It is often said that you can know a person by the company they choose to keep.
Andy Burnham has chosen Tory-appointed, former Goldman Sachs banker Lord Jim O'Neill as an adviser.
As the FT notes this morning:
An adviser to Andy Burnham has warned against further taxes on business, as the head of the UK's union movement reiterated calls for an increased levy on banks.
Lord Jim O'Neill, a former Goldman Sachs chief economist who has been helping Burnham frame a policy agenda, said the prospective prime minister should embrace spending controls, not tax rises.
“We can't just keep avoiding what are seen as difficult choices and having backdoor ways of raising taxes. And we certainly shouldn't raise them on business,” he told Sky News on Tuesday.
I like to think Burnham would ignore such advice. But he has chosen O'Neill to advise him, so how could he, and how would he?
The next round of austerity is on its way.
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Ah yes Jim, him of the calls for cutting welfare, the triple lock etc. But Its likely that Jim has a pretty good retirement income from private and public pensions and from his investments so a better idea is for people like Jim to pay more taxes on their earnings. Perhaps Jim will suggest that the next time Jim is asked by the BBC to comment on the economy or of course the interviewer could ask how much Jim’s income is each year and whether he should pay more tax? But the government like all the others is happy to have affluent people like Jim who believe in austerity but not for them!
2024. The election. Everybody knew, for sure, that Starmer would be (robotic) rubbish. He was.
2026, close to 2 years later, Burnt-ham will be rubbish but with a quasi-human facade.
Deckchairs will be re-arranged, UK serfs will be told (by state & private propaganda) that things are “getting better”.
However, this will fly in the face of the reality lived by most of the population.
The UK state hopes that it can keep “a lid on things” (https://statewatch.org/analyses/2026/clear-hold-build-the-uk-s-new-neighbourhood-policing-strategy-built-on-colonial-military-practice/)
On a related note, the police are so utterly useless they could not even stop this : https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/jun/14/illegal-dump-symbol-north-south-divide-makerfield-byelection
The reason? UK gov is not interested in the conditions in which UK serfs live, they want conformity and obedience as the statewatch article shows. In that respect, Burnt-ham is an identikit Starmer – with better delivery. One solution – the good citizens of Makerfiled could havs selected and elected the local village idiot as MP.
Ok, so let’s take on board the notion that businesses can’t take anymore tax rises. This may be the case. After all, many businesses are struggling. Banks aren’t struggling though, neither are a certain portion of the population who’s wealth keeps growing despite all the so called pressure on businesses. But ok, no tax rises to pay for government spending, great. Meanwhile, £600 million worth of road infrastructure jobs in the East Midlands have just been cancelled to pay for defense. That’s £600 million in lost revenue to British construction companies, not to mention the proposed economic benefits of upgraded infrastructure. That’s £600 million taken out of the economy to be funneled into defence, probably to companies with shareholders to pay. It doesn’t make any sense.
It doesn’t not, because skills to make the roads still exist.
In the middle of a nature and climate emergency we should be trying to get people out of their cars, rather than spending huge amounts of money encouraging greater use of them.
It is worrying that he appoints Lord Jim O’Neill. But he has other advisers such as Mariana Mazzucato (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/28/labour-keir-starmer-government-five-missions-failed-andy-burnham-mariana-mazzucato).
But why might he have appointed O’Neill? And why would he then not slavishly follow his advice? Come to that, why has he said he will observe the fiscal rules?
Answer: Politics.
A new Labour PM still has to, mostly, be consistent with the 2024 manifesto. Otherwise there is a reasonable argument for a general election. Furthermore an incoming PM doesn’t want to be savaged by the neoliberal press just as he starts, and it’s bad enough for any Labour PM.
But there are indications that he is sceptical of neoliberalism. He’s said he wanted the UK to move “beyond this thing of being in hock to the bond markets.” He’s talked sensibly about nationalisation and many other issues.
In practice, in the short term, we don’t absolutely need to break the fiscal rules. Sure, they are nonsense and long term they can’t stand. But short term we can increase tax on, and reduce benefits for, the wealthy. This needs doing anyway and the large aggregate central bank reserves shows there is plenty to tax.
But what about what he’s said in the past? Well it’s a long time since he was in government. Is it possible that he has learned,? I’d hate to be defined by the mistakes I made many years ago.
It’s right to be sceptical of him. But we don’t know and should, perhaps, be prepared to give a little benefit of the doubt until we do know. He has to be better that Starmer (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/23/keir-starmer-uk-prime-minister-peter-mandelson-gaza)
If I have bit more energy I might nitpick this, Tim. I haven’t.
“in the short term”…….if LINO do nowt (looking like this) it will let in the Tory-Deform imbeciles. Burnt-ham either does immediate stuff & the electorate sees results (e.g. = no turds in rivers, elec priced @ cost of production) or… Burnt-ham will be another Starmer – couple of years, useless & gone. There is only “the short term”, the situation is all-hands-on-deck & Burnt-ham (working on the basis of what he has said so far & done – e.g. the Goldsacks appointment) a deck-chair re-arranger.
Ta-ta UK – you are finished, by Oxbridge imbeciles and scum like the Goldsacks guy.
Mazzucato on R4 Today sounded quite optimistic about Burnham. Maybe he is speaking to her also.<p>
But signs about Burnham are certainly not good, the main one being – he is in cahoots with Josh Simon and presumably the other Starmer/LT gang that took over Labour using illegal funds.
She was optimistic about Starmer
Burnham has been nobbled, same as Starmer was, same as whoever comes next will be.
There was no need to “nobble him” – he was always part of the system – groomed by it, approved by it & allowed to be erected as PM by it., with help from the UK mejja who convinced the good people of Makersfield that he was worthy to be MP & thus PM. Pathetic. UK serfs, led by the nose by smiley lying faces.
The good people of Makerfield mostly wanted to keep the Nazis out. The majority of them probably know that won’t get a decently socialist alternative in.
Burnham has also appointed former OBR and BoE chiefs as economic advisors. High priests of neoliberalism. Institutions which protect the status quo from democracy.
I doubt he’ll be quite be as hated as Starmer by the time he gets the elbow, just average for PMs these days.
Agreed
Wonderful, More self imposed UK austerity planned to tie in with the looming Great Trump Recession/Depression with the usual hikes in ” we can only beat inflation by pushing up interest rates” approach.
But we must save the financial world from the self created collapses.
What a shame, Burnham picks someone with a track record of economics and finance as an adviser, rather than a nobody, ex-accountant with a rather large chop on his shoulder.
why are you all surprised?
You came here.
You clearly do not think I am a nobody.
You would not have commented otherwise.
Is it a lamb chop or a pork chop? Given Mr Murphy is a well balanced person I assume a chop on each shoulder (& in the event of a spare – I prefer mine grilled not fried).
I’m a nobody as well ………..in the eyes of our “rulers” who have done so well – haven’t they?
I see that you don’t not approve of criticism of our rulers by………experts. Ah well.
A track record in the economics and finance that has turned the UK into a poor country with a disproportionate number of rich people, and the most nature depleted country in the world, doesn’t seem to be anything to boast about?
Well I did not expect that.
I just watched Andy Burnham speaking to Andrew Marr on his LBC show say:
@6:59 “It is an endo to trickle down economics”
@7:05 “It is an end to neoliberalism”
”
PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham outlines his ‘very different’ political direction”
https://youtu.be/Vtkcan9bZhI?si=1jOlDoArVhaCsbP3&t=409
As we say up North, Aye right.
I will believe it when I see it.
That would be the greatest political change of course in ‘the country’ since Thatcherism.
The evidence will be in his actions