Andy Burnham and Wes Streeting have criticised Sir Tony Blair, accusing the former prime minister of misunderstanding modern politics in his recent attack on the Labour government. In a 5,700-word essay published on Wednesday, Blair urged Labour to embrace the “radical centre” and warned the party was “playing with fire” over the UK’s future, lacking a “coherent plan”.
Burnham, who is standing in the Makerfield by-election, suggested Blair was out of touch and partly responsible for the rise of politicians like Nigel Farage. He noted that Blair “doesn't mention inequality once” in his essay. “If you don’t get how that’s driving politics now… then you are not understanding what’s going on,” Burnham told the Observer. “People don’t think the centre has delivered for them… therefore, they’ve gone further to the extremes.”
Burnham, a junior minister under Blair, added that “the last 40 years has given us wide inequality – that's what's responsible for the abandonment of the centre.” When asked if he considered himself left wing, he said: “If you want to call it left wing that's fine by me. It's knowing where you need to take a more left solution and where you want to be pro-business. Blairism sometimes saw the market as always the answer.”
Wes Streeting, another potential Labour leadership challenger, echoed Burnham’s views in an article for The Guardian. He argued that the “striking weakness at the heart of Sir Tony Blair’s intervention” is the lack of mention of inequality. “Inequality – the economic, social and democratic fracture running through modern Britain – is treated as peripheral rather than fundamental,” Streeting wrote. “But inequality… is actually their cause.”
In his essay, Blair called on Labour to occupy the “radical centre” and urged Sir Keir Starmer to rip up net zero targets and reduce the welfare budget. He also criticised Burnham for claiming Britain has been “on the wrong path for 40 years”, a period that includes Blair’s own decade in power. Blair said: “I hope Andy wins Makerfield… but you know, when he does this thing about 40 years…”
