Maurisa Coleman is a strategic advisory consultant on political strategy, communications and international affairs.
Andy Burnham has been Prime Minister for three weeks. In that short time, he has promised Britain a new economic model, a new political model and a ten-year plan for the country. He has even established “No10 North” in Manchester, an initiative dressed in the language of devolution but which, at least for now, has more than a whiff of vanity project about it. What Burnham has not done is address Parliament as Prime Minister.
There is, of course, an obvious explanation. Parliament rose for its summer recess before Burnham entered Downing Street and does not return until September. But explanation is not justification, particularly when the Prime Minister taking office is not simply proposing to continue the programme of his predecessor. Burnham is promising to change it, and apparently quite substantially. He has been anything but invisible: travelling the country, meeting businesses and political leaders, launching policies and opening his new No10 North. What he has not done is subject that new direction to questioning by the country’s elected MPs.
Only a few months ago, Parliament was presented with Keir Starmer’s programme for government. MPs debated it, challenged it and voted upon it. Yet Britain now has a new Prime Minister promising his own ten-year plan, a new economic model and a new political settlement. Policies inherited from Starmer are being reconsidered, while new ideas on taxation, spending, social care, property and investment appear almost daily in the press.
This matters because there is an important constitutional distinction which risks being lost in the usual argument about an “unelected Prime Minister”. There is nothing unconstitutional about Burnham being in Number 10. Britain does not elect its Prime Ministers directly; a government governs because it can command the confidence of the House of Commons. Burnham can, and his appointment is constitutionally legitimate.
His route there was nevertheless unusual. Britain has now had seven Prime Ministers since David Cameron. Burnham returned to Westminster after a Labour MP vacated his seat, providing the route for his return to the Commons. He then became Labour leader without a contested membership ballot after his parliamentary support left no viable challenger. None of this makes him an illegitimate Prime Minister, but it does make parliamentary accountability more important, not less.
The real question, therefore, is not whether Burnham is entitled to inherit the office of Prime Minister. He plainly is. It is what happens when the programme pursued by the new Prime Minister begins to look substantially different from the one Parliament debated and approved only months earlier.
At what point does a change in programme become substantial enough that MPs should demand the new Government put its direction before Parliament, rather than simply begin implementing it while the House is in recess?
That question matters because Burnham is not merely waiting for Parliament to return before governing. Decisions are already being made. Money is being committed, existing policies are being reversed and new ones announced. Government must, of course, continue during recess. But there is a difference between keeping government functioning and beginning a substantial change of political and economic direction without giving Parliament an opportunity to examine it.
Burnham is certainly engaging. He has travelled, met political leaders and businesses, opened No10 North and is embarking on a national tour in what Downing Street calls “listening mode”. There is nothing wrong with a Prime Minister listening to the country. But there is something peculiar about spending six weeks listening to almost everyone except the elected MPs whose job it is to question him.
Meanwhile, speculation about the new Government’s programme continues almost daily. One day it concerns tax, another savings, property, social care or spending. Some policies were inherited from Starmer and Reeves. Some appear to represent the thinking of Burnham and his new administration. Others may simply be ideas being tested before the Budget and may never become policy at all.
Six weeks is a long time to leave households, businesses and markets guessing which is which.
That is where parliamentary scrutiny matters beyond Westminster. Parliament is not simply a stage upon which the Opposition gets to shout at the Prime Minister on a Wednesday afternoon. It forces government to turn political ambition into accountable policy. Ministers have to explain what they are actually proposing, how much it will cost, who will pay for it and whether yesterday’s newspaper headline bears any resemblance to tomorrow’s legislation. In doing so, Parliament provides something an economy desperately needs: information and, with it, a degree of certainty.
I have argued previously on these pages that trust is one of the most important, and most easily squandered, elements of economic policy. Governments tend to think confidence can be restored through the right fiscal announcement. It cannot. Businesses invest when they have reasonable confidence in the environment into which they are putting their money. Families make decisions about mortgages, pensions and savings according to what they believe will happen to their finances tomorrow, not simply what appears on a Treasury spreadsheet today.
