Shabana Mahmood, the NEC chair, Home secretary and front runner to be Andy Burnham’s chancellor has announced his coronation
‘It’s hardly a nail-biter folks. There was only one eligibly nominated candidate. One candidate received 379 nominations. One other candidate received one nomination and is not eligible’
In his acceptance speech the MP for Makerfield said that he will give people back ‘the Labour Party they once knew’All of them heard the call from the people of Makerfield for a return of the Labour they once knew.
‘We will be that Labour once again. We are united today and we put the power that comes from that unity at the service of people and places who have been waiting too long for politics to let them hope again. That’s what we’re doing.’
He said that assuming the Labour leadership is a “proud moment”- and insisted that he is ready for government.
“It is one for which I am ready. I am ready, ready to lead and to build on the foundation laid by one person more than any other.”
He paid tribute to Keir Starmer for taking Labour from its worst defeat to ‘one of our best victories in our history’
‘Today we thank Keir for his service to our party and our country’
Burnham said that’she wants to end the ‘insidious briefing culture’ and ‘move beyond’ factionalism
“ I will work relentlessly to build a culture of one Labour team. Change starts with us. We won’t beat Britain’s new right if we are consumed by infighting and pulling in different directions.”
He insisted he had not yet made any decisions about who he will appoint to his Cabinet adding that he would not “seek to suspend or punish” Labour MPs with views different from his own.
“I will be a leader for the North, the South, the East and the West, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland” he said adding
“Yes the North of England has given me so much. Everything in fact. In return I have sought to give it the strongest voice I could. Now I seek to do it everywhere.”
In what was probably the best part of his speech the new leader said that Britain took a series of wrong turns in the 1980s
“Political power was centralised and economic power was privatised”
“The country surrendered control of the essentials: housing, water, energy, transport, and left people exposed to higher costs”
“That in turn led to the concentration of more wealth and power in the hands of fewer people and fewer places”
“Large parts of Britain were deindustrialised without the power to set new ambitions for themselves”
“Proud British towns now a shadow of what they once were, and high streets in decline so common up and down the country”
“Over four decades political and economic power drained away out of our communities, in every region of the UK”
More follows….
