UK politics: Burnham says budget will be ‘challenging’ and denies he is just ‘tax and spend socialist’ – as it happened

Burnham rejects suggestion he’s just ‘traditional tax and spend socialist’, saying he will take ‘difficult decisons’

In his pooled TV clip, Andy Burnham firmly rejected suggestions that he is a traditional tax and spend socialist.

When Beth Rigby asked him to respond to Andy Haldane, the former Bank of England chief economist, who said in an interview last night that Burnham needed to persuade the financial markets he is not just “a traditional tax and spend socialist government with better TikTok videos” (see 10.58am), Burnham replied:

That doesn’t tell the story. We are not that.

Already I have taken difficult decisions in this job, in relation to re-prioritising government spending, putting digital ID on hold, for instance.

So it’s not the case that we aren’t going to take difficult decisions.

We will take difficult decisions to make sure the economy remains on track.

Key events

Afternoon summary

For a full list of all the stories covered on the blog today, do scroll through the list of key event headlines near the top of the blog.

Andy Burnham, left, and Nato secretary general Mark Rutte at RAL Space, the UK’s National Space Laboratory, at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Didcot. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA Pool/AP

Schools in England to get almost £500m extra in bid to avoid strike by teachers over pay

Schools in England are set to receive additional funding to cover the costs of the teachers’ pay award, the UK’s largest teaching union has claimed. The Press Assocation reports:

The leader of the National Education Union (NEU), which has been preparing a formal ballot of its members on strike action, said the move signalled “a welcome return to reality” and a “message of hope” for school staff.

In July, the government accepted the recommendations of the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) for teachers to receive a 3.5% pay rise from this month, but the Department for Education (DfE) said schools would be expected to fund some of the pay award out of their existing budgets.

But in a letter to the NEU on Wednesday, education secretary Lucy Powell said schools can use savings in employers’ contributions to the local government pension scheme to help cover the costs of pay rises for school staff.

The letter, seen by the Press Association, said the 4.9 percentage point reduction in what employers are expected to contribute will deliver “significant savings” on the pay bill for support staff.

Powell said: “We can confirm this reduction in costs will not be clawed back and as such, we are confident that schools will be able to cover the costs of the teacher pay award, at a national level.”

In the letter to the NEU, she added: “Given the material change to the affordability position, I would ask that the NEU revisits its proposed ballot of members planned for October and moves away from strike action.”

On Wednesday, the NEU claimed it had secured “a fully funded pay increase” for all teachers throughout England, and called it a “significant step”.

The NEU has been preparing a formal ballot for strike action, which was due to begin on 3 October and close on 15 December.

The union’s national executive will now meet on 24 September to discuss its response to the letter.

Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the NEU, said: “Finally, we have a government that accepts the reality that any teacher pay award must be fully funded.

“Plugging the £460m black hole in school budgets signals a welcome return to reality, and a message of hope for the entire school community.

“Be in no doubt that the significant ground conceded by government is a consequence of NEU members’ willingness to take a stand.”

Burnham says UK’s commitment to Nato ‘unwavering’ as he meets its secretary general, Mark Rutte

Andy Burnham assured Nato chief Mark Rutte that the UK’s commitment to the alliance remains despite the change in prime minister. As the Press Association reports, the Nato secretary general wished Mr Burnham “good luck” in the job as the two met face-to-face for the first time to discuss defence issues.

Burnham said:

There’s been a change of prime minister but never any change in the UK’s unwavering commitment to Nato and our Nato obligations … It’s critical for us always to show our firm commitment to Nato, and that’s what we will be doing today.

Rutte told him the UK was “one of the leading forces in Nato”.

The two met at RAL Space, a research facility in Didcot, Oxfordshire and Rutte praised the UK as a scientific and technological leader within the alliance.

Andy Burnham (right) meeting Nato secretary general Mark Rutte (L) at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Didcot. Photograph: Neil Hall/EPA

TUC votes to back pro-Palestinian BDS movement and for full arms embargo against Israel

Aletha Adu

Aletha Adu is a Guardian political correspondent.

The TUC has voted to endorse the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement in a direct challenge to Ed Miliband’s bid to severely condemn Israel’s occupation of the West Bank as unlawful in its entirety.

Last week Miliband, the foreign secretary announced sweeping sanctions on trade with Israeli settlements which marked a huge shift in the UK’s position becoming the first UK foreign secretary to describe what is happening in the West Bank as ethnic cleansing.

