Burnham: Give me 10 years to transform Britain

Andy Burnham
Photo: Getty Images

Incoming prime minister sets out his plan to boost the economy through devolution. Andy Burnham will set out a 10-year plan to transform the economy as he prepares to enter Downing Street, The Telegraph writes.

In a sign he intends to fight at least two elections as prime minister, Mr Burnham will argue on Monday that he needs a decade to overhaul Britain, strip power from Whitehall and deliver “good growth in every postcode”.

He will lay out plans for a “No 10 North”, moving part of his operation outside Westminster to push through a radical programme of English devolution, transferring decisions over spending from mandarins in London to powerful regional mayors.

In his first major speech since returning to Parliament in this month’s Makerfield by-election, Mr Burnham will commit to greater state control of Britain’s energy and water supplies.

He will also pledge a new programme of council house building and infrastructure projects outside the South-East as part of efforts to “lift Britain back up to where it should be”.

‘Shuffling power between politicians’

Opposition parties, however, accused Mr Burnham of failing to provide details of how he would help working families or defend the country, and warned he was simply seeking to “shuffle power between politicians”.

Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, called for him to go to Parliament and set out his priorities as a matter of urgency.

In May, Sir Keir Starmer spoke of his own hopes to lead a “10-year project of renewal”, causing derision as support for the Prime Minister among the Labour Party melted away.

There had been speculation that Mr Burnham might call an early election to secure a mandate for his reforms, given that he did not stand in the 2024 general election. However, allies played down the prospect on Sunday, saying the public did not want a poll.

Speaking in Manchester on Monday morning, Mr Burnham will pledge to “give Britain the circuit-breaker it needs” after years of decline.

He will vow to “change politics to make it work for us”, admitting that he – a minister under Gordon Brown – and others in his generation of politicians must take responsibility for the loss of public trust.

As part of this, a “No 10 North” will oversee the handing of power to mayors, who would be given larger budgets for social housing, education for over 16s, infrastructure, transport and tackling welfare dependency.

Mr Burnham will commit to a 10-year mission to raise living standards through reindustrialisation, better housing and infrastructure, and what his team calls the “reform of essential utilities”, understood to mean greater state control over the likes of water and energy companies.

He will set out education reforms to ensure that technical courses are esteemed like university degrees, and pledge to reform procurement rules so that public bodies are incentivised to sign contracts with British rather than foreign companies.

Finally, Mr Burnham will call for a new political culture focused on “place before party, problem-solving before point-scoring and long-term thinking over short-term politics”.

The MP – who, unusually, is not expected to take questions from the media after his speech – will say that there must be a change in how Britain is governed, not just who governs it.

But Kevin Hollinrake, chairman of the Conservative Party, accused Mr Burnham of pledging “more devolution, more committees, more process”.

Burnham is the wrong answer to the UK’s economic problem

He added that the Makerfield MP had said nothing about how he would pay for extra defence spending, despite fears that Britain was unable to combat Russia.

A spokesman for Reform UK added: “It’s a lot of words for no actual concrete changes. It’s clear that Burnham has taken a leaf out of Starmer’s book; all talk, no action.

“Britain is broken and only radical change at pace is going to fix it. Burnham is talking about 10 years. We don’t have that long to save the country. The British public deserves change quicker than in a decade’s time.”

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