A Week Of Prime Minister Andy Burnham

Summary

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Newscast: A Week Of Prime Minister Andy Burnham

BBC News – July 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode of Newscast provides a detailed retrospective on Andy Burnham’s whirlwind first week as UK Prime Minister. The show, hosted by Adam Fleming, with contributors Lucy Fisher (Financial Times) and Patrick Maguire (The Times), dissects the unprecedented "Number 10 North" project, Burnham's early decisions, the shifting landscape within Labour, and reactions from the opposition. The tone is insightful yet conversational, with a close focus on both process and personalities at Westminster during this rapidly evolving political moment.

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Main Discussion Points & Insights

The Shock of Office: Security Threats and Early Crisis

[04:25–08:59]

• The panel discusses an emerging security crisis: Irish police uncovered a car containing "military grade explosives," with arrests made including a woman in her 20s and a man in his 40s.
• Lucy Fisher connects this to the unpredictability of government:

  "Events, dear boy. Life comes at you fast." – Lucy Fisher [04:54]

• Emphasis on the recurring demand for top-level government attention on Northern Ireland, echoing challenges faced by Gordon Brown.
• Comment on Burnham’s handling of the emotive and controversial early prisoner release scheme in response to public backlash, notably from PC Harper's widow. Burnham paused the plan, risking further strain on prisons.

Notable Insight:
The hosts repeatedly stress the tension between a Prime Minister’s desire to "own the narrative" versus the inescapable, disruptive reality of breaking news and security issues.

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Number 10 North: Ambition or Gimmick?

[08:59–15:25]

• Andy Burnham launches "Number 10 North," a physical and symbolic extension of Downing Street, based in Manchester—claimed by Burnham to be "the happiest moment of his entire life" [09:41].
• Debates ensue about the substance behind the "stunt," with Lucy Fisher pointing out Burnham’s emotional investment and the deliberate recruitment of northern MPs into senior roles.
• Fisher also highlights potential business concerns about a "patchwork" of new local regulations:

  “If you’re suddenly having to deal with a patchwork of different planning and infrastructure rules… that will soon become a nightmare for business.” – Lucy Fisher [10:38]

• Patrick Maguire explains that while all Cabinet ministers are expected to spend time in Number 10 North, some may "hot desk," and new logistical structures are being trialled, such as ministers with responsibilities in multiple departments.
• Key unresolved questions: Will Whitehall adapt to this new structure? Will the Treasury acquiesce to Number 10 North’s ambitions, or resist as usual? Burnham’s messaging signals he is "serious," with warnings to the Civil Service.

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Power Dynamics: Centre vs. Treasury, and Rebuilding The Executive

[14:40–20:23]

• Adam Fleming and Lucy Fisher analyze whether Number 10 North is primarily about northern “representation” or is a strategic move to wrest economic management away from the traditional Treasury stronghold.
• Discussion of the practicalities of reconfiguring physical and organizational spaces in Whitehall, symbolized by Cabinet Secretary Antonia Romeo now sitting directly outside the PM’s office—a rare arrangement.
• Patrick Maguire:

  “That is a sign that Andy Burnham means what he says… turning Number 10 into the real power center of government. Number 10 traditionally has been pretty underpowered.” [17:11]

• The Cabinet Office is being streamlined and repurposed as “the Office of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet,” focused on cross-government work.

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Policy Pragmatism: "Breathing Space” and Burnham’s Early Moves

[20:23–24:41]

• Burnham's first policy announcements are discussed—measures aimed at the cost of living crisis, rough sleeping, capping bus fares, cutting VAT on energy, and business rate relief for pubs and clubs.
• Patrick Maguire highlights the importance of visible, "demonstrative" leadership to address public skepticism:

  “Andy gets stuff done. That’s the internal mission statement in Number 10.” [21:44]

• Lucy Fisher notes the value of the "breathing space" narrative, giving Burnham time before launching a long-term ten-year plan.
• Burnham is intentionally shaping his brand for a public that may not remember his earlier roles—projecting himself as on the side of "ordinary people."

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Regional Identity, Labour's Pendulum Shift, and Potential Risks

[24:41–29:57]

• Examination of Burnham’s northern branding and whether it risks alienating voters in the South ("Southern discomfort").
• Despite perceptions, the team points out that Burnham's outreach (via social media and appearances) is less "explicitly northern" than his critics claim.
• Patrick Maguire:

  "What matters to Andy Burnham… is, crucially, it’s not London. It is anywhere in the UK that’s not London.” [26:52]

• Lucy Fisher warns of Labour’s potential narrowing of appeal after removing "Tory-coded Labour MPs" from the frontbench and the abrupt "purge of Starmerites."
• Concerns are raised that the pendulum may have swung too far, possibly jeopardizing broad electoral attractiveness.

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Opposition Play: Kemi Badenoch, The Tories, and Reform

[30:16–35:27]

• Kemi Badenoch’s economy speech is discussed, in which she critiques Burnham’s business rates policy for not being “ambitious enough”:

  “I’m worried that this is just a pie in the sky announcement, because he hasn’t said where the money is going to come from. How can we believe him?” – Kemi Badenoch [30:49]

• The Tories are repositioning themselves, moving right—notably with the exclusion of centrist figures such as Grant Shapps.
• Lucy Fisher:

  “The implication is they can apply to stand for other parties… but they’re trying to improve the definition of themselves. The risk, of course, is that they are narrowing the band of their appeal.” [32:33]

• Patrick Maguire details how Reform UK, led by Nigel Farage, is bypassing mainstream channels and road testing direct-to-public methods—streaming online, appealing to "anywhere that’s not London" voters.

