Andy Burnham is the only declared candidate for the premiership, but little is known about his plans for the country. What is known, however, is the record he has built as mayor of Manchester – a mix of public ownership, immigration crackdowns and heavy reliance on opaque Chinese investment that has left some on the left deeply uneasy.
Burnham’s Manchesterism, epitomised by the Bee Network of publicly owned buses, offers what the New Statesman calls “a practical rebuttal to Starmer’s attempts to win back the ‘red wall’”. He has positioned himself as the antidote to deindustrialisation, privatisation, austerity and Brexit – what he called “the four horsemen of Britain’s apocalypse”. But that narrative masks a more complex reality.
“Andy Burnham is the only declared candidate for the premiership, but his record as Manchester mayor reveals a complex mix of public ownership, immigration crackdowns and reliance on opaque Chinese investment.”
Walk through the city centre and the contradictions are visible. The New Vic development, a cluster of skyscrapers marketed to graduates, is partly funded by Chinese money – though the local council keeps the exact amount secret. Nearby, the failed Pinnacle scheme left off-plan buyers in Hong Kong short of £31m when the developer went into administration in 2017. Manchester police and the Serious Fraud Squad investigated but no charges were laid. Now a Hong Kong company, Far Eastern Consortium, plans to develop the site, alongside Beijing Construction Engineering Group International and others. Chinese money, in the words of one commentator, is “aided and abetted by the council”.
On immigration, Burnham has taken a markedly hard line. He has publicly backed Shabana Mahmood’s plans to scrap permanent refugee status – a move that goes further than any Tory government. Reportedly, he plans to keep Mahmood as Home Secretary. The New Statesman, written by a former organiser for the left-wing anti-Brexit alliance Another Europe is Possible, accuses him of being “haunted by Brexit” and engaging with immigration “on Farage’s terms”.
For a candidate who came within a whisker of winning the Labour leadership in 2015 and now looks set for Downing Street, the question remains: can the King of the North govern without the support of the left that once cheered him? His record suggests he may already have made his choice.