Best Of

That's a thumping defeat for the populist right. Well played Andy Burnham and the voters of Makerfield. A new dawn has broken, has it not. No, it hasn't, but it feels like a hugely significant moment.

Burnham winning is exactly the result I wanted because he will almost certainly remove Starmer but also Farage and Lowe failing is an added bonus

The conservatives voted tactically and it looks as if more backed Burnham than Reform

When the rise in Labour vote share was lower than the fall in Green and LibDem, I’m not sure it is so obvious how Conservatives voted. Those Restore votes had to come from somewhere….

Notably and unusually the turnout in the byelection was several percentage points higher than the last GE.

I think that the very efficient Labour vote and Ming Vase strategy of Labour in the GE failed to get out the Labour vote in places like Makerfield, partly because of its lack of ambition and partly because a walkover was expected.

GOTV is going to be key at the next GE and clear choices for the tactical voter to beat Reform. In most seats that will be Labour.

The other thing about Burnham is that he was happy to sit out 2024 and the hard work to actually get Labour into government. Now he gets to ride in.

That is the right thing to do but it gets my back up.

But doesn't that betray a perhaps subconscious belief that the only things that really matter happen in London?
Whereas he's helped create an alternative nexus that elsewhere is actually important. And can be better and more successful?
Citizens of Somewhere and Levelling Up not just as slogans to win elections but actually as policies?

Why didn’t he run in 2024? I can’t see what’s changed in two years for him.

Like I said, I’m not against him running now for the sake of the country but I do think there’s something in not wanting to do the hard bit.

It's weird, Twitter kept assuring me Andy Bunrham wasn't even that popular, despite the fact I live in Manchester where he is really popular.

Yes. A succession of folk with no ties to GM kept sternly informing people that it was not true.
Even famous non-Labour types like cookie and Barty were basically told they were hallucinating.

Always felt weird to me. I don’t like the man but I can’t deny he’s popular on a scale no Labour person has been for a very long time. Hence why he’s clearly their best choice.

Why don't you like him out of interest?
He seems the very definition of a likeable bloke. But maybe that's a NW thing.
I never could get the Boris thing.

He strikes me as completely empty and opportunistic and willing to do and say basically anything. He was an average minister and did terribly in two leadership contests (2015 being a particular highlight).

I don’t care where the PM is from. It’s never bothered me.

I don’t hate him. I just don’t warm to him. He seems like Sir Keir but more charismatic.

Thanks. This is interesting. We don't actually have a NW poster who doesn't like him. Even those who disagree with his politics.
He's proudly, eloquently and unashamedly from, and of, his place.
Maybe we've had too many from the same place?

He has a popularity I don’t understand but I totally acknowledge he has true believers in a way others don’t.

But as I’ve said, I’ve never been bothered where the PM is from.