Andy Burnham stormed back to Westminster with a victory so emphatic that he won more votes than all his opponents combined – a result that instantly reshapes the Labour leadership contest and leaves Reform UK licking its wounds.
The former Greater Manchester mayor secured 24,927 votes (54.81%) in Thursday’s Makerfield by-election, nearly doubling Labour’s majority and relegating Reform candidate Robert Kenyon to a distant second with 15,696 votes (34.51%). The swing was extraordinary: just six weeks ago, Reform won 51% of the vote in the same wards at local elections, while Labour polled just 24%. Burnham achieved a 23-point swing in that time.
“Andy Burnham wins Makerfield by-election with 55% of vote, triggering Labour leadership challenge and exposing Reform UK's weaknesses.”
Nigel Farage, visibly rattled, conceded the result was “disappointing” and admitted his party had been “slightly hoist with our own petard”. In a video posted on X, he argued that voters had backed Burnham as a proxy to eject Sir Keir Starmer – the same slogan Reform used in May’s local elections. “What really happened here is it was ‘vote Burnham, get Starmer out’,” Farage said.
But Reform’s internal post-mortem is also focusing on Kenyon’s sexist social media posts, which emerged during the campaign. Canvassers reported women in particular were put off by them. The TV presenter Carol Vorderman demanded an apology after Kenyon joined a graphic discussion about her in since-deleted posts. One Reform activist said the party had advised the candidate not to apologise – “that’s something that was not his fault, it was how he was advised”. Another Reform source admitted: “I will admit that the Vorderman stuff did not help us.”
Farage also pleaded with voters who backed Restore UK – which took 6.84% of the vote under Rupert Lowe – to return to Reform. “We are the challenger party to the left in this country,” he said. But he had hoped for 18,000 votes; the party fell short by more than 2,000.
Burnham’s victory now gives him a Commons seat and a powerful argument: that he can beat Reform anywhere. Labour MPs, ground down by Starmer’s tanking ratings, see his win as proof of a viable alternative. Behind the scenes, preparations for a leadership challenge are under way. A No10 source told one journalist: “We are getting on with governing but we need to be ready to go on day one… We hope that’s not needed. But we have to be ready to go if it is.”
Starmer issued a short, terse congratulations on X, which Sky News’s chief political commentator Jon Craig labelled “miserable” and “grudging”. Burnham, for his part, is said to want to avoid a bruising contest and hopes the PM will agree a timetable to go. But Starmer, who sees his general election win as a personal mandate, has so far vowed to fight.
The by-election turnout was an unusually high 58.8% – more people voted than in the 2024 general election in the seat. The result, and the manner of it, has exposed Reform’s structural weaknesses: a party built around Farage’s personality, offering little policy substance, and now vulnerable to tactical voting. Pollster Professor Sir John Curtice has noted Reform sliding to the mid-20s in national polls – reminiscent of the SDP in 1983. For Farage, the Makerfield bubble has spectacularly burst.