Andy Burnham Suggests Labour Will Lose Crunch By-Election After Snubbing Him As Candidate

Andy Burnham has suggested Labour will lose the crunch Gorton and Denton by-election after snubbing him as its candidate.

The Greater Manchester mayor also accused party bosses of leaking the decision to the media before telling him, claiming that “tells you everything you need to know about the way the Labour Party is being run these days”.

It comes as the backlash to the decision to block Burnham from trying to return to Westminster threatened to develop into a full-blown civil war in the party.

Keir Starmer himself was one of eight members of a sub-committee of Labour’s ruling National Executive Committee (NEC) to vote against giving Burnham permission to apply to stand in Gorton and Denton.

Only Lucy Powell, Labour’s deputy leader, voted in favour of letting him run.

Reacting to the decision on X, Burnham said: “I am disappointed by today’s NEC decision and concerned about its potential impact on the important elections ahead of us.

“To whoever is Labour’s candidate and to our members in Manchester and Tameside: you will have my full support and I will be there whenever you need me.

“Tomorrow I return with full focus to my role as Mayor of GM, defending everything we have built in our city-region over many years. I decided to put myself forward to prevent the divisive politics of Reform from damaging that. We are stronger together and let’s stay that way.”

But he added: “PS - The fact that the media was informed of the NEC decision before I was tells you everything you need to know about the way the Labour Party is being run these days. You would think that over 30 years of service would count for something but sadly not.”

A Labour source described Burnham’s claims as “categorically untrue”, insisting the party had tried to contact him by phone and then emailed him the result of the vote before announcing it.

Later on Sunday evening, Burnham went even further in an exchange on X with Tom Baldwin, the prime minister’s official biographer.

Baldwin said speculation that Burnham would mount a leadership challenge if he becomes an MP again “does no one any good”.

Burnham replied: “I’m not sure losing a by-election does us any good either, Tom.”

His comment suggests he thinks Labour will now lose to either Reform UK or the Greens when the by-election takes place, possibly as soon as February 26.

A Green Party source told HuffPost UK: “We’ve been on the doorsteps in Gorton and Denton and the Labour vote has collapsed. It’s between the Greens and Reform. This is game on.”

A senior Labour MP said the decision to block Burnham “makes a leadership challenge against Keir more likely, not less – and sooner than May.”