Andy Burnham Distances Himself From Tony Blair's EU Advice
Labour's new leader wants Blair at arm's length as he works to shed New Labour's legacy ahead of his Liverpool party conference.
Andy Burnham, Labour's newly installed leader, is keeping Tony Blair at a deliberate distance — including away from this week's party conference in Liverpool — as he works to separate his political identity from the New Labour era that Blair defined, according to reporting in The Guardian.
The dynamic echoes a pattern that has shaped Labour leadership transitions for over a decade. Gordon Brown, Ed Miliband, Jeremy Corbyn, and Keir Starmer all sought, with varying degrees of success, to put space between themselves and the former prime minister. Burnham is now navigating the same delicate balance, even as Blair reportedly remains available for consultation behind the scenes.
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The relationship between the two stretches back further than recent months might suggest. Blair is said to recall with a certain wistfulness a clandestine 2010 meeting in which a then-cabinet-level Burnham — eager to position himself for a leadership run if Labour lost the upcoming general election — sought him out quietly, anxious that Gordon Brown not learn of the contact.
Much has shifted since that furtive encounter. Burnham's years outside Westminster — leading Greater Manchester as its first directly elected mayor — gave him the political space to recast his public image. In his own telling, the experience amounted to a personal reinvention, allowing him to shed the New Labour associations that weighed heavily on his earlier, unsuccessful leadership campaigns.
The question now is whether Burnham can chart a course that draws on whatever strategic counsel Blair might offer while maintaining the ideological distance his new coalition demands. Continue reading at Business | The Guardian.
