In the end, it was not even close. Andy Burnham has won the Makerfield by-election by a landslide, putting him firmly on course to be Britain’s next Prime Minister. The Mayor of Greater Manchester managed to comfortably beat even the most optimistic of polls by winning an impressive 24,937 votes (54.8 per cent), more than 20 points higher than Reform’s Robert Kenyon 15,696 (34.5 per cent). In a distant third came Restore Britain’s Rebecca Shepherd who took 3,111 votes (6.8 per cent), enough to keep her deposit. In an impassioned address, Burnham suggested tonight ‘could be the turning point’ for the country and the ‘final chance to change’ for the Labour party.
It was just six weeks ago, at the local elections, that Labour won just 24 per cent of the vote here in Makerfield. By dint of his stature and status as a PM-designate, Burnham has managed to completely turn that around, winning a majority of almost 10,000 on a 23-point swing. He did that by winning back those Labour voters who have switched to Nigel Farage’s party since the general election and convincing progressives who backed rival forces two years ago. There was strikingly little movement between the ‘left’ and ‘right’ voting blocs since 2024, suggesting that Burnham was able to win by uniting the left completely behind him and running a ‘Stop Reform’ campaign. ‘This is how we win nationally’, was one supporter’s remark shortly after Burnham claimed victory.
‘This is how we win nationally’, was one supporter’s remark shortly after Burnham claimed victory.
It was a pretty poor night for Reform for three reasons. The first is how little ground they gained on their 2024 performance, picking up a miserly three points in seat full of ‘our kind of people’. In a two-horse race, they barely got out the starting gates. The second is the Restore result. The margin of victory means that blame for the Reform defeat cannot be pinned solely on Rupert Lowe’s party, as some of Farage’s team would clearly have liked. Third, there is the result across the country in Aberdeen South, where Douglas Lumsden became the first Scottish Conservative to win a Westminster by-election in almost 50 years, taking the seat from the SNP on a 14-point swing. After all the confident Reform talk of the Tories being ‘dead’ on 7 May, this result will serve as a morale boost to Kemi Badenoch’s troops and strengthen her narrative of a comeback.
In winning by an absolute majority, Burnham has ensured that he will likely enter No. 10 in a matter of days and weeks rather than months. Already, there are reports from various allies that he is preparing to present Keir Starmer with a list of over 80 Labour MPs backing his leadership bid to convince him to resign without a contest. Louise Haigh, the ex-Transport Secretary and a key Burnham supporter, told the BBC this morning that Starmer should agree to an ‘orderly and managed transition’ of power in order to ‘do what’s best for the party’. Expect more such interventions over the next 48 hours as, ‘the herd’ – in Boris Johnson’s phrase – starts to ‘move.’
As Sir John Curtice pointed out this morning, Burnham’s margin of victory can be credited to ‘riding two horses’ at once, being both anti-Starmer and anti-Reform. After a campaign which has seen his favourability ratings drop 15 points in a month, Burnham will be aware that he too, in office, could be plagued by the same problems that has bedevilled the current Prime Minister. But, fearing for their seats, much of the Parliamentary Labour Party will now back any candidate who they believe can defeat Reform. In Andy Burnham, they have a man who has just done exactly that.
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