Ten years ago today, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union.
The helter-skelter in Westminster, where the Houses of Parliament are located, has been unceasing ever since. Just yesterday, Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced he will resign. His successor – likely Andy Burnham – will be the seventh PM in the last decade. For context: there were only five different leaders in the 37 years prior to the Brexit vote, dating back to the start of Margaret Thatcher’s premiership.
Brexit has directly contributed to the upheaval. Theresa May’s tenure was blighted by it, as she was unable to force through a vote that would formally take the UK out of the trade bloc before she exited office in 2019. Ever since the UK left in 2020, the economy has been stagnant. What’s more, net migration has increased over the last few years as the UK struggles to put a cap on non-EU movement – Brexiteers had argued that it would have the opposite effect.
As such, Burnham – assuming he enters office – may reverse some aspects of the UK’s exit from the EU.
“It’ll be interesting, in particular, whether he signals a willingness to rejoin the single market or the customs union, which will only be for after 2029,” said Mujtaba Rahman, Eurasia Group’s managing director for Europe. Rahman believes that Burnham could “go further” than Starmer in terms of building links to the Union.
But Brexit is not the sole culprit of the UK’s problems. The country has faced several crises since the vote: the COVID-19 pandemic, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – which sent energy prices soaring – and US President Donald Trump’s return to office, which has generated new uncertainty for Europe’s economic outlook and its defense.
So if Burnham succeeds Starmer, can he do any better? GZERO sat down with Rahman, an expert on UK politics, to get some insights on how the former Manchester mayor can learn from the outgoing PM’s mistakes. This interview is edited for length and clarity.
GZERO: Why did Starmer only last two years?
Rahman: Starmer’s inheritance was an incredibly challenging one. Everybody knew that the economic picture was a real challenge. Public services are on their knees, with no fiscal space. That general picture was compounded by a couple of things. First, the government didn’t really have a plan. Second, they made lots of mistakes. To the extent the government then delivered a plan, Starmer was way too cautious in light of the majority that he was sitting on. If you put that in the context of the picture he inherited, that explains the reason why it’s all fallen apart so quickly.
GZERO: Is Burnham going to be the next Prime Minister?
MR: I’d say so, 99.9%. There’s a possibility there’s a leadership contest. Labour MP Darren Jones is being pushed by many to run as a potential contestant in the race to force Burnham to articulate a plan for government and have his ideas subject to greater scrutiny. So, there may still be a contest. I don’t think that’s where this is going, but it’s possible. Even if there is a contest, I suspect Burnham will win. It will just mean he's in power in September, not mid-July.
GZERO: Which policies do you think Burnham will try to implement?
MR: The key areas of difference from Starmer will be a much greater focus on giving back power to the local level, given Burnham’s belief that local government is best equipped and most accountable at addressing the challenges that the country's regions are confronting. Also, electoral reform. I think they will do things on the domestic agenda, potentially be even more ambitious than investors and general commentators expect, potentially on the welfare bill. I think they’ll do more on social care, more on social housing, and he may even do more on infrastructure, for example, reinvigorating the high-speed rail network that Rishi Sunak killed when he was prime minister.
Where I think he will struggle is on fiscal policy. Where is he going to generate the cash to spend on some of these priorities, given the straitjackets of the fiscal rules and the Labour manifesto? The best Burnham can probably hope for is a virtuous circle in which he convinces investors of the UK’s growth prospects on the basis of a more compelling buy-side reform agenda. If there is a belief that growth will be stronger under a Burnham premiership, which may improve the outlook for public finances, it may create more fiscal space against these rules. That in turn enables him to spend more on some of these other political priorities he’s talking about.
GZERO: What can Burnham do to survive longer than two years?
MR: He’s got to have a narrative and political direction, and an ability to communicate with his party and with voters, so that he can take both of those constituencies, as well as investors, with him on this journey. That was obviously something Starmer was spectacularly unequipped to do. What is the goal of the government? What is its defining mission? Boris Johnson didn’t deliver much, but we knew what he stood for: leveling up and getting Brexit done. We knew what Tony Blair stood for: third-way politics. We don’t know what “Starmerism” really was, so Burnham’s challenge is going to be defining and articulating his goals to the country, and making sure all the key and relevant constituencies stay with him on this journey.
He will be better at that than Starmer because he is a better retail politician. I think he is better at engaging and communicating with the electorate in a way most politicians aren’t. You saw that reflected in the Makerfield result, where he won with a very large margin against Reform UK.