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Polling & The Wider Political Landscape

[34:50–35:43]

• Lucy Fisher references polling indicating Labour's bounce under Burnham, with Reform possibly stalling. The proximity of party polling could bolster Burnham’s legitimacy.
• Adam Fleming’s "favorite polling" insight:

  “When they announce they’re resigning, [Prime Ministers] become instantly more popular.” [35:27]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "Events, dear boy. Life comes at you fast." – Lucy Fisher [04:54]
• "Number 10 traditionally has been pretty underpowered… it’s a sign that Andy Burnham means what he says." – Patrick Maguire [17:11]
• "Andy gets stuff done. That’s the internal mission statement in Number 10." – Patrick Maguire [21:44]
• "What matters to Andy Burnham… it’s not London. It is anywhere in the UK that’s not London.” – Patrick Maguire [26:52]
• "The implication is they can apply to stand for other parties... but they're trying to improve the definition of themselves. The risk, of course, is that they are narrowing the band of their appeal." – Lucy Fisher [32:33]
• "When [Prime Ministers] announce they're resigning, they become instantly more popular." – Adam Fleming [35:27]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Security crisis & PM realities: 04:25–08:59
• Number 10 North debut: 08:59–15:25
• Whitehall and power reshaping: 14:40–20:23
• Burnham’s policies & positioning: 20:23–24:41
• Labour, identity, and risks: 24:41–29:57
• Opposition strategies: 30:16–35:27
• Polling & closing thoughts: 34:50–35:43

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Tone & Speaker Attribution

The conversation is lively, informed, and often wry. Adam Fleming provides moderation and context; Patrick Maguire offers insider anecdotes and analysis with a characteristic dry wit; Lucy Fisher brings a sharp policy and power-structure focus. Quotes are directly attributed above by speaker and timestamp.

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Summary

• Andy Burnham’s first week saw immediate crises, ambitious institutional rethinks, and carefully pitched policy announcements.
• The signature idea, Number 10 North, is both a practical northern expansion and a strategic attempt to rebalance power away from the Treasury and Whitehall—its success unproven.
• Burnham and the post-Starmer Labour government face risks of over-correction in identity politics, while the Tories under Badenoch swing to the right and Reform UK experiments with political communication.
• Early polling trends are positive for Labour but fragile, with the political landscape in flux and much yet to prove.

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This episode is a must-listen for anyone keeping tabs on the evolving anatomy of government under a new Prime Minister and the shifting tectonics of party politics in 2026.

Transcript

[Patrick Maguire]

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[Adam Fleming]

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[Adam Fleming]

Hello. Do you remember a couple of days ago I said, I wonder if we've got any newscasters in the treasury and if they could send us a signal to do with HP Source, which, as we all know, is the new Chancellor's favourite condiment. Well, on Thursday night I got home quite late. I was scrolling through my social media, saw a post from the treasury and the new Chancellor, John Healey. And very prominent in it was a bottle of HP sauce. I think that is the treasury insiders sending a very clear message that they listen to newscast. And that's what you're going to do now, because here is your latest episode

[Lucy Fisher]

of Newscast, Newscast, Newscast from the BBC.

[Adam Fleming]

Humanity's next great voyage begins.

[Patrick Maguire]

You know, I like my buses, I'll

[Adam Fleming]

come on to them.

[Patrick Maguire]

I see that. He was, I guess, the mayor of a town.

[Lucy Fisher]

Ooh la la.

[Kemi Badenoch]

Thinking about it like a panto helped.

[Patrick Maguire]

Do we play music now or what do we do?

[Lucy Fisher]

And what will you do? Stare at a wall?

[Adam Fleming]

Hello, it's Adam in the newscast studio and we're recording this episode on Friday. And what we usually do at the end of the working week is look back at developments in the week in politics and what a week it's been, because it started off with Andy Burnham arriving in number 10 Downing street and kicking off his first five days as Prime Minister. So I've got two seasoned Westminster watchers who are used to having their ears to the keyholes of various important doors. And one of them is here now in the studio. It's Lucy Fisher, who's the Whitehall Editor for the Financial Times. Hello, Lucy.

[Lucy Fisher]

Hi, Adam.

[Adam Fleming]

Are we allowed to reveal the quiet showbiz project that we did together a few weeks ago? I think we are, because they've announced the main cast and we're the minor cast. So, yeah, Lucy and I were invited to be in a press conference in the new sky series, the War Game, which is like a real time simulation of a war, and we're the journalists

[Lucy Fisher]

we got to play ourselves, which I felt was quite glamorous.

[Adam Fleming]

Yeah. And we went to, like a fake number 10 Downing street, although I don't know if we're allowed to reveal that much.

[Lucy Fisher]

Are we allowed to reveal who the Deputy Prime Minister who gave a press

[Adam Fleming]

conference was, who we quizzed?

