Andy Burnham says by-election loss exhibits ‘depth of the chasm between individuals and Westminster’
The Greater Manchester Mayor made the comments less than a week on from the Greens Hannah Spencer storming to victory in Gorton and Denton, with 14,980 votes – a majority of 4,402
Andy Burnham had hoped to stand in Gorton and Denton(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Andy Burnham claimed the Gorton and Denton by-election loss “revealed the full depth of the chasm between people and Westminster politics”.
In his first comments since the defeat, the Greater Manchester Mayor called for a “new political culture” and warned people no longer trust politicians to fix the basics. His intervention comes less than a week on from the Greens Hannah Spencer storming to victory in the Greater Manchester seat, with 14,980 votes – a majority of 4,402.
Speaking at a Centre For Cities event, Mr Burnham also highlighted the failure to pay social care staff properly, something he argued contributed to the NHS being in “permanent crisis”.
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READ MORE: Everything you need to know about the seismic Gorton & Denton by-electionREAD MORE: Fury and jubilation in Gorton and Denton: ‘Westminster is laughing at us’
He said: “From my point of view, I’m definitely not here to talk about my career plans, other than to say I wrote a book as you might know, with the mayor of the Liverpool City region Steve Rotheram about leaving Westminster and establishing devolution across England.
“It’s called ‘Head North’. All I can say today is that the sequel ‘Head South’ is currently on hold. What I want to say today is that the time has most definitely come for a serious conversation about our political system and its pervading culture, particularly so in the aftermath of the Gorton and Denton by-election. It revealed the full depth of the chasm between people and Westminster politics. I don’t think anybody can seriously dispute that statement.”
Mr Burnham, who was blocked by Labour’s ruling body from standing in the contest, told the event a failure to fix social care had contributed towards people losing faith in Westminster. He said: “It’s unbelievable how people on the frontline of social care do not get a basic enough salary to support themselves, even though they are doing incredible things to look after people. So no wonder is it that the NHS is in permanent permanent crisis, winter crisis because the preventative end just cannot cope.
“Basically, Westminster, it’s just almost like they said ‘well, we’ll just leave that.’ It’s just an incredible state of affairs to be honest. So if politics is once again to regain people’s trust and be about long term problem solving, I think we have to build a new political culture entirely.”
Mr Burnham claimed the public simply didn’t trust politicians to fix their basic needs, using the example of potholes. He explained: “Is there anything that more explains the levels of alienation people feel politics can’t fix a pothole?
“The collapse of local government and the failure of Westminster to fix the financing of local government to me, that is a really big thing that underlies the alienated political climate that we experience today. People just don’t see politics as able to fix the basics.”
In a further attack on Westminster, Mr Burnham argued it was not about addressing problems, but point scoring. An MP for 16 years, he said: “I just saw the political, if you like, culture just becoming more and more shallow. It simply doesn’t try to fix the big problems, the aim is to score points across the house, isn’t it? It’s not there to fix things.”
