Good morning. It’s been a torrid summer of getting screamed at, dumped on and generally run ragged by those who wouldn’t even be there without you. But enough about my paternity leave: today’s newsletter is about Keir Starmer’s wobbling Labour leadership, and the man some of his own MPs want to replace him in No 10.
In some ways, Andy Burnham is not an obvious candidate to replace Starmer: he is a throwback to a past Labour era, a figure once viewed as an uber-Blairite, and he’s not even an MP. But in the last couple of weeks, without any explicit challenge, the Greater Manchester mayor has been strikingly prominent. The resignation of senior aide Paul Ovenden yesterday, over offensive messages he sent about Diane Abbott in 2017, will have done little to soothe those sceptical of Starmer’s intent to use the visit of Donald Trump to reset his premiership – and story after story has suggested that Burnham is working quietly, but doggedly, to capitalise.