[Lucy Fisher]

Yeah, it was Nicola Sturgeon and I was very worried that I was going to corpse and ruin the whole shoot, but luckily she was so plausible, wasn't she, that managed to. Oh, totally.

[Adam Fleming]

She played the role very well. And that will be available on sky in, I think, September. It's coming out, but we're very minor, so we don't get involved in the publicity. But anyway. Right, also joining us, Patrick Maguire from the Times. Hello, Patrick.

[Patrick Maguire]

Hello, Adam. I'm very disappointed you weren't talking about Celebrity Traitors, which I allowed myself to believe for a belief, a brief but fleeting moment.

[Adam Fleming]

But the funny thing about that is I was away for the weekend in Inverness when they started filming the new series. And so I got to the airport to fly home and everyone in the airport was super excited because there'd just been loads of celebrities flying in. And then I thought, should I suggest that maybe I'm the surprise 21st contestant? But then I was like, well, I'm going home. That means I got kicked out on day one. So I decided not to do that. Anyway. Also, Patrick, we've been teasing Henry Zephman all week about you saying that he should go on Celebrity Mastermind.

[Patrick Maguire]

Well, that was exactly what I thought would happen. The teasing. Yes. But, you know when you leave the inky world of Fleet street that Lucy and I toil on for telly, and particularly the BBC, you ascend to another plane of national renown. Adam, I was speaking to Henry about this this week. You've already been on Celebrity Master.

[Adam Fleming]

Yeah, we don't need to remind everyone. It's only my time anyway. Right, let's get down to business. I mean, this episod going to talk about Andy Burnham's week and culminating in number 10 north being like, fully established in operation today on Friday. But it's another one of those moments where actually the reality of being Prime Minister has kind of intruded. Because, Lucy, we got this news from the police in Ireland that they had uncovered a car with what they're calling a extremely significant explosive device, a bomb in it. And it's an example of, yeah, life comes at you fast as Prime Minister, irrespective of what your grade is.

[Lucy Fisher]

Well, absolutely. And the details are still emerging in this breaking story. But it is unusual for the authorities to call something like this sophisticated. Extremely significant, as you say. And the suggestion has been made that it is military grade explosives that have been found in this bomb. We know that a female driver in her 20s has been arrested. But you're right, you know, Andy Burnham, I think, has broadly done a pretty good job this week of owning the narrative, being proactive in laying down markers to set the scene for who he is as Prime Minister, what kind of administration this is going to be. But events, dear boy, life doesn't come at you fast. And this could quickly become, you know, an issue he needs to grapple with. You know, this was a bomb heading into the uk, into Northern Ireland. Also this weekend, you know, a lot of people on the edges of their seat to see whether the war between the US and Iran escalates. The US have just committed a 13th consecutive night of major strikes on the country. Trump's still threatening to attack civilian infrastructure. That could have a big impact, you know, on the economy and the price of oil in the UK and beyond that. I also thought there was another example this week where we saw Andy Burnham having to react, and that was with the controversial early prisoner release scheme, where the very emotive widow of PC Harper, you know, complained publicly about the idea that two of his killers could be released early. And therefore, essentially off the back of that, and looking more closely at the scheme, he's decided to pause the whole thing, throwing the prison system, which is already creaking at the seams, potentially into turmoil as prison governors work out if they're going to have to keep 5,000 prisoners due for release in September back.

[Adam Fleming]

And we can talk about that a bit more in a second. But I should just say a man in his 40s has also been arrested in connection with this explosive device in Ireland. And, Patrick, it's a reminder that I find whenever you talk to people in the Government or in Whitehall who are related to security, after you chat to them for a bit, they then always come round to the fact, oh, we still have to spend quite a lot of time and resources monitoring the security situation in Northern Ireland. Story is not done.

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah, indeed. And a huge amount of resource and headcount for the security services is still in Northern Ireland. It's very easy to forget that. And I think it is a reminder as well politically for Andy Burn, one of, of two things. One, that, that. That distant Republican threat and that's what the police in, in Ireland think this is quite obviously that hasn't gone away. Indeed. It's pretty alarming to hear words like military grade explosives in connection with their. Which contrasts with their usual modus operandi. But the other thing is there's a sort of, there's an operational lesson for Andy Burnham here as well, because this is a week in which he wanted to grab the mic, hold the mic and run number 10 as the campaign center of a Labour government. Right. Be the country and the government's campaigner in chief. It's a reminder that if your Prime Minister. And by the way, Gordon Brown had this in his first week in office as well, didn't he, with the. The car bombs in central London, attempted car bombs in central London and the attack on Glasgow Airport, it's a reminder that the work of Prime Minister Andy Burnham wants to be a very demonstrative public facing campaigning. Prime Minister, you're talking about conversations with security people on Whitehall. How many of those have we all had in our journalistic careers? And it often comes back to you when you speak to those sorts of people, half the stuff the PM and the Home Secretary and the Security Minister are talking about, probably more than half it actually, we literally never hear about necessarily. Right. It's all about plots that have been thwarted, threats we don't hear about stuff they're doing behind the scenes, people whose doors they're kicking in in the morning to prevent bad things happening. And those briefings take up a lot of time, you know, hence why Andy Burnham hasn't, you know, he's been very visible this week, but there'll be points where he's got a big announcement planned, where he's pulled away into a briefing and we never know what it's about.

