tea, so little time.If you're enjoying our journalism, why not sign up to From the Editor, our free email newsletter.

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