Letters to the Editor – week ending 26 July 2026

Read what people have been writing to our editor about this week. Find out how to share your own views here.

Burnham Issues: Your response to the new PM and cabinet

Andy Burnham has given me and my family hope after a long time of feeling ignored. We have all rejoined the Labour Party again, and look forward to attending meetings and being part of the Labour movement as we used to be before. I realise it won’t happen overnight but the fact Andy is so positive and inspiring really helps. 

I wish him and his team all the very best, I will offer support in any way I can. I believe we all need to stand united as a party and also show support to our new Prime Minister.  

Kind regards 

Carol Murphy

******

Andy Burnham is hope for the middle-aged.

When Andy Burnham danced to Faith by New Order at the Leadership announcement, the music hit me full on and brought back a wave of memories and probably did so for everyone else over 50. 

The choice of music was spot on – a Manchester band from his youth, just like we’ve come to expect. However if you dig a bit deeper the year of release was particularly poignant politically. 

The year was 1987 when many of us in the party were probably forming our political opinions – no doubt influenced a great deal by events of that year. The main one being the Conservatives led by Margaret Thatcher won a third term in the General Election that year. 

The thought of ever having a Labour government seemed so far away and the Labour values of decency, fairness and altruism that many of us grew up with were being replaced with a desire for less state control, more individualism and an ‘I’m alright Jack’ attitude. We were told by the Conservatives to literally get on our bikes and just get on with it. 

For me it all felt so cruel and in direct opposition to what I had been brought up to believe. 

In 1987 three tragedies also defined the failures of light touch regulation. The Herald of Free Enterprise ferry capsized soon after leaving Zeebrugge in Belgium; Michael Ryan killed 16 people and injured 15 in Hungerford, Berkshire before taking his own life; and a fire at King’s Cross Underground station killed 31 people and injured over 100, all because of another careless act of someone discarding a cigarette on a wooden escalator. 

So that’s why Andy Burnham is the  middle-aged person’s Prime Minister. We remember how bad it was in the 1980s, a generation who saw friends and family members destroyed by Thatcherism. 

It didn’t just tread heavily on hopes and dreams, it removed them entirely replacing them  with a pyramid scheme of faux aspiration.

Andy Burnham becoming prime minister gives the  middle-aged across the country hope that we too still have something to contribute. I know the nostalgic music and wallaby shoes may be irritating but it’s incredibly important because that music and nostalgia reminds us of a time that (as dreadful as it was) is a flash point that guided many people to reject Thatcherism and towards the Labour Party winning 10 years later. 

Most importantly the middle-aged demographic are caring for increasingly frail and dependent older parents. Andy Burnham talking about his own personal challenges caring for his father with dementia hits home. Reform of social care and creation of a National Care Service can’t come quick enough for the over 50s

So Andy Burnham dancing to a New Order song from 1987 matters. It filled our hearts with hope and joy and we’re a generation he needs to keep winning over over especially as we are more likely to vote in elections too 

Cllr Anna Lynch
Deputy Leader
Hackney Labour Group

*****

John Healey as Chancellor – a Blinder.

Yvette as Health – good one, she can be trusted.

Ed as Foreign Secretary –not sure. 

Mahmood – probably a clever move, although I don’t like her politics.

Lucy Powell as Education – why remove Bridget?

Wes as Defence –are we safe in his hands? This is a mighty important role.

Raynor – brilliant

Lisa Nandy – great

Miatta – Great

David Lammy –a great loss. 

Woman Chief Whip – great

Plenty of Women. Not enough Black faces.

Like that lots of really good people are back in their old jobs. Overall, very positive. 

Myra Farnworth 

Ideas for Andy

Hello Labourlist,

Instead of cancelling the 5% VAT from 1 October, which will cost the government (saving households ~£45 annually) he should have broken the artificial link between electricity and gas prices, which would not cost the government.

The benefit to households would be far greater, and be paid for by reducing the excess profits made by the suppliers.

In the past, a % windfall tax raised money for the government but didn’t benefit the electricity bills of householders.

David Murray

*****

One of the disturbing early signs of the Andy Burnham era is the downgrade regarding the climate and biodiversity crisis.

An early indication was the move towards drilling in the North Sea. 

Meanwhile, the new administration seems to be bowing to the demands of the arms lobby on military spending. Both moves smack of crass populism.

The real crisis is climate and biodiversity breakdown. The intense heat of recent summers. The threats to food security, with harvests likely to fail one in every three years if warming goes 1.5 degrees above pre industrialisation levels (every other year, if it goes above two).

The simple absorption of resources in dealing with the crisis – firefighting, flooding, health costs. It has been reported that the NHS has been under as much pressure due to heat this summer as in mid-winter. More than 2,000 people have died.

On a more positive note, economic prosperity lies in green growth. Investment in this sector will profit the country and make it more secure.

On an electoral note, dumping the climate and biodiversity agenda opens up a huge territory for the Greens and Liberal Democrats to exploit. Is this what Burnham wants? 

Surely, his 10 year plan, when it arrives, has to have climate and biodiversity criteria front and centre – anything else won’t be worth the paper it is written on.

Paul Donovan

*****

Dear Labour List,

As a lifelong supporter of Labour and wanting to wish the new labour lineup every success, I would like to offer two thoughts that might change the narrative we are so constrained by.

1. very simple but I am sure you all have thought about it – STOP eliding TAX with BURDEN as if they inevitably go together. If, instead, the narrative starts to become TAX CONTRIBUTION then people may feel they could benefit from any tax changes. You would, of course , have to challenge every political broadcasting commentator as they inevitably say TAX BURDEN when referring to taxation due to the power of ‘group think’.
2. re Housing — Homes should be for living in not an investment vehicle. One possible way of encouraging this is to adopt the French model for buying and selling property. 

Namely, the tax contribution is removed from the buyer, i.e. no stamp duty, thus making houses cheaper to buy. And the tax contribution is collected from the seller as capital gains the amount of which, AND HERE IS THE KICKER, decreases the longer you live in the property and becomes zero after 20 years. This not only gives a tax incentive for the property to remain in occupation it also keeps the property market a lot more stable and affordable.

Yours

Janie Grote

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