[Adam Fleming]

Right, let's talk about what is on Andy Burnham's grid then. So when he's not getting redirected onto other things like breaking news. But Lucy, as we're recording on Friday, is the inauguration of number 10 north and did I see a photo and you can't tell if things are AI or real anymore? Did I see a photo of them all posing in front of a fake number 10 black door in the foyer of the building?

[Lucy Fisher]

I also saw that and assumed it was real. But now I wonder.

[Adam Fleming]

I think it is naive. Yeah, yeah. What's your take on how number 10 north is shaping up?

[Lucy Fisher]

Well, look, as far as stunts go, it's a good one. It's yet to be seen if it's going to be more than a gimmick. I thought it was. You know, Burnham was approaching the level of gushing today when he talked about this being the happiest moment, potentially of his entire life to see this number 10 north, you know, local branch.

[Adam Fleming]

Bear in mind this is a man who is married and has children and has recently become Prime Minister and this is the best day of his life.

[Lucy Fisher]

Yes. I was wondering if he was going to get a slight clip around the ear from. From his wife this evening over that comment. It's clearly important to him, and we've seen with the makeup of his Cabinet, a huge emphasis. MPs from the north and the Northwest coming into the top ministerial roles and even sort of lower down the ministerial ranks pivot away from a more southern and London focused emphasis. And, of course, devolution is the big idea at the heart of his government. I still think we need to see a lot more detail on how he's going to parcel out powers and resources to the regions and to what level in particular, because while it doesn't surprise me that many MPs, many in local government are very excited about this idea of having more autonomy, the mood music from business has been a lot more cautious. And you can imagine, especially if you're a national business or a major employer, that if you're suddenly having to deal with, you know, a patchwork of different planning and infrastructure rules, different skills regimes, if there's some level of fiscal devolution or there are grants or other schemes that require a huge administrative burden to apply all over the place and to try and, you know, work out how to get hold of little pots of money that will soon become a nightmare for business.

[Adam Fleming]

And Patrick, do we. Who's going to be working in number 10 north? Because I've seen reports that some Cabinet ministers, but not necessarily all of them, are sort of going to maybe hot desk there during the week. But there's also talk of actual units within government departments going there permanently.

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah, indeed. I think the expectation, I think, is that every Cabinet minister will be expected to work there on a regular basis. Some of them, Lucy Powell, Louise Hague, some of the names mentioned will be there fairly often on a weekly basis. Was the briefing this week? I suspect Alex Norris, the new Justice Secretary, who, despite being a Nottingham mp, is from Manchester and is a massive Manchester City fan, may well find a regular pretence.

[Adam Fleming]

How convenient.

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah. And may well find a regular pretext to see how his, his tricky brief is going from a Mancunian vantage point as well. And obviously you've had this suggestion of financial relocation packages for officials. What's interesting, though, about the reshuffle is seeing the number of junior ministers who've been appointed to two, or in some cases, three briefs. Three departments, rather. Right. So you've got Dan Tomlinson, for instance, Treasury Minister, but also joint with the Cabinet Office. You've got others who are joint with, say, the Ministry of Housing, Local Government, Department of Transport. That does suggest that this department, number 10 north, is going to become an engine room for that sort of cross departmental cross cutting thinking. It's interesting, by the way, and not

[Adam Fleming]

trying to like, bust out of the silos that exist in Whitehall.

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah, exactly. But what's interesting about the department is there is no Minister for number 10 North. I mean, the argument is Andy Burnham is, Louise Hague is. But there are questions from ministers, certainly. I was speaking to one of them yesterday who said, look, number 10 north, you know, people being ministers in two or three departments at once, great idea. But it all seems to me, said this Minister, to be a recipe for people being captured by their officials because they'll be bouncing between places, they'll never be able to truly grip one department. And listening to what Lucy said about devolution there, I completely agree that a patchwork of, you know, local regimes, particularly in a party system this complicated, by the way, is probably a recipe for business anxiety. But when they announced this number 10 north thing last month, I remember having conversations with Andy Burnham's team and they were very pleased. Not about the devolution stuff, but the way they see it, and the proof will be in the pudding as to whether it's seen this way in Whitehall, and particularly by the treasury, they thought the most important thing about Number 10 north was not the north bit and not the sort of hopey, changey, happy, clappy devolution Stephanie Burnham was talking about, but the suggestion that it represented number 10, be that in the north or in the south, taking control of growth policy. Now, can they implement it? Do they have the ministers? Will they have the officials and Crucially, will the system in Whitehall Think number 10 north is the same thing as number 10 south? That's the big test. And I thought it was interesting. A grand old man of Whitehall was saying to me this morning, they were reading Andy Burnham's piece in the Guardian on this this morning, and the last sentence of it was basically a warning to the Civ Service saying, I'm serious about it, get on board. And this very experienced Whitehall old hand said, you don't put that in there unless you think the system is going to kick back. So that's one to watch. Do they think number 10 is the same thing as number 10?

