Burnham planning for No 10 for at least a year, key ally says

One of the pressing challenges confronting a prospective Burnham administration is the payments budget. A major review of Personal Independence Payments (PIP) in England and Wales, published on Thursday, concluded that the disability benefit is “not acceptable for purpose” and requires fundamental reform. Opposition parties, most notably the Conservatives, have argued that the fund should be trimmed to free up money for defence spending. Sir Keir Starmer sought to push through reforms that would cut £5bn a year from the budget, but a backbench revolt led by Haigh and others forced a U‑turn. Haigh told the BBC that the payments bill was “ballooning massively,” yet she warned that the cuts the Labour government had attempted would not sustainably lower the bill because they would merely shift costs elsewhere in the system. Among Burnham’s signature policies is the devolution of authority from Westminster to local bodies, and he has suggested that decision‑making could be moved away from the Treasury. “The Treasury is all‑powerful and does exert, I think, excessively overmuch power implicit different areas of nationalist policy,” Haigh said. She added: “I deliberation whilst Andy has a wide program for immoderate of that due to the fact that he thinks truly profoundly astir rewiring the state, I don't deliberation successful 2 and a fractional years we've got clip to interruption up the treasury due to the fact that it would conscionable resistance everything down and beryllium a immense distraction.” Haigh’s resignation in November 2024 marked the first departure from Sir Keir Starmer’s government and followed revelations that she had pleaded guilty to a fraud offence a decade earlier. She admitted informing police in 2013 that she had lost her work mobile phone in a mugging, only to later discover the phone had not been taken. Magistrates granted her a conditional discharge after the incident, which occurred before she entered Parliament. Haigh told Nick Robinson that she had disclosed her conviction to Sir Keir while Labour remained in opposition. She said the Prime Minister had initially been supportive when the story emerged in the Times, before his former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney requested her resignation. Asked whether Sir Keir’s stance in summer 2024 after assuming office was overly pessimistic, Haigh replied: “We were elected connected a mandate for change, and everyone was hopeful erstwhile we came in. There was excitement and ambition for a changed country, and the authorities instantly turned astur and said that wasn't possible. We've conscionable ne'er been capable to retrieve from that, nary substance however galore resets [Sir] Keir Starmer and the remainder of the authorities attempted, it could ne'er get itself retired of that.”