Efforts to oust Keir Starmer from Downing Street took a significant leap on Thursday.
In an explosive move, Labour MP Josh Simons said he would stand down as an MP to make way for Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham to return to Parliament. But the route to Westminster is by no means a simple one.
A by-election will now be held in Simons’ Makerfield constituency in the North West – and Mr Burnham is expected to put himself forward to stand as a candidate. The decision of whether he can stand will be up to the National Executive Committee, Labour’s ruling body. The NEC earlier this year blocked him from standing in the Gorton and Denton by-election amid concerns about a separate costly contest having to be held to replace him as mayor. But the NEC’s position is said to be softening.
The move came as Health Secretary Wes Streeting resigned from the Government and said it was clear the Prime Minister will not lead Labour into the next general election. But the MP for Ilford North – who has long been a leadership hopeful – failed to fire the starting gun for a leadership contest with a formal challenge to the PM. An MP must have the backing of 81 Labour MPs to make an official trigger a race.
He said a contest to replace the PM should “be broad” with the “best possible field of candidates”, suggesting he was opening the door for a Burnham return. If Mr Burnham manages to win a by-election and return to the Commons, he could then trigger a leadership contest – if he has the support.
The Mirror takes a look at who could run in a Labour leadership race if one is triggered.
READ MORE: Labour live: Andy Burnham launches bid for sensational return to Parliament as MP steps aside
Wes Streeting
Wes Streeting has made no secret about the fact he has leadership ambitions. The ex-Health Secretary – who resigned from his government post on Thursday – has long been floated as a name to take over from Keir Starmer.
When the PM faced accusations of breaking Covid-19 rules during the pandemic, Mr Streeting was one of the bookmakers’ favourites. A resurfaced clip from 2018 – in which several MPs were asked who will be Prime Minister in ten years time – Mr Streeting cheekily joked: “I think probably me.”
The MP who grew up in a council flat in east London is admired for his arduous journey to success. The 43-year-old’s passion for politics was driven by a childhood seeing Tories “denigrating single-parent families like mine, which I took quite personally”, he said in a 2022 interview. He has often spoken about growing up in poverty, with his book One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up also detailing his grandparents’ time in prison.
Mr Streeting, who is gay and a Christian, studied at the University of Cambridge and later became president of the National Union of Students. He was elected to Redbridge London Borough Council in 2010, before storming onto the Westminster scene as an MP for Ilford North five years later. He joined Keir Starmer’s frontbench in 2020.
The Blairite figure is known for his effective communication skills, often breezing through difficult media interviews using jokes and personality. Since becoming Health Secretary, Mr Streeting – who has survived kidney cancer himself – has seen success in the brief with NHS waits improving, but his tenure has also been plagued by resident doctor strikes.
His close links with Peter Mandelson – Britain’s ex-Ambassador to the US who was sacked over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein – is also a thorn in Mr Streeting’s side. Texts between the pair – which were released in February – showed Mr Streeting criticising the Government for having “no [economic] growth strategy”.
The Cabinet minister was also among senior figures to push for the recognition of Palestine. In texts to Lord Mandelson, he admitted he could be “toast at the next election” amid the rise of Muslim independents in his area. At the 2024 election, he scraped a win with a majority of just 528 votes.
Angela Rayner
Angela Rayner is known as Labour’s authentic working-class warrior.
The former Deputy Prime Minister has self-branded herself as “proper working-class”. She grew up on a council estate in Stockport, left school without any qualifications and got pregnant at 16.
She later became a Grandmother at age 37 when her 20-year-old son had a baby. “It does qualify me as proper working-class and Jeremy Kyle,” she said in an interview in 2017, adding that she was going to become a “glam-ma”.
The outspoken northerner rose up the political ranks after a stint as a trade union representative. Elected as MP for Ashton-under-Lyme in 2015, she first joined Labour’s opposition frontbench the following year when Jeremy Corbyn appointed her as shadow education secretary. She was elected deputy labour leader in 2020, when Keir Starmer became leader.
In government, Ms Rayner championed social and affordable housing as Housing Secretary, securing a record £39billion investment in last year’s Spending Review. The trade unionist in her also capitalised on her role as Deputy PM to push through the most ambitious package of workers’ rights in a generation, which ends exploitative zero-hours contracts, limits “fire and rehire” practices, and introduces day-one rights for sick pay.
But her successes came crashing down in September when it emerged she had breached the ministerial code by failing to pay enough stamp duty on her seaside flat in Hove. The image of her as a working-class hero appeared to shatter, as she faced painful questions about tax-dodging. She was forced to dig up details about a trust set up in 2020 to care for her disabled son.
HMRC cleared her of deliberate wrongdoing over her tax affairs on Thursday, paving her way for a potential bid for the leadership race. On the backbenchers, Ms Rayner has made several pointed – and significant interventions, including calling Shabana Mahmood’s reforms to indefinite leave to remain “un-British”.
Ms Rayner has insisted she will not trigger a leadership race but is expected to throw her name in the hat as a soft-left candidate if Mr Streeting is the only other candidate to step forward.
Keir Starmer
If a leadership race is triggered, Keir Starmer will automatically be a candidate and it’s up to him if he wants to fight it.
The PM has previously suggested he’d battle it out, telling The Sunday Mirror: “I’m not going to walk away from the job I was elected to do in July 2024.”
Before becoming an MP, Mr Starmer had a high-flying career as a human rights barrister. He co-founded Doughty Street Chambers in 1990 and advised David Morris and Helen Steel during their marathon legal battle with McDonald’s which eventually became known as the McLibel case. And he was the head of the Crown Prosecution Service from 2008 to 2015, making him one of the most senior lawyers in the UK.
