Burnham is here, and he’s just like Keir

When Keir Starmer was unceremoniously handed his marching orders, Labour promised that bringing Andy Burnham into 10 Downing Street would act as a structural “circuit breaker“.

The impression was given that he would sweep into London, banish the grey managerial technocracy, and finally deliver the progressive revival of “Change” promised to voters.

But just months into his premiership, how different he will be is coming into question.

Already his plan to scrap the triple-lock on UK state pensions is being compared to Keir Starmer’s winter fuel payment fiasco.

And recently a leaked document, showing what Keir Starmer would have done if he remained Prime Minister, just drew attention to how many of Andy Burnham’s announcements since becoming PM have been lifted straight from it.

What we are witnessing is not a revolutionary shift in governance, but a predictable political rerun.

Watching Andy Burnham handle his campaign commitments in office is like watching a magician perform the exact same trick again and again. The promises vanish into thin air, and an increasingly bored audience is left wondering why they bought a ticket to this Westminster farce in the first place.

Before entering No. 10, Mr Burnham built his political brand on high-minded radicalism. But much like a GPS, his administration has spent its opening month performing a rapid series of policy U-turns to fall right back into the satellite’s programmed route to the Westminster status quo.

Having campaigned on putting “life’s essentials back under public control“, his government quickly backed away from structural, immediate renationalisation for troubled water monopolies.

Pledges to take back control of critical assets have collapsed into temporary restructuring schemes and deferred takeover options – a policy backtrack that reads like a landlord promising a brand-new roof, only to drop off a bucket to catch the leaks and a sponge to mop up the dribbles.

During one of his runs for the Labour leadership, Mr Burnham raised expectations of abolishing tuition fees. Now he’s only considering cutting them … for European students. A worthy sentiment but hardly beneficial for domestic students.

Even before becoming Prime Minister he was U-turning like a Mini in “The Italian Job”.

During the Makerfield by-election Andy Burnham told a hustings that he would “stick by the WASPI women because they deserve some recompense for the unfairness”.

Yet the very next day he – or rather his anonymous spokesman – were ruling out compensation for WASPI women.

As a simple Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham was critical of the Labour government’s National Insurance Contribution increase.

However, challenged on it after becoming Prime Minister, his spokesperson couldn’t confirm that it would be abolished.

In 2021, Andy Burnham replied to a tweet about proportional representation saying he had “come round to it”. He reinforced this support in a podcast saying that first-past-the-post breeds resentment as it fails to represent voters.

Safely ensconced in Downing Street and “Burnham has categorically ruled out any change to the electoral system before the next election”.

A year ago Andy Burnham told a Labour conference fringe meeting that Brexit was a “disaster” and said “I want to rejoin the EU. I hope it happens in my lifetime“.

Now he is Prime Minister and it’s “Burnham commits to Starmer’s Brexit red lines in blow to hopes of rejoining EU”.

And whilst Burnham indicated regret for the way Keir Starmer’s government responded to Israel’s onslaught against the whole population of Gaza, his government still sells arms and munitions to Israel.

The rapid retreat from key platform pledges shows that changing the Prime Minister does not change the core nature of Westminster. It’s just Keir Starmer’s playbook recycled.

Keir Starmer famously abandoned his leadership pledges the moment the ink dried on his victory speech. Andy Burnham has simply accelerated the timeline.

Substituting one Labour leader for another to fix Westminster’s systemic failures is like rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic and expecting the iceberg to say sorry.

For voters in Scotland, this pattern is painfully familiar. We were told that a Labour government in London would deliver real change. Instead, we have a Prime Minister who treats campaign promises like hilltop snow seen in summer – impressive while it lasts, but melts into nothing the moment the sun shines on it.

It speaks volumes that while the cost-of-living crisis continues to hit Scottish communities hard, the new Prime Minister’s initial policy announcements have focused strictly on English regional devolution, leaving Scotland’s national democratic choices dismissed as “off limits”.

His “listening tours” end at the border and he fails to attend his UK conference’s ‘Scots Night’, demonstrating that no matter how often they say a Westminster leader will prioritise Scotland, the gravitational pull of the Westminster establishment always takes over.

Andy Burnham’s first few months have proven what the SNP has argued all along – the fundamental problem is not simply who sits in 10 Downing Street, but the broken system that surrounds them. Changing the ringmaster doesn’t fix a circus that is always treats the audience with contempt.

Scotland does not have to remain trapped in this endless cycle of Westminster’s broken promises, retreats, and U-turns.

We can choose a different path – one where decisions about Scotland’s resources, economy, and future are made directly by the people who live here, rather than by a Prime Minister in Westminster who views fundamental pledges as disposable option lists.