From Starmer's shadow to No. 10: Can Andy Burnham avoid the same fate?

It was almost déjà vu when Andy Burnham made his maiden speech as the UK’s new prime minister to his Labour Party members. He resembled his predecessor Keir Starmer, who had addressed the same conference two years ago. Similar clean-cut face, clipped hair, thick, black-framed spectacles. Also similar was the speech—same buzzwords about hope and challenge.

Starmer had talked up “project hope”, a bureaucratic vision of Britain walking the long road to government-delivered utopia. Instead, people stumbled into a purgatory of inflation, debt and deficit. Burnham unfurled a grander political vision of “hope again”, overcoming challenges to—land on government-delivered utopia. Mocking the omnipresent “hope again” slogan, satirist Robert Hutton asked, “When was hope? What happened to it? How can we be sure it is back, again?“

The slogans are back, but the two men are different—in accent, manner, tone and ambition. Starmer is decent, but wooden. Burnham is authentic, empathetic, folksy and social media savvy, promising “honest conversations” on challenging issues. Labour rank and file cheered throughout his hour-long speech.

Burnham cares about care. He announced crowd-pleasing Labour policies: better elderly care, social welfare, transport, jobs for the disabled, housing support for first-time buyers, a bigger role for government, greater control over utilities, a “buy British” procurement programme and, perhaps, even a return to the European Union. He transformed the Brexit slogan “take back control” into government takes control.

If he pulls it off, Burnham will go down in history as equally impactful as Margaret Thatcher but at the opposite end of the ideological spectrum. There is support for Burnham’s lefty agenda today because voters see the ill-effects of right-wing Thatcherism—plundering privatisation, inequality, decaying neighbourhoods, inefficient health system, shrinking welfare.

But Burnham’s promise comes with two caveats. Nothing is on offer now. Project “hope again” comes into effect if Labour wins the 2029 elections. He is hopeful, but the opposition—the Tories, far-right Reform Party and others—aims to wreck his plans. A British joke captures the second caveat, “When a Labour prime minister starts telling the country ‘we must be honest with ourselves’, it is time to watch our wallets.” Sure enough, Burnham says taxes will be raised to fund his social care scheme. He mentioned “honest” 11 times in his speech; voters expect a big bill.

From now on, Burnham intends to earn public trust, win over the opposition and do the necessary spadework for his project launch. To build bridges with political opponents, he avoids shaming them, saying optimistically “it is about problem-solving than point-scoring”.

This delusion enthrals every new prime minister until realisation dawns that opponents don’t want his agenda. They want his job. Divided on regional, ideological, economic and social lines, Britain’s polarised politics is about problem-making for point-scoring. Neoliberal Tories obsess about cutting welfare (waste) and lowering taxes (make the rich, richer). Burnham is left-wing antidote to Nigel Farage’s far-right populism. Though scandal-tainted, Farage feuds on. The Iran war continues. Energy costs rise. Growth declines. Britain’s money pot shrinks.

But welfare requires massive fund allocation. So does defence as UK fortifies itself amidst geopolitical tensions. The Brit­ish Cham­bers of Com­merce president Andy Haldane scoffed at Labour’s obsession with public spending. He says, “It is a tra­di­tional tax-and-spend social­ist gov­ern­ment with bet­ter Tik­Tok videos.”

As prime minister, Starmer extolled the “sunlight of hope”. But reality, like sunlight, is a disinfectant. Unfulfilled promises disinfect optimism, heralding the “sunset of hope”. In 2024, Starmer won Labour a massive mandate, but had to resign in two years. To avoid his career from resembling Starmer’s, Burnham must prevent hope from turning into disappointment—again.

Pratap is an author and journalist.