[Adam Fleming]

Yeah. Lucy, what do you think about that theory there, that actually it's not necessarily about northern representation or giving a northern flavor to the government to balance the very southern flavor of Whitehall, that actually it's a way of kind of reinventing how government is done to make it feel a bit more modern and also less captured by the treasury, who like to say no to things?

[Lucy Fisher]

Well, I think that is a big part of it. And I've spoken to people close to the new Chancellor, John Healey, who say that, you know, he accepts that that will be the way that things are, you know, that number 10 is the engine of the economy within government, trying to focus on growth and catalyzing growth and, you know, making the UK attractive for inward investment, while the treasury is more so traditional tax and spend department. Let's see how that goes.

[Adam Fleming]

I mean, yeah, how many times? And we're not that old, but we've lived through enough versions of things where the Prime Minister, or if the Prime Minister's allies and number 10 say, yes, we've got the. We've basically got the keys to the treasury and we will tell them what to do. And, I mean, it never really ends up working that way.

[Lucy Fisher]

No. Normally, you know, events happen. Prime Minister is quickly forced onto the back foot to react. And of course, I was very struck that in the lead up to the changeover of power this week, both Keir Starmer and Theresa May made the these very pointed public remarks about how international affairs impinge pretty quickly, especially at a time of global turbulence as we're living through now. And so while I'm sure that Andy Burnham, as Prime Ministers before him, want to concentrate on the domestic and reform within the UK's borders, it may be that he quite quickly finds he has to spend more time abroad dealing with various issues that arise in multilateral forms.

[Adam Fleming]

And not to turn this into an Institute for Government podcast, which would be Very interesting and they make very good podcasts, if you're into that stuff. But, Patrick, I noticed your column, a lot of that is about where individual desks are, not in number 10 north, but in the old school buildings in Downing Street. Why is that so important?

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah, a couple of people in number 10 were talking to me this week and they said, you won't believe who's got a desk in the Outer Office. And I had to ask for a brief primer on what the Outer Office was because there are lots of rooms in number 10. And as someone, alas, who has not yet become a regular visitor to number 10 under any prime Minister, at least not the. The bits of it they actually work from and don't put on nice canapes for hacks like us in. I sort of had a vague idea, but the Outer office is the office directly outside of the Prime Minister's study. And who, as of this week, has got a desk in there? None other than Antonio Romeo, the Cabinet Secretary, who would usually sit, and he still does have an office in the Cabinet Office. And speaking to people who've been in number 10 before, I said, is this the usual thing? Does the Cabinet Secretary usually sit directly outside the Prime Minister's office? And all of them said, no, that is a sign that Andy Burnham means what he says. And he and Louise Haig are really, really trying with their new office for the Prime Minister and the Cabinet to turn number 10 into the real power center of government. Right. Because number 10 traditionally has been pretty underpowered. You know, it's not really department in its own right. It's sort of sometimes forced to act as the sort of referee or umpire of other departments rather than driving that change for the centre. So the Cabinet Secretary taking up a desk right outside the PM's office is a room is a sign that that is now really the new locus of government. And as Dan York Smith, who's the Prime Minister's most senior Civil Service aide, said to colleagues in a message earlier this week, when you go through the link door between number 10 and 70 Whitehall, where the Cabinet Office is now, on the other side of that door is no longer the massive, all powerful department of the past, but in his words, a smaller department that is much more focused on policy cross government work, specifically support the PM not running a whole range of stuff. So it's a really. It's a small thing, it's a techy thing, it's a nerdy thing. I know you like those in newscast, Adam, but it's symbolic is what it Is. Well.

[Adam Fleming]

And I suppose, Lucy, the reason Andy Burnham would see a need for those kind of changes and to grip things is because so many of his predecessors have said the same thing, which is like whatever metaphor they use, they reach for the lever of power and it comes off in their hand and it's not connected to anything.

[Lucy Fisher]

Well, absolutely. And when you look at Downing street, well, just the physical infrastructure, it is a Georgian townhouse. It's not really set up like a modern office, and it is a sort of warren of corridors that, as Patrick sort of made clear there, reaches sort of back into the Cabinet Office. I'm not surprised to hear that the Cabinet Office itself is being retooled and renamed to become the office of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet in order to try and be more streamlined, be more focused on delivery. And I think Antonia Romeo, you know, she's a real operator. She is someone that understands small p politics. And I think, actually, in a sense, Burnham is lucky to have her and someone with such a grip on the Civil Service and who wants to sort of push reform through. So I think she will be crucial to the success or failure of this administration.

[Adam Fleming]

The reason I'm slightly smiling is there's a great video from the first Cabinet meeting where she is sat next to Andy Burnham and she's got a huge notepad and a big pen and she's writing down, it looks like every single word he's saying. And then I'm wondering, oh, the email that we get two hours later of what Andy Burnham told the Cabinet, is that coming from that notebook that she then goes and types into her laptop and sends out as an email? But she looked like she was taking some very thorough notes. And you also just think, in this, she wants to be in charge of AI rollout across the government. And like, for the person who's in charge of using AI to make the public services more efficient, to be sat there with a massive notebook in front of the world's media just kind of made me chuckle a little bit.

[Lucy Fisher]

Come on, though. It was cameras rolling. Looked busy, wasn't it?

