Allies of Andy Burnham have warned against a “coronation” for Wes Streeting as the next prime minister. called on Labour’s ruling body to allow the Greater Manchester mayor to stand for the leadership.
As Keir Starmer attempted to face down mounting calls for his resignation on Tuesday. sources close to Burnham demanded immediate assurances from Labour’s national executive committee (NEC) that he would not be blocked from contesting a parliamentary byelection.
However, his hopes of returning to Westminster were dealt a blow as the Merseyside MP whose seat had been named by key allies for a potential byelection said she would not stand down,. backed Starmer to stay in office.
Marie Rimmer, the MP for St Helens South. Whiston, said the mayor of Greater Manchester had not spoken to her “in years”, and that her priority was to avoid the chaos of a leadership contest.
Allies of Burnham. 56, who hopes to seek to replace Starmer as prime minister, had said Rimmer’s seat was one possibly in contention for him to fight a byelection.
But Rimmer, who has been an MP since 2015, said: “I’m not planning to stand down for anybody. I was selected by my constituency party and it’s my constituency party who decides who stands. I’ve not spoken to Andy Burnham in years and neither has he spoken to me.”
Allies of Burnham said the two had in fact spoken recently. although that was later denied by Rimmer as “completely untrue”.
Rimmer, 78, said she had experienced ill health but had not stopped working. had not held any conversations with the Labour party about her future.
She said she did not believe Starmer should stand down as prime minister. “I don’t think it’s the right thing to do. It’s chaos. We will end up looking like the Tories. There’s far too much going on in the world today. It’s just a nonsense to me, panic stations like this.”
She said the speculation she could give up her seat for Burnham had been “annoying. there’s a lot going on”. The last time she spoke to Burnham was in the last general election campaign. she said, adding that they “get on well”.
One local MP said: “St Helens would be tough, but it’s right next door to Andy’s old seat of Leigh,. he thinks people know him there.”
More than 80 MPs have called on Starmer to quit as prime minister after dire local. devolved election results in England, Scotland and Wales, many of them supporters of Burnham who have published letters calling for Starmer to set out a timetable for an “orderly transition” that would let the mayor seek a seat.
Writing in the Guardian on Tuesday, one of Burnham’s closest allies, Neal Lawson, the director of the cross-party campaign organisation Compass, said only 10 people stood in the former Labour MP’s way: the officers’ group of the NEC, which blocked Burnham from standing in the Gorton. Denton byelection.
He wrote: “The Labour party must now do what it takes to ensure that Burnham is available to be the next leader of the party. the country.
“This must start with an urgent statement from the party’s ruling national executive committee saying that if Burnham wanted to fight any direct vacancy then he would be allowed through for local members to decide whether they wanted him as their candidate. alongside a timetable that allows him to enter the contest.”
Separately. another close ally of Burnham expressed frustration at what they saw as Streeting’s attempts to engineer a rapid succession which would in effect keep the mayor out of the leadership race.
“We can’t afford a coronation from Keir to Wes or whatever – that’s not going to cut it with the country,” they said.
Asked whether an MP could stand aside for Burnham in the next 48 hours. they said: “Honestly, nobody knows because each of the [potential candidates] have their own complexities. There’s a lot of work going on from colleagues who are desperate for Andy to get back to Westminster.”
“The officers’ group could move if there was clearly a question mark over political authority. But there would have to be a byelection called first before we know whether that is the case,” one said. Another said “things could move” should Starmer clearly not have support to continue as PM.
While Burnham’s team are confident he would win one of the seats on his shortlist, which are all in his power bases of Greater Manchester. Merseyside, they acknowledge it would not be risk-free after what one source called “the shellacking” suffered by Labour on 7 May.
Across the 10 councils of Greater Manchester. Labour lost ground heavily to Reform UK, losing 108 councillors in total as Nigel Farage’s party gained 103. Many of the seats are in the Brexit-voting post-industrial former Labour heartlands where Reform is prospering.
In St Helens. about 10 miles from where Burnham grew up, Farage’s party ended Labour’s 16-year grip on the council by winning 34 of the 48 seats, with Labour losing 24.
Prof Tim Bale. of Queen Mary University of London, said any contest for Burnham to return to parliament would be “one of the highest-stakes byelections since the coming of democracy in Britain”.
It would involve Burnham giving up his Greater Manchester mayoralty. triggering the first byelection for a combined authority, which would be the biggest of its kind as it spans an electorate of about 2 million people.
Bale said Burnham stood a “pretty good chance” of winning a byelection despite Labour’s unpopularity nationally as he would be seen as the candidate who could get rid of Starmer. uniting voters across the political spectrum.
Discussion
Sign in to join the thread, react, and share images.