But he now faces pressure from unions representing five million workers who have voted to pressure governments to uphold their legal obligations following the ICJ rulings of 2024 … at a minimum by imposing a full arms embargo on Israel.

The motion proposed by the Artists’ Union also called for an escalation of “economic, academic, cultural and sports BDS campaigns”.

“BDS is an effective strategy to put pressure on Israel to end its ongoing genocide”, the motion added.

It marks a sharp rejection of Miliband’s actions, as he specifically condemned the BDS movement when announcing the sweeping sanctions as part of a passionate speech in the Commons last week. He said BDS targets the entire Israeli economy and not just occupied territories.

The motion from the Artists’ Union also called for “protection of artistic expression on Palestine”, and for artists, culture and education workers to not be forced to handle goods they believe breach international law if they don’t want to.

TUC delegates confirmed their support for workplace days of action for Palestine from 20 to 29 November.

There are a number of Labour MPs who do privately support the BDS movement, but still support Miliband for making an unprecedented move.

Commenting on the result, Peter Leary, deputy director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, said:

This historic vote, committing the TUC to support the Palestinian-led movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions, recognises that the limited steps announced by the government fall far short of meeting Britain’s legal obligations not to assist Israel’s ongoing genocide, apartheid, illegal occupation and other violations of international law. Trade unions and workers across Britain are right to call for continued political pressure and action in the workplace to end the complicity of companies, institutions and the government in Israel’s crimes against the Palestinian people.

In response to the call from Palestinian trade unions and the BDS movement, workers across Britain, alongside workers from around the world, will put this motion into practice on Thursday 26 November when they take part in the TUC-backed workplace day of action in solidarity with Palestine.

At least five Reform councillors joined Facebook group linked to far-right Patriot Platform

At least five Reform UK councillors have been members of a Facebook group linked to the far-right group involved in the blockades of Dover and Portsmouth by masked men, according to anti-fascist campaigners. Ben Quinn and Amelia Gentleman have the story.

DHSC announces local health partnerships as part of shifting focus from treatment to prevention

The Department of Health and Social Care has announced that it is going to pilot a new form of local, health partnership. They will focus on joined-up prevention.

The initiatives will involve NHS organisations, councils and community groups working together to tackle health inequalities. They will launched in: Bristol; Lewisham; north-east Lincolnshire; 19 boroughs of London; North Nottinghamshire; and York and Scarborough.

Explaining how they will operate, DHSC says:

The projects will help more people receive joined-up support earlier, avoid unnecessary hospital admissions and remain independent for longer.

The six sites will develop and test new neighbourhood health models that bring together NHS services, councils, community organisations and local people to improve outcomes and tackle inequalities.

They will pave the way for the future so more areas can benefit from the innovative partnership model. The funding will help sites develop and test new neighbourhood health models, creating the foundations for larger-scale investment and wider adoption across the NHS in future.

The government has partnered with Social Finance, Macmillan Cancer Support and West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust. This will bring together expertise in cancer care, system transformation, innovative finance and neighbourhood health. Integrated Care Boards and local government partners across England were invited to apply.

The projects will be backed £1.5m in funding from the Office for the Impact Economy, a government body that works with “impact investors” – people wanting to invest private capital for a social good.

The government argues that these models could provide a model for the future because current health funding models don’t incentivise health providers to spend money on preventative measures that will stop people going to hospital.

Diana Johnson, the health minister, said:

The programme is a key part of our 10-year health plan, helping us shift from treating sickness to preventing it in the first place, and giving people the help they need in the heart of their own communities.

Burnham should appoint a deputy PM, says former cabinet secretary Simon Case, as he calls for written constitution

Andy Burnham should formally appoint a deputy PM, the former cabinet secretary Simon Case has said.

Case said he thought the appointment was necessary because in a country like Britain there should be absolutely no doubt about who might take over in the event of the PM being incapacitated.

He made his comment in evidence to the Lords constitutional affairs committee where he also said he had gradually come round to the idea that Britain needs a written constitution – in part because of the risk of informal constitutional conventions being ignored by rogue actors.

Case said he first became convinced of the need for the government to have a deputy PM when Boris Johnson became so ill with Covid in 2020 that his life was at risk. At the time Dominic Raab was the de facto deputy, as first secretary of state.

Raab was made deputy PM in 2021 and since then every PM before Burnham appointed a deputy.

Burnham does not have a deputy. But Louise Haigh is first secretary of state, and second to Burnham in the cabinet order of precedence.

