Andy Burnham has said he is “disappointed” after being blocked from standing as a candidate for the upcoming parliamentary by-election in Gorton and Denton by Labour’s ruling body. As a directly elected mayor, Burnham had to get approval from Labour’s national executive committee (NEC), after he applied to be a candidate on Saturday.
But Labour said the party had decided to deny him permission to stand to “avoid an unnecessary mayoral election, which would use substantial amounts of taxpayers’ money and resources”. Burnham, a former minister, is widely seen as a potential leadership challenger to Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer should he return to Westminster.
Writing on X, Burnham expressed concern about the ruling’s “impact on the important elections ahead of us”, and said he would return with “full focus” to his role as mayor.
“I decided to put myself forward to prevent the divisive politics of Reform from damaging that. We are stronger together and let’s stay that way,” Burnham said.
However, he criticised how the ruling was made known on Sunday, saying: “The fact that the media was informed of the NEC decision before I was tells you everything you need to know about the way the Labour Party is being run these days”.
The seat in Greater Manchester is vacant after former Labour minister Andrew Gwynne stood down on Friday as an MP on health grounds.
The move to block Burnham has infuriated Labour MPs and is likely to anger some ministers who said local party members should have had the option of choosing the Greater Manchester mayor as the candidate.
It is a big political gamble by allies of the prime minister and risks inflaming tensions within the party, which is consistently trailing Reform UK in national opinion polls.
One senior Labour source who had been supportive of Burnham’s candidacy said: “They’re gambling the PM’s whole premiership on winning a very hard by-election without their best candidate. It is madness.”
The decision was made by 10 members of the NEC, including Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, party chair Ellie Reeves and the prime minister himself on Sunday morning.
NEC sources told the BBC the vote was 8-1 in favour of blocking Burnham’s candidacy.
The prime minister was among those who voted to block him from standing.
Mahmood abstained as the chair, while Labour’s deputy leader Lucy Powell voted to allow him to stand.
