The significance of Labour’s leadership crisis for Wales

Martin Shipton

Less than four months ago, Andy Burnham was blocked by Labour’s National Executive Committee from putting his name forward to be the party’s candidate in the Gorton and Denton by-election.

The reasons given at the time were that he was doing a good job as the Mayor of Greater Manchester and that a by-election to elect a new Mayor would be expensive. There was also a concern that Reform UK would win the Mayoralty.

The real reason, of course, was the fear felt by Keir Starmer and his advisers that Burnham could, if back at Westminster, mount a successful party leadership challenge.

On Friday Burnham was given the green light by the same NEC to apply for the by-election candidacy in Makerfield. The decision was well-trailed in advance of the NEC meeting, and the previous objections weren’t even mentioned.

It was another instance where principled politics and the Labour Party have parted company under Starmer.

Another example, closer to home, became apparent following reports of the first conversation between Starmer and Rhun ap Iorwerth after the Plaid Cymru leader was installed as First Minister.

Starmer, it seems, told ap Iorwerth that he was “open” to talks about the devolution of further powers to Wales. Assuming Starmer is being sincere – a dubious assumption, admittedly – where does that leave the “muscular unionism” that Welsh Secretary Jo Stevens has been displaying ever since she got the job nearly two years ago, presumably on the assumption that such was the stance expected of her?

Why has Starmer softened his position towards Burnham and potentially changed his tune on the question of more devolution?

As I have already suggested, I think we can immediately rule out any thought that these changes derive from any evaluation based on principle. That means there are other, less honourable factors in play.

Vicious

Political leaders display their most vicious tendencies when they believe they have been betrayed by their own close colleagues and friends. When Wes Streeting dropped into 10 Downing Street to tell Starmer he should resign as PM and make way for him, he was shown the door very quickly: he was inside for just 16 minutes, according to reporters who spend their working lives hanging around outside the PM’s official home on the off-chance they’ll be rewarded with an exclusive.

It could be that Starmer knows that his time is up, and wants an influence over the succession by giving Burnham the chance to derail Streeting’s hopes, which is very likely to happen if Burnham wins in the Makerfield by-election, called for his convenience.

So far as Starmer’s potential U-turn over Senedd powers is concerned, it could reflect genuine concern over the haemorrhaging of Labour votes to Plaid Cymru. Polling figures can be worrying in themselves, but there’s no way to mitigate the damage caused by actual crosses on ballot papers. Ask the Labour MSs who lost their seats on May 7.

If he didn’t believe it before, Starmer is now aware that many normally Labour voters were prepared to back Plaid Cymru, a party that has railed at Westminster against Labour’s adoption of the Tories’ muscular unionism.

Starmer has devoted much attention – arguably too much – to the phenomenon of voters in former Labour strongholds switching to Reform UK.

Analyses of voting trends suggest that the number of direct switches from Labour to Reform is relatively low. At the Senedd election, however, Labour haemorrhaged so many votes to the left that Plaid Cymru ended up with more votes than Labour had ever achieved in a devolved Welsh election.

Three months before, the Green Party had won the Gorton and Denton by-election, proving that if Labour tried to present itself as a tough-on-migration, watered-down version of Reform UK, it was vulnerable from the left.

Conciliatory

So it could be that in appearing to offer an olive branch to Rhun ap Iorwerth, Starmer was wanting to seem more conciliatory than he used to before the crushing electoral losses sustained by his party.

Equally, he had been warned in the run-up to the election by Labour Senedd Members that the anti-devolution approach adopted by Jo Stevens and her associates wasn’t going down well among grassroots members and was likely to lose the party votes – as proved to be the case.

While the narrative that became accepted suggested that Labour to Plaid switches were motivated by a desire to defeat Reform, the fact is that such tactical voting would not have been required had voters not been abandoning Labour for other reasons.

Prominent among such reasons was that Labour was no longer seen as standing up for Wales, leaving such territory free for Plaid Cymru. In such circumstances, it is prudent of Starmer not to show Rhun ap Iorwerth the door in the same way he did to Wes Streeting.

None of this necessarily means that the Labour UK Government is going to change its mind and translate its openness to discussing further devolution into concrete proposals.

Starmer is in a precarious position and his conciliatory words may have been uttered to placate Plaid in the short term, when he is fighting for political survival.

Nevertheless, Plaid’s victory in the Senedd election has changed the dial. What comes next depends on the result of the Makerfield by-election.

Formidable

Andy Burnham will certainly be a formidable Labour candidate. He is generally perceived to have been a good Mayor of Greater Manchester, building tens of thousands of affordable homes while simultaneously protecting the Green Belt as well as improving public transport, building segregated walkways and cycleways and working towards a carbon neutral Greater Manchester by 2038 (enough to give a Reform candidate apoplexy).

The experience he has gained as Mayor and his genuine affability make him well-placed to defeat whichever racist rabble-rouser Farage chooses to field against him. Nothing can be taken for granted, however.

If Burnham wins the by-election, there’s little doubt that within a short space of time he will be Prime Minister.

As someone who has enjoyed significant power as Greater Manchester’s Mayor, his view on progressing devolution may be closer to Rhun ap Iorwerth’s than that of Keir Starmer.