[Adam Fleming]

Yeah, true, Patrick, when we talk about the things that Andy Burnham has delivered this week, the things that thing that I just think about it is, okay, these are things that may help people with the cost of living. He. They might feel like good things to kind of hit the ground running with, but they're not exactly new ideas. They're tinkering or revising things that other Prime Ministers have done. And I was expecting something maybe a little bit more. More Imaginative.

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah. It's an interesting point and I think there's. There's something in that criticism. But I remember, I say I remember as if it were, you know, a decade ago. And in some respects it does feel like a decade ago. But I saw Andy Burnham last Sunday, the day before he became Prime Minister, his last afternoon as a free man, and he'd just been in the treasury that morning talking through some of these announcements, the announcements we've seen this week. He was very pleased. There was no tension in the system, he said. But I said to him, how are you going to convey to people that you get it and that help is coming, the cavalry is coming, in his words, on the cost of living, on everything that is making our politics so volatile and everything that ultimately screwed over Keir Starmer in terms of his standing in the electorate. And he was quite candid. He said, I'm not gonna come in and say all the things I'm gonna do, which he didn't reveal to me then, but we had a good idea of what they were. Are going to fix things overnight in the way that people want.

[Kemi Badenoch]

Want.

[Patrick Maguire]

But what I hope people see is that I get it and that I am making moves towards it and that the moves themselves recognize it. Right. I used the word demonstrative before, and it's a bit like that. It's about showing, in his view, the government has agency and that he has empathy and that he can't do everything. But he's showing people, he's, he's. He's moving towards it. And I think. I think that is the, the political objective in all this. Yes. You know, sort of something old, something new, something Boris, something blue quality to some of the policy. But, you know, he's doing it. He's doing something. The internal mantra in number 10, you know, that what's at the top of the. The notes that are circulating on how they want to communicate this, it is the phrase, Andy gets stuff done. That's the internal mission statement in number 10. Andy gets stuff done. And that's the impression they're trying to convey, even if the stuff is small. Right. It's stuff that he, he. He's trying to show them. Right? It's not just, I'm getting stuff done, it's I'm getting the stuff you care about done.

[Adam Fleming]

And also, Lucy, that I'm getting slightly tired of seeing press releases talking about breathing space. But then that means when political journalists are tired of it, it means that members of the public are maybe hearing it for the first time. And you realize the breathing space formulation is actually quite, quite neat, isn't it? Because it fills the gap, gap between now and this 10 year plan for the future of the country that he's promised in the autumn. So you could be doing something in the short term while they're beavering away on something for the long term.

[Lucy Fisher]

I think that's right and I think that is broadly what a new administration needs to do, particularly with a takeover prime Minister coming in without a huge sort of nationwide political campaign during an election to really frame themselves for the public. Because there'll be many people who don't really remember Andy Burnham from the first time around in the cabinet, who haven't been aware of him as Greater Manchester Mayor for the past decade. And therefore, given that it was a key criticism of Keir Starmer, that he was too sluggish to define himself and therefore was defined by his critics, I think Burnham has done quite a good job this week in defining himself and whose side he's on. It is, you know, ordinary people and they're left behind. And I do think, you know, Patrick is right. Taken individually, a lot of these measures are quite small. But together as a package, whether it's ending rough sleeping, you know, capping bus fares, cutting VAT on energy bills, you know, it's important to sort of show whose side he's on and also to say a little bit about himself. You know, the idea of cutting business rates for pubs, clubs and live music venues allowed him to be, you know, in a bar pulling a pint, giving his sort of bloke ish quips and trying to project his Persona for those people who don't know him very well.

[Adam Fleming]

What was so interesting for me was I was doing antisocial on Radio 4 on Friday lunchtime and we were doing a program about the sort of the culture and the identity stuff around the North South Divide. And obviously it was inspired by Andy Burnham becoming Prime Minister. And in my mind, I'd felt there'd been a bit of a backlash already to how he presents himself as being northern and his northernness as part of his brand. But then you go back through his social media and actually, Patrick, it's not as explicitly northern as you might think. And you realize, oh, that's, that's people caricaturing him because there's a video of him in Cardiff, there's a video of him at the bus garage in Bristol. Yeah, he's pulling a pint to advertise the business rates relief for pubs. But that's just a Pint in a pub. It's not a working man's club in the North. So I wonder if actually he's not projecting quite as much northern bloke as people maybe think.

[Patrick Maguire]

Well, yeah, he's projecting northern bloke in that at the end of the day, he is one. Despite the Cambridge degree, I think it's, you know, still possible to be a, A bloke from the northwest if you've been to a good university. At least I, I, I hope I would embody that myself, Adam. But no, I think you're right. There is a. He has a very strong political brand and as such, he's easy to parody. He's easy to pigeonhole to a certain extent, by the way, that's, that might be a strength. Right, what was Keir Starmer ever parodied for? What definition did he have? The flip side of that is, of course, care, basically. Yeah. Yeah.

[Adam Fleming]

Well, a really slick haircut.

