Andy Burnham says he will have to be ‘wrenched’ out of Manchester amid leadership rumours

Andy Burnham said he would have to be ‘wrenched’ out of Manchester as he was grilled over his rumoured leadership bid hopes.

The Greater Manchester mayor was quizzed over speculation that he might launch a leadership bid to become the Prime Minister, the controversial digital ID rollout, and the rise of Reform.

Answering questions at the Guardian Politics podcast live at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool, Mr Burnham said being the mayor is the ‘best job in politics.’

He said: ‘I can’t launch a leadership campaign, I’m not in Parliament – that is the bottom line.

‘The thing that I’m doing is putting forward ideas that in any scenario – whoever is the leader – I think Labour needs to take on board. That is what I’m saying.

‘The only thing I’ve launched is a debate about how to get a plan together to beat Reform. I’m of course talking about the General Election.’

But he left the door open for a possible future leadership bid by refusing to rule out leaving the mayoral term before its end, despite saying ‘you would have to wrench’ him out of Greater Manchester.

However, Mr Burnham appeared to put the matter to bed by later answering ‘yes’ when asked by The Times whether Sir Keir is the best person for the job.

When asked whether he supports the digital ID, he said ‘not now.’

He insisted that the government inherited a ‘difficult’ situation, and that it has done ‘good things’ like bringing rail companies back into public ownership.

But he said the government now needs take more ‘practical’ steps.

Mr Burnham said: ‘They renationalised rail, and I applaud them, that’s a really good thing to do, but go the next step and start to reduce rail fares. Rail fares in this country are way too high.’

Speaking on his plan to beat the right-wing rise, he continued: ‘We need to have more to take more to the doorstep.

‘If you think of the populist right – whatever we may think of what they are doing, they are putting big things on the table.

‘We have to do the same thing – never pandering to them – but to put big things on the table, tell a story about this country and where do we want this country to go.

‘While the government has done good things, I don’t think it has come together yet as that powerful story about the future of Britain.’

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