Markets can absorb bad news. What they struggle to price is uncertainty. Households are not so different.
Take the Government’s inherited policy on Cash ISAs. The intention is to reduce the amount most under-65s can put into cash each year and encourage more money into investments. There is an economic argument for doing so. But it ignores a more interesting question: why are people choosing the relative security of cash in the first place?
If people are cautious because they are uncertain about taxation, employment, disposable income or the wider direction of the economy, changing the tax incentive does not make them more confident. It simply makes their caution more expensive. Confidence cannot be legislated into existence.
The same applies to businesses. If Burnham wants investment, businesses need to know the rules. If he wants households to invest, they need confidence in the economy into which he is asking them to put their money. Government by newspaper speculation achieves the opposite.
Burnham himself has spoken about Britain’s need for stability. He is right. Seven Prime Ministers in little more than a decade is hardly evidence of a settled political system. Which makes allowing uncertainty about the programme of the seventh to build while Parliament remains silent all the stranger.
Yes, Parliament is in recess. But Parliament can be recalled. It’s not due to come back for another three weeks. A new Prime Minister proposing a markedly different political and economic direction for the country is surely entitled to ask himself whether six weeks of government by speculation is preferable to allowing MPs to do their jobs.
Recall Parliament. Tell MPs which parts of Starmer’s programme remain and which are being abandoned. Explain what this new economic model actually means, what the ten-year plan will cost and how the Government intends to pay for it. Let Parliament challenge it, and let the country hear the answers.
Burnham spent years cultivating his reputation as the King in the North. He now has the crown, his own No10 North and a national tour on which to listen to the country. None of those things is inherently objectionable.
But Britain already has a national forum in which every part of the country is represented. It is called the House of Commons.
If Burnham has time to travel Britain explaining and developing his new programme, he has time to ask Parliament to return and answer questions about it. Waiting six weeks while substantive decisions are taken and speculation grows is not necessary. It is a choice.
Maurisa Coleman is a strategic advisory consultant on political strategy, communications and international affairs.
Andy Burnham has been Prime Minister for three weeks. In that short time, he has promised Britain a new economic model, a new political model and a ten-year plan for the country. He has even established “No10 North” in Manchester, an initiative dressed in the language of devolution but which, at least for now, has more than a whiff of vanity project about it. What Burnham has not done is address Parliament as Prime Minister.
There is, of course, an obvious explanation. Parliament rose for its summer recess before Burnham entered Downing Street and does not return until September. But explanation is not justification, particularly when the Prime Minister taking office is not simply proposing to continue the programme of his predecessor. Burnham is promising to change it, and apparently quite substantially. He has been anything but invisible: travelling the country, meeting businesses and political leaders, launching policies and opening his new No10 North. What he has not done is subject that new direction to questioning by the country’s elected MPs.
Only a few months ago, Parliament was presented with Keir Starmer’s programme for government. MPs debated it, challenged it and voted upon it. Yet Britain now has a new Prime Minister promising his own ten-year plan, a new economic model and a new political settlement. Policies inherited from Starmer are being reconsidered, while new ideas on taxation, spending, social care, property and investment appear almost daily in the press.
This matters because there is an important constitutional distinction which risks being lost in the usual argument about an “unelected Prime Minister”. There is nothing unconstitutional about Burnham being in Number 10. Britain does not elect its Prime Ministers directly; a government governs because it can command the confidence of the House of Commons. Burnham can, and his appointment is constitutionally legitimate.
His route there was nevertheless unusual. Britain has now had seven Prime Ministers since David Cameron. Burnham returned to Westminster after a Labour MP vacated his seat, providing the route for his return to the Commons. He then became Labour leader without a contested membership ballot after his parliamentary support left no viable challenger. None of this makes him an illegitimate Prime Minister, but it does make parliamentary accountability more important, not less.