[Patrick Maguire]

Yeah. Moisturized every day. People forget that about Keir Starmer. He told me that once in 2020 every morning. Explain why he still looks quite good for his age. Anyway, we digress. I think the, the difficulty with having such a strong regional brand is, if you look at the economists, had some fascinating polling last week. It was like a heat map of where Andy Burnham was good for the labor brand and where, where he polled less well, where Labour polled less well with him on the ballot. And basically there was no real disaster zone. But you saw it was really hot in the Northwest, quite hot in the southwest and really hot in the Northeast. And then there was just this sort of. And bits of the Midlands as well, but there was this sort of ribbon from the southeast across to South Wales where it was not so hot. And that is the difficulty. But you're right, he has been all over the country and I think, I think the essence of this. And he'll have to find a way to communicate it more clearly. I wrote about this in the Times last week. What matters to Andy Burnham and the people around Andy Burnham is, crucially, it's not London. Right? It is anywhere in the UK that's not London. That's the sort of. That I think has been the defining cultural divide in the Labour Party for a while. And when he talks about changing culture and priorities, it's about that as much as anything else. And that has been sort of terrain that Nigel Farage has owned politically for a very long time. That's not to say, of course, that London's not important to the Labour Party. I mean, it's very important to the Labour Party. Most of its membership is in London, the southeast. But that's probably a more useful frame to understand it from London Labour versus what some people might call normal Labour. Not that there aren't any normal people in London, but that is a frame that some people, influential supporters of Andy Burnham, that's how they see the world.

[Adam Fleming]

That's one of the things I gleaned from this episode of Antisocial, which is available to listen to on BBC Sounds now, which is that if you actually look at the north south divide and a really kind of authoritative way of measuring where that is and how big it is, is to look at a basket of statistics like number of graduates, house prices, average earnings and health. So like people's life expectancies. And you then get a line which includes Wales being in the north and means that Leicester's in the south but Nottingham's in the north. And so you then realize geographically it gets a little bit skewed and weird and then you realise the key thing is that London is so different, different from everywhere else. So actually, Lucy, that's, that's, that's just repeating Patrick's point, but kind of with a bit more of a geography angle.

[Lucy Fisher]

I do think the pendulum might have swung too far back the other way though. And he is potentially at risk of creating a Southern discomfort. And I think that the purge of the Starmerites, which was pretty brutal and savage, you know, could come back to bite him and getting rid of, you know, Peter Kyle in Brighton, Darren Jones in Bristol, Steve Reed in London and others, you know, in the south. You know, it has been such a pendulum shift. Has it gone too far the other way? I'm also interested in some of the people he's sacked or demoted. People like Darren Jones, Peter Kyle, Lucy Rigby, who remains a Treasury minister but. But demoted from Secretary.

[Adam Fleming]

Yeah.

[Lucy Fisher]

Who I would call and they may not thank me for this, but Tory coded Labor mps in. In that, you know, if you had the volume off on. On. On the telly or there's something like their presentation or the way they speak and quite sort of right of center for the Labour Party politics, which I think is more appealing to centrist or Tory curious voters or people who have voted Conservative in the past. So I think again, he might be missing a trick there in, in sort of narrowing the appeal of Labour by losing some of those players from the front bench.

[Adam Fleming]

And talking of somebody who would be very happy to be described as Tory coded because she is the leader of the Conservative Party. Is Kemi Badenok, who did a big speech on the economy this week, which she did on a very sunny rooftop in London. And then afterwards she taking questions. And here is her response when she was asked about Andy Burnham's pledge to cut business rates for pubs.

[Kemi Badenoch]

Our business rates policy will abolish business rates for most of the high street. So it would include all the places that Andy Burnham has talked about, but it would also have retail, it would also have restaurants. Hospitality is one of the areas that is hardest hit by Labour's jobs tax. Andy Burnham is not reversing that. What we're saying is, is we found the money and a better way to actually make life easier for them. So I'm happy that he is focusing on those, on those businesses he should focus on more. I'm worried that this is just a pie in the sky announcement because he hasn't said where the money is going to come from. How can we, how can we believe him?

[Adam Fleming]

Yeah, Lucy isn't interesting there that Kemi Bayrock is attacking Andy Burnham for kind of not being ambitious enough. Even though Andy Burnham's whole thing is like, I want to be really ambitious

[Lucy Fisher]

and do things different, differently, it's not surprising, right? That's the job of the leader of the opposition, even when they agree with what the government's doing, to say, well, you're not being bold enough or going far enough or doing it fast enough. So I, I wasn't surprised in that sense. And I'm sure it's quite frustrating for, for an opposition party when the government of the day nicks your policy, or part of it. For me, one of the other really interesting things of Cami Badenoch's intervention this week was to talk about in very unabashed terms how she is, you know, tacking rightwards in the party. The policies are changing, the people are changing, the processes are changing, she said. And there's been this big Ferrari around Sir Grant Shapps being blocked from running again as a parliamentary candidate for the Tories. He's held six cabinet briefs. He was an MP for almost 20 years before he lost his Welwyn Hatfield seat at the last election. And I think it's really setting down a marker that, you know, this is a renewed party. She wants the public to understand it's a fresh proposition that she's putting to them something more full blooded in its conservatism and therefore saying, you know, we don't want anyone who doesn't agree that the 2050 push for net zero needs to be ditched. We don't want anyone who doesn't agree we need to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights. And I spoke to Kevin Hollenreich, the Tory chair this week, who it was fascinating how much he was sort of leaning into this, saying, look, there are people we like and admire who just don't reflect Kemi Badenoch's brand of conservatism. And therefore, you know, the implication is they can apply to stand for other parties or be associated, you know, with other movements across the spectrum, but they're trying to improve the definition of themselves. The risk of course, is that they are narrowing the band of their appeal. And again, there are many sort of centrists who will be feeling fairly homeless with the direction in which the Tories are headed.