At the committee hearing, John Cryer put it to Case that everyone assumed that, in the event of something happening to Burnham, Haigh would take over.

Case replied:

My assumption is the same as yours. This title, first secretary of state … is conveying the sense that this person fulfills that deputy role. But, as you said, these are assumptions that we’re making

We’re a $4 trillion economy, a nuclear power, a P5 nation [one of the five permanent members of the UN security council]. You and I shouldn’t be sitting here having to make assumptions about who’s in charge if the prime minister is unavoidable. I mean, come on.

Case said that over time his views on the need for written constitution had changed. He said that he did not think important process decisions should be left up to “the whim of a prime minister of the day”.

As an example of how some constitutional rules are unclear, Case confirmed reports that, when Johnson was facing a leadership challenge, some of his team thought he could avoid being forced out by his own MPs by calling a snap election. Case said:

When Boris Johnson’s cabinet ministers were resigning left, right and centre and his government was falling apart, some – well, I’ll leave them unnamed – uninformed individual around Boris Johnson decided to float the idea of whether it would be time to call a general election as a way of avoiding him being sort of brought down by his own party.

Case said he had to see off the idea by digging out a copy of the so-called Lascelles principles – a letter to the Times, sent anonymously by the king’s private secretary in 1950, that explains when it is appropriate for the monarch to refuse a request from a PM to call an election. The letter has no legal status, but is now taken as part of the unwritten constitution.

Explaining how his views had changed, Case said:

As time has gone on, I’m one of those people who’ve been on a rather long journey on this, becoming more and more convinced that we should be heading towards a more codified and written constitution.

But Case also said he was a “pragmatist”, and did not think this would happen for “a very, very long time”.

(Ironically, Burnham himself is on the record as backing a written constitution – but it is not an idea that he has proposed since he became PM.)

At the committee, Lord Strathclyde, the chair, suggested to Case that a cabinet secretary could stop a PM acting inappropriately by resigning, or threatening to resign.

In his reply, Case said:

I’m not entirely sure that the resignation of a cabinet secretary would have that impact. Perhaps in years gone by that might be true.

But cabinet secretaries these days are becoming a little bit like prime ministers and London buses – they come and go.

Simon Case giving evidence to the Lords constitutional affairs committee today Photograph: House of Lords

Reform UK claim position of Senedd member who defected to Plaid ‘completely untenable’ because she has no mandate

The Reform UK member of the Senedd in Wales who defected to Plaid Cymru yesterday has been accused of betraying the wishes of her constituents.

At Westminster it is normal for MPs who defect from one party to another to resist calls for a byelection, partly by arguing that they were personally elected.

But in the Senedd elections in May, MSs (members of the Senedd) were for the first time elected by the closed proportional list system, with each constituency electing six members.

Sarah Cooper-Lesadd, the lead candidate for Reform UK, Pen-y-Bont Bro Morgannwg (Bridgend and Vale of Glamorgan) was elected as a direct result of people voting for Reform UK. But she will now sit as a Plaid Cymru MS and vote for Plaid policies.

Under this election system, Cooper-Lesadd cannot resign and trigger a byelection. If she were to resign, her seat would be taken by the next person on the Reform UK list in that constituency.

In a post on social media, Joe Martin, a Reform UK MS, said her position was “completely untenable”. He went on:

No one, literally no one, voted for her in May’s election. The votes that put her in Parliament were for Reform UK. Specifically, they were to scrap the nation of sanctuary, prevent the breakup of the UK, and to deliver Reform’s manifesto.

This means she has no mandate to represent those people any longer. The people of Pen-y-bont Bro Morgannog wanted a voice in Reform. Instead, they’ve been used as a springboard for the political ambitions of Sarah Cooper-Lesadd. That simply isn’t right.

If you believe in Plaid Cymru, stand for Plaid Cymru. Don’t deceive your way through a selection process to stand where you think is most opportune to realise your own ambitions. A party with any sense would drop her like a stone at the next election.

In a separate post, Matthew MacKinnon, Reform UK’s director of external affairs, said Cooper-Lesadd should resign.

She was elected on a list system under a Reform banner with a clear intention to pursue her own agenda and not @RUKWales

She was not elected as an independent.

She has shamefully manipulated the party and the electorate.

She should resign.

Today James Evans, one of the Reform UK MSs, said he will not stand for leader. There is a vacancy after Dan Thomas resigned yesterday after being arrested and bailed on suspicion of assault and controlling or coercive behaviour.

