'He's a down-to-earth guy who speaks for the people'

SUPPORT ON STREETS FOR BURNHAM'S POSSIBLE LEADERSHIP BID

- By LILLIAN RACE

Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham

JACK Haughton doesn’t look like a man about to change his lifelong political habits. Since the 1980s, he has always marked his ballot for the Conservatives.

Yet on a bright Thursday afternoon in Chadderton, he says one man would change that.

“If Andy Burnham ran, I'd vote Labour.

“He's a normal, down-to-earth guy who speaks for the people of Greater Manchester. He's the right man for the job.”

Jack’s comments come amid growing speculation that the Greater Manchester mayor could be preparing a return to Westminster, having left Parliament in 2017 two years after his second defeat for the Labour leadership.

In a number of media interviews last week, Burnham claimed Labour MPs have urged him to challenge Sir Keir Starmer and accused No 10 of creating “alienation and demoralisation” within the party.

The former Shadow Home Secretary has openly set out a radical plan for Britain that includes public control of housing, energy, water and rail and to “get back to speaking to working-class ambition”.

“Politics BAU - business as usual - Westminster politics, ain't gonna do it,” Burnham told the New Statesman.

Burnham insists he isn’t plotting to unseat Keir Starmer, but hasn’t ruled out a future leadership bid.

With Labour bruised by the recent resignation of Angela Rayner and the sacking of Peter Mandelson and its popularity in the polls struggling against Reform UK, it feels apt that the question of how real Burnham's ambition is has resurfaced.

To test that, we went to Chadderton in Oldham to ask whether locals see him as someone they could trust to lead.