Andy Burnham Rails Against Starmer Policies in Latest Rebellion – Guido Fawkes

Andy Burnham Rails Against Starmer Policies in Latest Rebellion

mdi-fullscreen

King in the North Andy Burnham is becoming increasingly vocal in his criticism of Starmer. Not hard to see the space for that with polls as they currently stand…

The Manchester mayor spoke at the Institute for (Big) Government yesterday and called for more powers from the government. Now he gives a punchy interview with aggressive lines against the Labour leadership. He says: “If I was in parliament now, I would be saying ‘I’m not happy, you need to change this.’” So-far reticent backbench rebels could take note…

He attacks the benefit changes further:

“We have a disabled people’s panel in greater Manchester, who even before any of this were saying ‘the system is punishing’. When I first got in parliament my dad said, ‘never vote for policies that take money off people who’ve got no ability to make that up’. I always remember that.”

He calls for the fiscal rules (Reeves’ keystone) to be abandoned:

“There is a question about how much you can be driven by [the fiscal rules], I think there has to be more flexibility. The world is turbulent now. We are going to have to be able to protect people from some of these shocks.”

Gary will be happy with that. He says there should be a wealth tax:

“I think there is a case for looking at taxes on wealth. I look at the way society has changed in the last 20 or 30 years. Even in the pandemic, the very wealthiest got very much more wealthy.”

He attacks reports that Starmer might change the Digital Services Tax to get a better deal from the Americans:

“I instinctively would support [the tax]. I hope it survives.”

Burnham adds that he puts his role above his “party affiliation” and also says some kind of ban or restriction should be put on social media for children. Very boisterous indeed…