His background as the son of a nurse and toolmaker, as well as the struggles of his late brother Nick and his sister’s career as a carer, have long been a driving force to his politics. He was elected as MP for Holborn and St Pancras in 2015 and was later appointed to Jeremy Corbyn‘s shadow Cabinet, where he held a number of roles, most notably Shadow Brexit Secretary.
He began to distance himself from Corbyn in later years. Mr Starmer – who was named after Labour’s first leader Keir Hardie – became Labour leader himself in 2020. He ran a left-wing campaign with promised to scrap tuition fees, nationalise water companies and increase taxes on the richest 5% of Britons. As Leader of the Opposition, many of these proposals were dropped, with Mr Starmer moving the party more to the centre. He also steered the ship through a damaging antisemitism crisis that rocked Labour in the wake of the Corbyn years.
He was elected as Prime Minister in a historic landslide in 2024 but costly mistakes including cuts to winter fuel payments and a painful benefits reform U-turn has seen his popularity quickly plummet.
Andy Burnham
If you believe the polling, Andy Burnham is the public’s top choice to take over from Keir Starmer.
Earlier this week YouGov found 34% of voters have a favourable opinion of him – giving him higher net favourability than Mr Starmer, Kemi Badenoch, Nigel Farage and Zack Polanski.
But if Labour MPs and members do hit the Burnham button, there are a number of hurdles to overcome first – not least getting him into Parliament quickly. On Thursday a route finally presented itself after former minister Josh Simons announced he was stepping down.
He now needs to convince Labour’s National Executive Committee (NEC) to let him stand, win a by-election, get 81 MPs to support him and then win a leadership contest.
The Mayor of Greater Manchester, who earned the nickname ‘King of the North’ during the Covid pandemic for consistently standing up to Boris Johnson, has already tried twice to become Labour leader. He came second to Jeremy Corbyn in 2015, and was eliminated in the first round in 2010, when Ed Miliband prevailed.
Mr Burnham was MP for Leigh in Greater Manchester for nearly 16 years, quitting the Commons – and Mr Corbyn’s shadow cabinet – to stand as the area’s mayor. He was a junior Home Office and Health Minister under Tony Blair, and Culture Secretary and Health Secretary under Gordon Brown, so brings plenty of frontbench experience.
He has called for a national care service – fully integrated with the NHS – to deal with bottlenecks across the healthcare sector, and pushed back against private sector influence in the health service.
But his spell in Parliament was not devoid of controversies. Mr Burnham voted for the Iraq War and was accused of flip-flopping after saying he would not vote against the Tory welfare bill in 2015, toeing the party line despite describing it as “unsupportable”.
He has in the past advocated for “aspirational socialism”, and has advocated for nationalising transport, energy and water – which he dubbed “life’s essentials” brought under control. During his time in Parliament he repeatedly voted against welfare cuts, in favour of ID cards and stricter asylum rules.
Ed Miliband
There has been a lot of chat about Ed Miliband launching a leadership challenge in recent days to unite the so-called ‘soft left’.
The Energy Secretary is well respected among the Labour membership – consistently topping popularity tables on LabourList. But his critics will point out that Mr Miliband has had his chance to become PM.
He led the Labour Party between 2010 and 2015, but was defeated at a general election – losing 26 seats in the process. There is some discomfort about the prospect of parachuting him into the top job with this on his CV.
But that’s not to play down the fact that he’s well regarded and viewed as a heavyweight. He is a firm believer in shifting to green power and reaching Net Zero – which Nigel Farage has long been griping about.
As leader of the opposition he was vocal in opposing Tory cuts to public services, and his 2015 election manifesto included raising the minimum wage, bringing back the 50p top income tax rate for those earning over £150,000 and cutting business rates. Mr Miliband also pledged to boost NHS funding and recruit 20,000 more nurses, and scrap the controversial Bedroom Tax.
But he was haunted by a strong of mis-steps, including the unveiling of the infamous ‘Ed Stone’ with Labour pledges – which looked a lot like a headstone. An awkward photo showing him eating a bacon sandwich and being mocked for having two kitchens in his North London home did not help either.
Al Carns
While the other potential candidates are more established names, Al Carns, the current Armed Forces Minister, is also gaining ground as leadership hopeful.
Allies of the former marine insist the less well-known MP is a serious candidate. This week, Mr Carns wrote an extensive piece on how Labour can turn around its fortunes. The piece in left-wing magazine the New Statesman, which was titled “How Labour Can Win Again”, was seen by many as a future leadership pitch to voters.
Mr Carns’s highly acclaimed military background is likely to intrigue many MPs – especially during a time of global instability. He joined the Royal Marines at age 19 before rising through the ranks and becoming a special forces colonel. He was awarded the Military Cross in 2011 for his service in Afghanistan. After 24 years of service, he decided to resign
Many MPs question whether the MP for Birmingham Selly Oak is a serious candidate compared to the more established names who are expected to put their names forward. Some believe he is too “untested” as a politician and that military leadership does not necessarily translate to the messy world of politics.
Those on the soft left are unlikely to entertain an attempt from him, but others across the Labour party believe the military man is a moderate candidate who has less baggage than the other potential leadership hopefuls.
He is clearly ambitious and known for breaking down barriers – he was, after all, part of the group of soldiers to set a record last year by climbing Mount Everest in under five days without acclimatising on the mountain.
While Mr Carns’s name has been swirling around Westminster for a while now, a quote that emerged on Thursday morning appeared to show he was serious about entering a leadership race. “Al Carns has said ‘he is getting on with doing his job, but if someone fires the starting gun, he isn’t afraid of gunfire’,” a parliamentary source told The Times.