Labour promised change – now it's tearing itself apart

Here is one U-turn that Keir Starmer will not be making.

- JOHN RENTOUL

Fifty Labour MPs have signed a round-robin letter asking the prime minister to reverse his decision to block Andy Burnham as the Labour candidate in the Gorton and Denton by-election. It is not happening. They can save their breath. It is not a huge saving, obviously, not to say to Clive Lewis, the MP who drafted the letter, “Yes, you can put my name down.” But there was a time when it would have been automatic for the vast majority of Labour MPs to refrain from adding their names to pointless protests against the leadership.

And this is a pointless protest. The prime minister’s decision to keep his most dangerous leadership rival out of parliament was not merely an act of ruthless self-defence. It was also squarely in the Labour Party’s interest.

To be blunt, once Andrew Gwynne stood down as an MP, the party faced a stark choice: lose the parliamentary by-election, or lose the mayoralty of Greater Manchester. Neither outcome was guaranteed, but each was likely enough to make the rational decision clear. Labour could keep Burnham in office as mayor and sacrifice the seat in the Commons.