[Adam Fleming]

And Patrick, you've. You shared a few private jet flights with Nigel Farage in the last few months as part of your work, obviously, just to be clear, to be a fly on the wal, but like, where's he been this week?

[Patrick Maguire]

Well, what Reform are doing I think is, is really interesting because they have had a pretty rough and tumble time with the mainstream media of late in Westminster, if you mention the Clapton by election, people will either say, oh, is that still going on? Or hahaha, we love camp in face or something. Right, so.

[Adam Fleming]

And a full list of candidates is available on the BBC News website and 33 others.

[Patrick Maguire]

I'm sorry, Ash, it's a very, very, very long list of candidates. I'm very sorry for opening that can of worms. But what Reform are now trying to do is show and prove that they can circumvent the usual channels of politics and consolidate that 25 to 30% of the vote, probably close to 25% of the vote. That has been pretty immovable for them. Now they're doing that how they're doing that, they are streaming their own content online. Right. Nigel Farage gave a big speech this week about the need for a general election. Lots of people wouldn't have seen it, but it was doing big numbers on reforms, social channels. He's been in Clacton a lot. So they're using this period to road test a series of techniques, a way of doing politics that they think allows them to circumvent establishment channels. We'll see. But we're gonna see another summer in which and Reform have done this the past two summers, maybe in a slightly less high profile way, maybe in a way that gets less coverage from the Westminster media given a new government, but where they are road testing techniques, they think they can take forward into elections and continue hitting their high spots of electoral performance. Let's see, Andy Burnham may complicate that and you know, but in their view, it's still all to play for and that, you know, Andy Burnham's hold on seats like Makerfield will be. It will be a passing fancy. So let's see.

[Lucy Fisher]

I'm really interested to see when the crossover moment comes in the polls, if indeed it does come. If you look at the end of this week, it looks like Labour have had a bit of a bump from Andy Burnham. They're beginning to trickle up. Reform have been trickling down this spring and it could be they're only a couple of points apart in some pollsters estimation. And I think that that could be a really big boost for Andy Burnham, showing that he's making progress, rewarding the confidence of those MPs that have put him in place in ousted Starmer. And again, very bad news if that does happen for Farage after it feels like reform's lost momentum this year.

[Adam Fleming]

My favorite thing I've gleaned from the polling this week is that YouGov favorability tracker of all the different Prime Ministers of the last few years and it shows that when they announce they're resigning, they become instantly more popular. Funny that. Lucy, great to see you, thanks for having me, Adam and Patrick, thanks for joining us down the line.

[Patrick Maguire]

Thank you, Adam.

[Adam Fleming]

And just a reminder that we've launched our latest newscast gimmick. Andy Burnham will obviously have his eye on what he's achieving in his first hundred days as Prime Minister, but we want you to have an eye on what you could achieve in the first hundred days of the Andy Burnham era. What task challenge put off thing would you like to achieve? I for one, I'm going to try and run 500km, not in one go, just cumulatively. So an average of 5k per day. Colette messaged from Cardiff to say I'm going to spend my next hundred days hopefully growing my first baby to full term. He is due five days later on the 1st of November and Colette says that we've been great company for her during her pregnancy insomnia over the last six months. So good luck whenever you're listening to this. Colette Albert messaged me to say my main goal during andy Burnham's first 100 days is to go to the newscast podcast at the Edinburgh Fringe and he's got tickets on Monday and Friday and a few other people messaged me on Instagram. Alex said, I'm gonna finish the first draft draft of my novel. And one more Sara says, is it cheating to say that I would like my achievement in Andy Burnham's first 100 days to get a shout out on newscast? So we've got our first achievement in your 100 days, Sara, getting a shout out on this very podcast. And if you would like a shout out for your challenges or achievements, let us know newscastbc.co.uk or you can WhatsApp us on 033-01-2394. And this weekend I will be trying to contribute to my own challenge of running 500km. So if you see me running along a canal towpath, that is what I am doing. And maybe I will be listening to the first in the new series of Old Newscast. Throughout the summer weekends, we're going to be dropping episodes of our sort of history spin off and we thought we'd look at the broad arc of British politics and the big events that have happened, happened in the last few decades. And so the starting point for that series of miniseries is the 1997 election and the last time there was a Labour landslide. So old newscast from 1997 with an amazing cast of old newscasters coming your way very soon.

[Patrick Maguire]

Bye bye.

[Lucy Fisher]

Newscast, Newscast from the BBC, you've come

[Patrick Maguire]

to the end of Newscast. Some people, and you know who I mean, might say you ooze stamina. Can I encourage you to subscribe on BBC Sounds? And you can get in touch with us anytime. Email [e-mail], you can WhatsApp us on 0301-239-480.