New Labour leader Andy Burnham will put up taxes despite having “no mandate at all”, Nigel Farage warned today as he called for the incoming Prime Minister to call a General Election. The Mail has the story.
The Reform leader attacked what he said was a “vacuous” speech by “chameleon” Burnham as he was elected unopposed to replace Sir Keir Starmer.
Farage hit out at the Right-wing CPAC UK conference organised by Liz Truss after Burnham vowed to undo many of the economic reforms spearheaded by Margaret Thatcher’s government in the 1980s.
“On Monday, we’ll have a new Prime Minister, our seventh Prime Minister in 10 years – and we used to laugh at the Italians. He comes in with absolutely no mandate of any kind at all,” Farage said.
It comes as a new poll puts Labour under Burnham level with Reform, after a torrid month of revelations about Farage’s finances, including a £5 million payment from a Thailand-based billionaire.
They are both on 24% with Savanta, ahead of the Tories on 21%.
The new Labour leader, who is due to enter No. 10 on Monday, also set his sights on “eradicating” Reform UK, vowing to take on the “new Right” at the head of a united Left-wing party.
After spending the past year seeking to undermine and replace Sir Keir Starmer, Burnham used his victory speech to attack “factional politics” within Labour.
It comes as his party chose a new leader who it hopes can beat Nigel Farage and Reform, who have led in the polls for more than a year but are now embroiled in a financial scandal.
The new Labour leader said: “I will work relentlessly to build a culture of one Labour team, because change starts with us.
“We won’t beat Britain’s new right if we are consumed by infighting and pulling in different directions. That is, and always has been, an indulgence that falls heaviest on the people who need Labour most.
“Fighting to eradicate it, and the insidious briefing culture that goes along with it, will characterise my leadership.”
In what may be seen as a dig at his predecessor Sir Keir, he added that the party will not “try to out-Reform Reform”.
Worth reading in full.
Discussion
Comments
This week across the site:
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to the Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Dear Will, I heard Liz Truss talking about introducing CPAC to the UK. Grateful for your comments on the topic.
Embroiled in “financial scandal” is media hyperbole. Is evading £200,000 tax not a financial scandal and is the perpetrator really being considered suitable for Chancellor? So now we also have two-tier scandals dependent on hostility rather than ascertained facts.
Need more time for Restore to get organised.
Not going to happen.
It’s back to 70s Britain and real Labour not trying to pretend to be sort of Thatcherite.
We shall see a re-run of all the things that failed then – high taxes, particularly the rich, nationalised industries, bloated public sector, ever more welfare splurging £billions on “projects”, more State intervention in the economy, more borrowing and money printing – because this time in the hands of St Andrew of Burnham Patron Saint of Economic Illiterates, it will be done “properly”.
Socialism has always failed because it has not been done “properly” but when someone comes along who knows how to do it “properly” then Utopia will be created.
Other than nationalised industries we’re already seeing all these things.
I don’t know how industries/companies can be re-nationalised unless they’re in severe financial difficulty and can only be saved with a government bail out, as happened with NatWest. Given the ridiculous level of debt successive governments have racked up there’s no way they could afford to try and become the majority shareholder of a company that’s doing well. Buying huge numbers of shares would simply push the price up.
Why was it a good idea to nationalise NatWest.
It wasn’t NatWest it was the Royal Bank of Scotland whose financial collapse would have been embarrassing for Scottish PM Broon. The government made a complete mess of returning the company to the private sector when the US government were excellent at disposing Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae for a profit not loss.
It was Natwest that was nationalised, they own RBS, as well as Coutts who de-banked Farage. This means that Farage was de-banked by a government owned bank and surprise surprise they did nothing about it.
Banks might be the exception to the rule that nationalising failing companies is a bad idea because if they collapsed millions of people would loose their savings.
When the left say they are out to increase taxes on “the rich” it always means the middle class pays. The rich can legally get round higher taxes not least by leaving the country.
Higher tax rates won’t yield more money so the borrowing will rise and all working people will be charged.
The fact that Burnham wants to “eradicate” Reform UK proves how much of a loony lefty he is. The only reason he wants to eradicate them and not the Greens, Tories etc is because he thinks they’re a bunch of dangerous far right extremists.
He doesn’t really think that at all.
The old parties are behaving just the way old monopoly or oligopoly businesses behave towards a newcomer. They use all sorts of improper means to suppress them rather than improve their products.
There will soon be a rust belt of old political parties. In the future grandchildren will be astonished to learn their forebears actually voted for these hulks.
He wants to eradicate them because they are dangerous competition…