Two weeks into Andy Burnham’s tenure in Downing Street, Labour leads over Reform in the polls for the first time in months. Is this shift largely down to Burnham’s political style, his policy changes, or the problems that have recently hit Reform? And, most importantly, will it mean a transformed Labour Party?
As for Reform’s top brass, the problems facing Nigel Farage, Richard Tice and Zia Yusuf stem mainly from their collective wealth. All three are multi-millionaires, with a combined wealth that comfortably exceeds £70m – hardly the stuff of an anti-elite party supporting people on the margins.
Reform has responded by dismissing criticisms as an establishment plot, but that is unlikely to be effective. The fact of a well-off leadership backed by overseas billionaire wealth is hard to deny, especially when allegations of sleaze begin to make it into the print media.
Although Farage’s party may have had a serious setback, it is far from down and out, with Westminster politics currently too unpredictable to rule out a comeback. What is more relevant right now is how Burnham’s leadership is progressing.
In some respects, it seems to have had a successful start, at least in terms of domestic politics. The new leadership is pushing two issues hard: the need to address multiple problems with post-18 education and the currently disastrous funding of adult social care and its direct links with a seriously stretched NHS.
But while these policies have certainly attracted some support, Burnham’s real test will be on whether his government intends to move beyond the neoliberal economic model that has been dominant since the days of Margaret Thatcher. The last time Labour proposed doing so was in its 2017 election manifesto, when “for the many not the few” struck a chord with many voters and came close to getting Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street.
For now, we remain stuck in a ‘for the few, not the many’ world – and only a break with that, starting with root and branch tax reform, will change that. Enacting such changes would certainly bring plenty of older Labourites back into the fold and thereby strengthen Burnham’s position.
Burnham has so far made positive noises on this front, surprising many of the party’s former voters with a tentative questioning of neoliberalism, perhaps hoping to speak to the 800,000 people who wanted a new party in the Corbyn mould barely a year ago.
Under Keir Starmer, the Labour Party lost at least half its membership, falling from 564,000 under Corbyn in 2017 – one of the largest party memberships in western Europe – to around 250,000 now. At the time, this drop caused little concern as many of those who departed were viewed as obstacles to the kind of safe centre-right party that those around Starmer wanted to build.
Meanwhile, the most telling challenges will stem from foreign policy and the defence posture. On both matters, Burnham is out of step with many of those on the left whom he badly needs to win back to Labour, having pledged to place the update of the Trident strategic nuclear system at the centre of his plans to re-industrialise the UK economy.
As for NATO, the new PM aims to continue Starmer’s agreement to expand Britain’s nuclear posture. As part of this, he will go along with his predecessor’s plan to deploy new tactical nuclear missiles on Royal Air Force strike aircraft, though these will be controlled by the Pentagon in the US. NATO’s nuclear war-fighting posture very much relies on having these B61-12 free-fall nuclear bombs – a plan no doubt shared by Vladimir Putin in Russia, however much the Kremlin may claim otherwise.
So, no change there, nor in the decision to allow the US Air Force to use the RAF Fairford base in Gloucestershire to house the many B-1B Lancer strategic bombers that it is using to bomb Iran. The posture, claimed by the Ministry of Defence, that the B-1Bs will not hit “non-offensive” targets is little short of laughable.
RAF Fairford is the US Air Force’s only heavy bomber base in all of Europe; if Burnham were to refuse to let the Pentagon use it, any large-scale bombing campaign of Iran would be very much more difficult. If he sticks with the current Starmer posture, he will have to justify the decision in terms of international law.
Given that Donald Trump is reported to be exasperated with the failure of the Pentagon to win the war with Iran, and that the US and Saudi air forces have just jointly attacked pro-Iranian militias in Iraq, a sudden expansion of the war is certainly on the cards. If it comes to pass, we can be sure that Burnham’s government will be in the thick of it.
On Israel, Burnham is unlikely to voice the Starmer-era strong support for Binyamin Netanyahu’s government, but is equally unlikely to introduce any change in UK policy on Gaza or take any effective action, such as economic boycotts, against the concerted settler violence in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. Trump may claim recent success, with Hamas agreeing to disarm, but that is meaningless without a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, which is unlikely in the extreme.
Finally, there is the dominant issue of climate breakdown, where the current rash of wildfires across the world may at last be having an effect on public opinion. Given the forecast of an unusually strong El Niño later this year – further increasing global temperatures – that mood will likely increase in intensity.
In this context, to have any impact on the greatest global security challenge of all, Burnham’s Labour will have a rare opportunity to play an international leadership role. This will involve standing up to the powerful fossil fuel lobbies, ending any further development of oil and gas reserves, hugely accelerating the transition to renewables and re-directing a substantial part of the current defence budget to that end.
That may seem a very tall order, but it is what is required. Will it happen? Time will tell, although we no longer have too much of that. As far as the Labour government is concerned, where are Damascene conversions when you need them most?
