If Andy Burnham is serious about becoming prime minister, then there are a series of questions he needs to answer before anyone can sensibly judge whether he offers a genuine alternative to the current government, or merely a different personality pursuing much the same agenda.
The questions need to go beyond personality, competence, or electability. They need to establish what he believes, what he would do, and how he understands the challenges the UK faces.
Here are 52 questions, including one final critical one, I would like him to answer.
The economy
1. What is the fundamental purpose of the UK economy?
2. Do you believe economic policy should prioritise GDP growth, or should it prioritise wellbeing, security and sustainability?
3. Do you believe the UK government is financially constrained in the same way as a household, business or local authority?
4. Do you accept that a government issuing its own currency can always meet obligations denominated in that currency?
5. What role do you think taxation plays in the economy: revenue raising, redistribution, inflation control, market shaping, or all of these?
6. What is your view on the current fiscal rules, and would you retain, reform or abolish them?
7. Would you continue paying interest on all commercial bank reserve balances held at the Bank of England?
8. What is your view on quantitative easing and quantitative tightening?
9. What would you do to improve productivity in the UK economy?
10. How would you reduce Britain's dependence on rent extraction, financial speculation and asset price inflation?
Wealth, tax and inequality
11. Do you believe wealth inequality is now a greater problem than income inequality?
12. What specific measures would you introduce to tax wealth more effectively?
13. Should income from wealth be taxed at least as heavily as income from work?
14. How would you tackle tax avoidance by large companies and wealthy individuals?
15. What is your view on reforming inheritance tax?
16. How would you reduce regional inequality within the UK?
Housing
17. Do you think housing should primarily be a home or an investment asset?
18. What would you do to reduce house prices relative to earnings?
19. How many social homes would you build each year?
20. How would you finance a large-scale social housing programme?
21. What would you do to reform the private rented sector?
22. Would you support land value taxation, compulsory purchase reform, or other measures to tackle land speculation?
Climate and the environment
23. Do you believe economic growth can be fully reconciled with environmental sustainability?
24. What is your strategy for achieving net zero while maintaining public support?
25. How would you fund the transition to a low-carbon economy?
26. What role should public ownership play in energy generation, transmission and distribution?
27. How would you ensure that the costs of climate transition are borne fairly?
28. What policies would you adopt to restore biodiversity, waterways and ecosystems?
Public services and the state
29. What should be the balance between public provision and private provision in healthcare?
30. Would you reverse NHS privatisation measures introduced since 2012?
31. How would you tackle the social care crisis?
32. What reforms would you make to education?
33. How would you rebuild local government after fifteen years of austerity?
34. What powers and funding would you devolve to local and regional government, and are you open to independence if Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland wish for it?
Work, income and social security
35. What is your vision for the future of work?
36. Do you support stronger trade union rights and sectoral collective bargaining?
37. What is your view on a job guarantee programme?
38. How would you address economic insecurity among younger generations?
39. What reforms would you make to Universal Credit and social security more generally?
Debt, money and finance
40. Do you believe the national debt is a major problem facing the UK? Please explain your logic.
41. What do you understand government debt to be? Should government debt always be reduced, or can it sometimes be increased for good economic reasons?
42. How do you distinguish between productive public investment and current spending?
43. What role should government borrowing play in funding infrastructure, housing and climate transition?
44. Should the Bank of England's mandate be reformed? Should it pay interest on central bank reserve accounts?
45. What reforms would you make to the banking system?
Britain and the world
46. What should Britain's economic relationship with Europe be?
47. What industrial strategy would you pursue?
48. How would you respond to increasing geopolitical instability and trade fragmentation?
49. How do we resolve conflicts in the Middle East? What is the UK's role in that?
50. What role should Britain play in tackling global inequality and climate change? 51. What is the future of our relationship with the USA and NATO? What are the defence consequences of that?
The biggest question
And perhaps the most important question of all:
52. What is your theory of society?
That question matters because every successful political project ultimately rests on an answer to that question:
- Neoliberalism begins with the individual.
- Conservatism begins with institutions.
- Reform begins with belonging and identity.
- The Greens begin with nature and climate.
- Labour traditionally began with solidarity, but that no longer seems to be the case.
Before Andy Burnham can ask people to support him, he needs to tell them where he begins and what his priorities are, because every policy choice that follows depends upon his answer to that question. Isn't that the least we should expect?
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Bunrhams’ formative political experience was under BLiar and Broon. Thus, how much have these experiences influenced his current thinking? Like Starmer, he has said little of substance wrt the UK.