The real question, therefore, is not whether Burnham is entitled to inherit the office of Prime Minister. He plainly is. It is what happens when the programme pursued by the new Prime Minister begins to look substantially different from the one Parliament debated and approved only months earlier.
At what point does a change in programme become substantial enough that MPs should demand the new Government put its direction before Parliament, rather than simply begin implementing it while the House is in recess?
That question matters because Burnham is not merely waiting for Parliament to return before governing. Decisions are already being made. Money is being committed, existing policies are being reversed and new ones announced. Government must, of course, continue during recess. But there is a difference between keeping government functioning and beginning a substantial change of political and economic direction without giving Parliament an opportunity to examine it.
Burnham is certainly engaging. He has travelled, met political leaders and businesses, opened No10 North and is embarking on a national tour in what Downing Street calls “listening mode”. There is nothing wrong with a Prime Minister listening to the country. But there is something peculiar about spending six weeks listening to almost everyone except the elected MPs whose job it is to question him.
Meanwhile, speculation about the new Government’s programme continues almost daily. One day it concerns tax, another savings, property, social care or spending. Some policies were inherited from Starmer and Reeves. Some appear to represent the thinking of Burnham and his new administration. Others may simply be ideas being tested before the Budget and may never become policy at all.
Six weeks is a long time to leave households, businesses and markets guessing which is which.
That is where parliamentary scrutiny matters beyond Westminster. Parliament is not simply a stage upon which the Opposition gets to shout at the Prime Minister on a Wednesday afternoon. It forces government to turn political ambition into accountable policy. Ministers have to explain what they are actually proposing, how much it will cost, who will pay for it and whether yesterday’s newspaper headline bears any resemblance to tomorrow’s legislation. In doing so, Parliament provides something an economy desperately needs: information and, with it, a degree of certainty.
I have argued previously on these pages that trust is one of the most important, and most easily squandered, elements of economic policy. Governments tend to think confidence can be restored through the right fiscal announcement. It cannot. Businesses invest when they have reasonable confidence in the environment into which they are putting their money. Families make decisions about mortgages, pensions and savings according to what they believe will happen to their finances tomorrow, not simply what appears on a Treasury spreadsheet today.
Markets can absorb bad news. What they struggle to price is uncertainty. Households are not so different.
Take the Government’s inherited policy on Cash ISAs. The intention is to reduce the amount most under-65s can put into cash each year and encourage more money into investments. There is an economic argument for doing so. But it ignores a more interesting question: why are people choosing the relative security of cash in the first place?
If people are cautious because they are uncertain about taxation, employment, disposable income or the wider direction of the economy, changing the tax incentive does not make them more confident. It simply makes their caution more expensive. Confidence cannot be legislated into existence.
The same applies to businesses. If Burnham wants investment, businesses need to know the rules. If he wants households to invest, they need confidence in the economy into which he is asking them to put their money. Government by newspaper speculation achieves the opposite.
Burnham himself has spoken about Britain’s need for stability. He is right. Seven Prime Ministers in little more than a decade is hardly evidence of a settled political system. Which makes allowing uncertainty about the programme of the seventh to build while Parliament remains silent all the stranger.
Yes, Parliament is in recess. But Parliament can be recalled. It’s not due to come back for another three weeks. A new Prime Minister proposing a markedly different political and economic direction for the country is surely entitled to ask himself whether six weeks of government by speculation is preferable to allowing MPs to do their jobs.
Recall Parliament. Tell MPs which parts of Starmer’s programme remain and which are being abandoned. Explain what this new economic model actually means, what the ten-year plan will cost and how the Government intends to pay for it. Let Parliament challenge it, and let the country hear the answers.
Burnham spent years cultivating his reputation as the King in the North. He now has the crown, his own No10 North and a national tour on which to listen to the country. None of those things is inherently objectionable.
But Britain already has a national forum in which every part of the country is represented. It is called the House of Commons.
If Burnham has time to travel Britain explaining and developing his new programme, he has time to ask Parliament to return and answer questions about it. Waiting six weeks while substantive decisions are taken and speculation grows is not necessary. It is a choice.