𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

Who is Andy Burnham? He’s 56 years old, He’s been involved in politics for almost his entire career. And he’s almost certainly about to become our Prime Minister. But there are still Labour colleagues who claim they don’t know what he believes or what he stands for. Nominations in Labour’s leadership contest close on July 16. If nobody else stands, as seems likely, Mr Burnham will make his triumphant entry into Number 10 on July 20. There is, however, no manifesto setting out his policies or even the core principles that will guide his premiership.

It’s true that the former mayor has delivered speeches and conducted interviews in recent weeks, but they were all, officially at least, about his campaign to become MP for Makerfield – not about leading the country. We know that he’s a working-class Scouser, raised as a Catholic but not very religious, who met wife Marie-France van Heel when they were both Cambridge University students. They have two daughters and a son.

His entire career has revolved around politics, including spells as a researcher for Labour MP Tessa Jowell, a parliamentary officer for an NHS body and a special adviser for a Cabinet Minister. He became an MP in 2001.

Some Labour MPs like to tell a joke that goes like this: “A Blairite, Brownite and Corbynite walk into a bar. The barman says, ‘What will it be, Andy?’”

The point is that he’s seen as a chameleon, somebody who changes depending on what’s fashionable at the time. When the Labour Party was divided between Blairite and Brownite factions, Mr Burnham managed to stay friends with everyone. He was a minister in Tony Blair’s government and a cabinet minster under Mr Blair’s great rival, Gordon Brown.

When lefty Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader in 2015, denouncing his predecessors, Mr Burnham remained at the top table as shadow home secretary. Supporters insist his ability to work with people from different political backgrounds is actually a strength that will make him a better prime minister.

And it doesn’t just extend to the Labour Party. When Mr Burnham quit as an MP in 2017 it was to become Mayor of Greater Manchester, one of the first generation of regional mayors. He developed a strong working relationship with Conservative minister Jim O’Neill, a champion of the Northern Powerhouse project – and Lord O’Neill, who has left the Tories and is now an independent member of the Lords, is currently advising him.

Today, Mr Burnham’s core supporters in the Labour Party are on the soft left, including deputy leader Lucy Powell and former transport secretary Louise Haigh, but he is also expected to confirm Blairite former MP James Purnell as his chief of staff. So he’s not a factional politician, but is that a bad thing? A more serious criticism might be that he’s likeable, but lacks substance.

In person, Mr Burnham is charming, sincere and generous. He has interests outside politics, and while some MPs feign an interest in football, his lifelong passion for Everton is the real thing. He dabbled with the guitar, and you can find footage on YouTube of him jamming with pop star Feargal Sharkey.

But he’s stood twice before for the party leadership, in 2010 and 2015, and lost both times. Not only that, but he deserved to lose. There was nothing inspiring or innovative about his campaigns.

He did publish a manifesto for the 2015 contest, titled: “A radical Labour vision for the 21st century”. It began: “My vision is simple: Labour will be the Party that helps everyone get on in life.”

In it, he set out five key policies designed to appeal to left-wing Labour activists, including abolishing student tuition fees; building more council homes; ensuring younger workers get the same minimum wage as older colleagues; nationalising railways and sorting out social care.

With the exception of the first of these, Keir Starmer’s government is pretty much committed to all those policies already.

Presumably, Mr Burnham has some new ideas this time around. But what are they? There is no manifesto today, because he doesn’t need one. So far, at least, there are no rival candidates, and therefore no real contest.

That’s a worry for some Labour MPs, who feel it would be a good thing if Mr Burnham’s ideas were put to the test in a proper leadership election.

Instead, we are left to pore over speeches and interviews given during his successful Makerfield by-election campaign.

Mr Burnham has said he wants a ten year plan for public investment and procurement, with the Government and its various agencies buying British – rather then awarding contracts to countries like China.

He also suggested he wants to increase funding for the armed forces. When it comes to finding the money, he told the Times: “I am not squeamish about saying that the plan would be to reduce the welfare bill.” However, this would be done by helping claimants into work, not reducing payments. And Mr Burnham has spoken about cutting taxes for the lower-paid.

But none of these are firm promises, as you would find in a formal document. Rather, they are issues Mr Burnham has said he feels strongly about, or ideas he is in favour of exploring. And he does seem to change his mind. He complained that Britain was in “hock” to the bond markets, suggesting he might ditch the tough fiscal rules employed by the current government which limit borrowing.

But Mr Burnham has changed his tune and says he will follow the fiscal rules after all, much to the disappointment of Labour left-wingers. He also once said he hoped the UK would rejoin the EU, but now says it would be a mistake to “re-run those arguments” about Brexit.

Pensioners, at least, have little to fear. Mr Burnham has said scrapping the “triple lock”, which ensures pensions rise in line with the highest of inflation or earnings, would be a “very damaging thing to do”.

And he has been consistent about his desire to hand more power over to the English regions. It’s no surprise that this will be the focus of a speech this coming week, when he may at last start providing firm details of his plans for Britain. Further speeches on the economy and foreign affairs may follow.

But in addition to specific policies, Mr Burnham has an overarching mission – to fix politics so that it “works” for ordinary families.

Speaking in the run-up to the Makerfield by-election, he told an interviewer: “I am serious when I talk about changing politics. It isn’t working. The country is not solving the big things it is facing.”

There’s no disagreeing with that. But with three weeks to go until Mr Burnham is likely to become Prime Minister, we still don’t know quite what it means in practice.