Andy Burnham bursts into Westminster and puts Premier Keir Starmer on the ropes

LondonGood news for British Labour and, at the same time, bad news for Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and also for the ultra Nigel Farage. The incontestable victory in the Makerfield constituency by Andy Burnham in the by-election to the House of Commons held this Thursday opens a new phase in the party's crisis, and positions the Mayor of Manchester as the main contender to succeed Starmer at Downing Street. Burnham obtained 54.8% of the votes (9,231 ballots), very comfortably defeating the Reform Party candidate, Robert Kenyon. After almost a decade focused on local politics, the so-called King of the North will be able to return to Westminster, where he already tried to take the reins of the party after the electoral defeat of 2010.

The magnitude of the triumph shows, according to his supporters, that Burnham is capable of reconnecting Labour with the traditional working-class electorate of the north of the country. Voters who, in both the 2025 local elections and the most recent ones, on May 7th, had opted for Farage. But in just six weeks, since Burnham announced his candidacy and his intentions to challenge Starmer's leadership, Makerfield has gone from offering a 27-point lead to the Reform Party to giving a 20-point victory to Labour. The swing between the two contests has been 23 points. Burnham overturns the decline of the last two contests and, in fact, widely surpasses the results with which Labour won this seat in the 2024 general election.

In his victory speech, the new MP launched a direct warning to Starmer. "This is the last chance to change," he said, assuring that it was the message he had heard repeatedly during the campaign. Burnham has not formally announced a candidacy for Downing Street, but in the preceding weeks he had made it very clear that he would join any leadership race that got underway.

The ball is now in Starmer's court, who will have to decide whether to step aside, as almost a hundred of his own MPs asked him to six weeks ago, or to fight, as he has repeated on different occasions, against the very likely challenges to his authority. An authority, however, that has been flushed down the drain thanks to the countless errors and changes of direction he has made since becoming premier.

Throughout his speech, Burnham's criticism of Westminster has been explicit: "Everyone knows that politics is not working. Everyone perceives that the country is not where it should be. Tonight could be, it could simply be, a turning point. I will give everything I have to ensure that the name Makerfield is forever associated with the change this country needs, with the return of what we have lost: hope. Hope in the future."

as nearly a hundred of their own deputies asked them to six weeks agoAccording to sources close to Burnham, the new MP would already have the support of the 81 parliamentarians needed to formally trigger a leadership contest. Former Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who resigned after the May electoral shock, warned Starmer this week that he must either announce a timetable for an orderly departure or risk facing an internal rebellion. The premier has, for the moment, limited himself to congratulating Burnham on his victory.

Burnham's triumph, a man from the moderate left of the party, has unleashed a wave of enthusiasm among sectors critical of the current premier, who, on his way to Downing Street, unleashed a ruthless purge against all these sectors, attempting to resurrect the Blairites, the current identified with former-premier Tony Blair. The strategic decision for the two souls of the party is now to decide whether to initiate a civil war or whether Starmer's supporters agree on a withdrawal.

Personal setback for Farage

The defeat of the Reform Party candidate also represents a personal setback for Nigel Farage and his xenophobic policies. The far-right leader was confident that Makerfield would be one of his great opportunities to demonstrate that he could turn his good local election results into parliamentary victories that would facilitate his access, in 2029, to Downing Street. In this regard, Burnham has insisted that his victory "now offers the possibility of building a new politics based on unity and hope, far from the path that leads to a dark and divisive politics like that of the United States".

Burnham's victory also has a strong symbolic weight. It is the first clearly positive result for Labour in a competitive by-election since Starmer has been in Downing Street. It also comes at a time when polls show a sustained drop in support for the government.

With Burnham's imminent return to Westminster, and the prospect of a leadership battle, the Labour Party now faces decisive days. What until recently seemed like a peripheral criticism of Starmer's leadership has become an alternative with electoral credibility.