Questions: When will the “coronation” take place? Who will fund Burnham? Will this be made public (before or after)? What promises will he make to “interested parties” (the money men, the Israel lobby, etc). What contact (if any) does Burnham have with the warmonger & Broon? Does he tacitly support genocide a la Starmer? & so on & so forth?
Because I am fair minded and like to give a person a chance, I’ll regard him as a two-faced corrupt liar (& thus no different from the vast majority of what infests the HoC and HoL) until proved otherwise. (& I don’t regard what he did in Manchester as substantive in the least – in fairness (??) he had little access to money & thus could achieve little).
And he failed at the clean air hurdle. Let the children choke on SUV fumes.
Mike “Who will fund Burnham?” Why does a UK PM need or expect funding?
He needs to be elected leader of LINO. The current one (& PM) received funding from various sources including those with close connections to the Israeli gov. WRT the middle-east most of Starmers actions have reflected that funding – only disclosed after he was elected (I regard his election as LINO leader as fake). Thus the questions I pose, are fair questions. Burnt-ham ain’t PM, he is an MP that’s all & we know nothing wrt any policies he has. Doubtless LINO true believers will swallow anything he says. Since 1990, all LINO leaders have been frauds and liars, with one exception (& I am wholly unconvinced he would have made a good PM).
Reply to Cyndy Hodgson and several others who have noted Andy Burnham’s Israel connection. Below is a quote from Jonathan Cook of Middle East Eye which refers to a photo of Andy Burnham being embraced by Josh Simons, who gave up his seat at Makerfield to enable Burnham’s tilt at the Labour leadership:
‘Josh Simons, one of Morgan McSweeney’s hatchet men from Labour Together – the group that took Israel lobby money and secretly broke election laws to get Starmer into power – embraces Andy Burnham after giving up his seat for him’
It was allegedly McSweeney, a devoted supporter of Israel, who masterminded the ousting of Jeremy Corbyn and the ascendancy of Keir Starmer, a self acknowledged Zionist, to the Labour leadership. Could this be more of the same, with McSweeney pulling the strings of who gets to be boss behind the scenes? Andy Burnham has form as a supporter of Israel through membership of Labour Friends of Israel and public speeches supporting Israel (albeit more than 10 years ago). Further questions I would add to Richard’s 52 questions therefore are, ‘Do you support Israel in its current form and given the UK Government has recognised Palestine as a State, what measures would you propose to enable the fulfillment of their Statehood?
Replying to Philip Maughan, a still further question might be “Will you de-proscribe Palestine Action, quash the convictions of all jailed anti-genocide activists, cancel any upcoming trials – and apologise? A simple Yes or No will suffice.”
Richard, great questions. My view is that I don’t see Andy Burnham as our saviour who is going to transform Labour and save our country, but I do see him as a better opinion than Starmer. I also want a general election delayed until the Reform peak is well and truly over and the Greens under Zack Polanski have time to find their feet.
What I would like off Burnham is PR and more cross party working. I’m solidly Green, so how economic policies are going to be too pro business and capitalist for me, but in the South West we desperately need a reverse of the NI hike on low paid workers which is hammering jobs down here.
I think people’s expectations are low, but a prime minister that doesn’t sound like an AI generation and some hope would be good. We are in a mess and I don’t think that can be turned around quickly, but if we could get rid of Rachel Reeves and stop introducing measures that are making things worse,it would be a start.
hear hear Hazel. Burnham is far from what we would wish for in an ideal world sure, but a step in the right direction is infinitely better than shooting him down in flames and seeing Fagash as our next PM.
Burnham may be a step in the right direction, but Labour cannot beat Reform on their own. If he ends up muddying the waters by being slightly better than Starmer, he will split the opposition to Farage and Reform will walk it. It’s always important to consider opportunity cost in politics
Andy Burnham’s wife is Dutch-born, and as far as the information goes not Zionist. Both seem like positive points to me.It seems foolish to asssume that a politician’s wife doesn’t influence his attitudes.
T. A. R. A for a most important article!
Might it be interesting/relevant to ask why it is unlikely, in the extreme, that Main Stream Media people would ask questions of such pertinance and precision?
I hope they might. I opu this – all of this – on Twitter.
There is a clip on the internet from Burnham’s 2015 leadership bid, supposedly authentic, where he states that the first country he would visit, were he to be elected, is Israel. In other words, pro Zionism business as usual. No thank you.
I think you’ve debunked him already!
The problem for me is that Burnham will be like a lot of regional managers of this over centralised country. He has got used to working with shortages of money. What I find this does is make those managing the heavy handed centralised handouts they are given believe that THAT is the reality of public finance today (everything is paid for by tax that is unpopular / we have to rob Peter to pay Paul – ‘tough decisions’ – one thing or the other but not both – MMT does not exist).
