Burnham insists he can deliver change despite ‘challenging’ circumstances

On the eve of his first Labour conference as Prime Minister, Andy Burnham has maintained he can deliver genuine change for Britain despite severe economic headwinds facing the country.

Conceding that he and Chancellor John Healey confront a "challenging" environment at the Budget, Mr Burnham stated it was "crucial" to secure public finances to put his agenda on firm footing.

Escalating borrowing costs from the Iran War and global turmoil continue to limit Mr Burnham’s financial flexibility prior to the October 28 fiscal event.

Speaking to the Guardian before the gathering, the Prime Minister insisted he could make difficult choices to safeguard public finances while delivering radical change.

He told the newspaper: "The public would have more respect for us if we go and grab something difficult … and say, ‘right, we’re going to do something here’, rather than constantly playing the political game before fixing the problems.

"It’s challenging, definitely, but there are still things that you can do. Always in politics, there are things that you can do. The question is sometimes: Are you prepared to do them? Yeah, I am prepared to do them."

Asked about the required buffer for spending plans, the fiscal headroom, Mr Burnham said: "I do think it is crucial to have stability and to show that there’s a willingness to face up to the reality of some of these difficult things.

"But actually from that stability, the permission can come to make bigger change that, in the end, could put the country in a stronger position in relation to the public finances."

Mr Burnham also discussed with the Guardian the death of his father Roy last week.

"I’m in this job for what I can do for people, not for what it can do for me … to make the changes that my dad, for instance, long pushed me to make," he said.

Arriving at the gathering, the Prime Minister pledged to set Britain on a new trajectory, describing the decade since the Brexit referendum as one of "drift and division".

Mr Burnham declared: "We’re going to make this a really important week where we set out a new direction for the country.

"We’ve had a decade since Brexit and it’s been a decade of too much drift, too much division, and we need to draw a line on that."

He said his direction would leave "people able to have hope again that things will improve, that life will get better – and it will".

Dressed in a jacket, T-shirt and black jeans alongside his wife Marie-France van Heel, Mr Burnham called attending his first Labour conference as leader a proud moment.

Meanwhile, Labour’s party chairwoman insisted she was not complacent regarding electoral success, despite the party regaining public favour in recent opinion polls.

Bridget Phillipson suggested Mr Burnham’s "real sense of connection" with voters likely explained the latest polls, which showed Labour as the largest party in a snap election, though short of a majority.

Reform UK and the Conservatives would be neck-and-neck in seats, MRP polling by YouGov indicated, leaving neither capable of forming a government on its own.

The Prime Minister rejected calling an early election despite the improved trajectory, as he completed a marathon series of broadcast interviews before the conference.

Speaking to the Press Association on Saturday, Ms Phillipson acknowledged Labour faced "a massive fight on our hands with Reform, with the Tories".

She urged caution over recent polling, "because the only poll that will matter is the one that happens on election day in 2029".

She added: "We’ve got a big fight on our hands come the next election, and I don’t underestimate that challenge for one second, but there’s a real sense of purpose and energy as conference gets under way."

Ahead of the Liverpool meeting, several Labour figures noted Mr Burnham’s leadership has revitalised party prospects following Sir Keir Starmer’s tenure in No 10.

Education Secretary Lucy Powell told the Guardian that Sir Keir's Government had "lost sight of some of the politics and the purpose".

Speaking to the BBC on Saturday, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said: "I think the reason, frankly, that we had a change of leadership at the start of this year is because we all felt that people need to feel the change in their lives that we promised in 2024 much more quickly."

Ms Phillipson declined to comment directly when asked whether Sir Keir’s two-year tenure as leader represented a wasted opportunity for Labour.

Instead, she told PA that she remained "forever grateful to Keir for taking us to one of the best election results in our history", while noting: "But there is more to do, and we know that the public are impatient for change, want to see it, and they want to feel it.

"That’s why Andy Burnham this week will be setting out how we step up that change, how we demonstrate that people can feel better off, can see that sense of change within their communities."