Shameless!

 Andy Burnham is already trying to stitch up Nigel Farage - he's got no shame at all.

Labour are changing the rules in one massive election, to try and lock out Reform from taking the crown, argues Aaron Newbury.

OPINION

By Aaron Newbury, Political Correspondent

13:59, Tue, Jul 14, 2026

Burnham has got himself new digs down South (Image: Getty)

Andy Burnham might think he is already walking the corridors of Downing Street, but until asked to take post by His Majesty, he is but a mere backbencher. But that, it would seem, has not stopped him rigging the game before he has even picked up the keys to Number 10. For in just a few weeks the £5million Greater Manchester mayoral by-election - triggered because Andy wanted a nicer digs in London - will take place.

Make no mistake, that costly ballot exists for one reason: because more than 400 Labour MPs agreed none of them were good enough to be the new Labour leader and Prime Minister. So they parachuted in Andy Burnham, the municipal messiah whose main goal it seems is to make as many references to Oasis whilst avoiding talking about what he might do to us all as PM. One of his first big political tests will be ensuring Labour wins the election to choose a new Greater Manchester mayor. But he'll face it safe in the knowledge that the rules for choosing his successor have just been changed. How very convenient!

For Labour this entire sordid process has been about their political survival, and this does little more than prove it.

Mr Burnham was of course, first blocked from returning to Parliament, in Gorton and Denton - for fears they could lose the Mayoralty!

But now, with Andy no longer at the helm, out goes first past the post, the simple system where the candidate with the most votes wins.

In comes the Supplementary Vote, where electors mark a second choice and the also-rans' votes are shovelled around until the right result pops out.

Why does it matter? Because under the old system, with the Left split three ways between Labour, the Greens and the rest, a strong Reform candidate could have romped home.

Now under the new system, losing lefties can gang up, pooling second preferences to lock Reform out.

Funny, is it not, that Mr Burnham, a man who has spent years itching to fiddle with how we vote, should see his side benefit so neatly?See More Comments

This is Labour to its rotten core. When they cannot win under the rules, they simply change the rules. It's the same logic as to why, when their polling plummeted, these cantankerous socialists wanted to let children have the vote.

Why bother beating your opponents when you can just rewrite the rules?

It is Reform that shall feel this dirty deal the most. Stretched and outmanoeuvred, the party has been forced to pull its troops out of Manchester and rush them to Clacton, where Nigel Farage fights a by-election of his own.

Sadly this is the measure of the man about to lead our country. Before a single day in office, his instinct is not to win the argument, but to rig the pitch.

Democracy means letting the people decide, and Mr Burnham's very first act tells you he would rather decide for them. DE.