So, in this logic where regional managers are simply dealing with the downstream effects of Westminster perma-austerity, when they get the chance to work at the centre or seat of government, all we get is a person who sees that as their job – the only difference is being in charge of salami slicing budgets, but nothing more than that, no real fundamental change of approach because they have been conditioned by their political masters.
I see this in the local public sector all of the time – fighting over budgets with other departments, local authorities responding to central government departments but never asking the fundamental question – why do you lie, what is this lack of money and investment you keep going on about (when there is a huge government reserve account for the private sector for example waiting for the next bailout).
So, with Andy Burnham, all we are potentially looking at is the next ‘Salami Slicer in Chief’.
I suspect you are right.
Maybe another question could be, “How much do you have budgeted for the next big bailout?”.
As a “manager”, he’d need to ask his bosses (holders of purse-strings) at the Treasury/BoE/City!
The reason his supporters are trying to arrange a “coronation”, rather than a leadership contest, is so that he doesn’t have to answer those questions publicly, for as long as possible.
Agreed
Andy Burnham needs to find a project first. Without that his answers offer nothing. He doesn’t have a clear image of what he will do. And I agree that question 52 is the most important one. Burnham’s own view of society is where he will inevitably find that image. He can no longer rely on the images of Blair, Brown or the Milibands. It must be his own.
Concise, relevant questions – thank you. Some could get equally concise answers (eg 3 & 4) but most are quite complex and difficult (eg 9).
As a party member who is supposed to get behind our leader and policy (yes, that has been rather difficult recently) I think I am owed some answers – it’s just good manners. So, if anyone in Team Burnham is reading this then, please, address these questions.
And, Team Murphy, you have written a lot on all these issues. Would this list of questions with links to articles you have posted be worthwhile?
That would take a lot of effort – and team Murphy is in disarray right now. Thomas is in a plaster cast and maybe needs an op. Three broken metatarsals – one twice.
hope it’s not too bad. I am sure your followers wish him a speedy recovery
Please send poor Thomas best wishes from all of us and hope he gets well soon.
I hope it wasnt a pothole that did it
No – it was martial arts training. He is a Buhurt fighter in full mediaeval armour. Now you know why I do what I am told by him 🙂 . Injuries are, apparently very rare.
Richard – I am so sorry to hear that about Thomas. He is clearly a terrific team member behind the scenes who enables the enterprise (although not alone in that). Please wish him a speedy and full recovery.
The evidence suggests he’s just another neoliberal zionist
53 Are you willing to proscribe ‘Labour Friends of Israel’ for MPs?
54 Are you willing to remove any support for Israel in foreign policy?
55 Are you willing to remove American use of military bases for any purpose in the UK?
56 will you order the arrest of any with ICC arrest warrants if tgey land here?
Might it be better to to describe ‘Israeli foreign policy’ as ‘Zionist’ foreign policy when it appears to be so? I think so.
Not only will BBC not put most of Richard’s questions to Burnham – they certainly won’t put Mike Parr’s on who’s funding him and the ongoing Genocide in Gaza Lebanon and West Bank.<p>
It is really chilling that apparently no Labour MP is prepared to discuss membership of Labour Friends of Israel, and that possible sanctions against the war criminals just cant be mentioned. If there were a discussion for and against that would be one thing, but the fact it cant be mentioned is really frightening. <p>
It is 1984.
I wish I could be more optimistic, but as far as Scotland is concerned I very much doubt if Burnham, or who ever else might succeed Starmer, will treat us any differently. “Shut up, and you are no getting an Independence Referendum. So there”.
I fear so.
Wouldn’t it be fantastic if we could ask all our political leaders these fundamental questions and get some real answers?
I know we are a long way away from such a situation with the state of our political commentary and media at the moment but Richard has provided an excellent framework which could be used in serious debate.
I have also started to use this framework to ” test” myself in imagining how a hypothetical politician who espoused a politics of care might answer so proving that There Is A Responsible Alternative ( TIARA)!
Thanks
Learn from the Starmer debacle and avoid a “lesser evil” approach in thinking about Burnham.
We have been here before.
Andy Burnham’s byelection victory and the politics of lesser evilism – The Left Lane
Alan Story for THE LEFT LANE
An important question is ‘Will you introduce Proportional Representation?’
[…] By Richard Murphy, Emeritus Professor of Accounting Practice at Sheffield University Management School and a director of Tax Research LLP. Originally published at Funding the Future. […]