According to a Spectator piece by James Heale, who is writing a book about Reform UK, Helen Jenner, the current deputy leader, is a favourite to replace Thomas. Heale says:

Jenner is Kipper royalty: a long-marcher whose husband is a good friend of Nigel Farage. Likeable and modest, she was working as a school teacher just weeks before being selected for the Senedd.

Pip more prone to abuse compared to equivalent disability benefits abroad due to design flaws, report says

The government is under pressure to cut the amount of money spent on disability benefits, particularly the personal independence payment, a non-means tested benefit that helps people with the costs they incur as a result of their disability.

In a report out today, Re:State, a centrist/right-leaning thinktank focusing on public sector reform, says the amount being spent on Pip is too high. It says other, equivalent benefits in prosperous democracies have much tighter rules and, as a result, work more effectively.

In particular, it highlights the fact that, while Pip claimants have to provide evidence of their disability, they do not have to provide evidence of the extra costs they are incurring as a result. “The requirement for evidence of extra costs is common in international models, but entirely absent from Britain’s model,” it says.

The report concludes:

Britain stands alone on a number of fundamental decisions. Pip has been designed to maximise administrative simplicity at the cost of accuracy, transparency, and perception of fairness. No other country relies solely on a functional assessment to determine extra-cost entitlement, without requiring evidence of the costs the benefit is intended to help meet. This creates a system which is vulnerable to gaming, and poorly equipped to distinguish between different levels of genuine need.

Additionally, Pip’s broad definition of extra costs means that its daily living component overlaps substantially with services that other countries address through social care and local provision. Elsewhere, clearer boundaries allow different parts of the state to perform different functions and reduce the risk of paying twice for the same need.

In incapacity benefits, versus the comparison countries, Britain appears to have a low bar for access; a less rigorous application and assessment process; and much weaker work incentives. Some of the comparator countries also make much greater use of employer responsibilities, intended to prevent people requiring incapacity benefits in the first place. It appears highly likely these design choices contribute to a greater proportion of Britain’s working-age population claiming incapacity benefits and a much greater proportion claiming incapacity benefits without any conditionality, as well as Britain’s comparably high disability employment gap.

The lesson from international experience is therefore not simply that Britain spends too much or that other countries have better systems. It is that design choices have consequences. How need is defined, where responsibility sits, what evidence is required, and what incentives are created all affect caseloads, expenditure, employment, and public confidence.

John Swinney, Scotland’s first minister, welcoming the president of Ireland, Catherine Connolly to his official residence, Bute House, in Edinburgh today. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian

Pepper spray in young offender institutions used disproprotionately against black boys, prison charity says

Last year the Home Office announced that prison officers would be allowed to use Pava, a form of pepper spray, to incapacitate children at young offender institutions.

Today the Howard League for Penal Reform, which opposed the move, has released figures showing that Pava has been used disproportionately against black boys. In a news release, it says:

In April 2025, Shabana Mahmood, the then secretary of state for justice, gave the green light for Pava spray to be used in three prisons in England, holding boys as young as 15 – Feltham A, Werrington and Wetherby. The Howard League understands that deployment began in August for Werrington and Wetherby and in September for Feltham A.

Figures provided to the Howard League in response to a Freedom of Information Act request show that in the first few months of deployment, up to the end of March 2026, Pava spray was drawn and used against 33 children and young people in total – 19 in Feltham A and 14 in Werrington. In Wetherby, Pava spray was drawn on at least one occasion but not used.

Of the 33 children and young people who had Pava spray used against them, 18 were Black and six were white. Despite comprising only about 30% of the population in Feltham A and Werrington, Black children and young people were on the receiving end about 55% of the time.

Gemma Abbott, legal director at the Howard League, said:

Pava is a chemical irritant spray that can cause severe pain, and it is classified as a prohibited weapon under the Firearms Act 1968. It is shameful that prison staff have been given the power to use it against children.

Andy Burnham watching workers at the McLaren Technology Centre during his visit today. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

Burnham and Trump expected to meet for first time next week as PM steps up presence on world stage

Andy Burnham is expected to meet Donald Trump for the first time in person at the UN general assembly next week in New York, Aletha Adu reports.

Burnham says he will ‘look at issues raised’ in Piddington referendum, but insists small boat crossings ‘signficantly down’

Andy Burnham was also asked about the Piddington anti-migrant camp independence vote in his pooled TV interview. Adopting the same tone as Lisa Nandy earlier (see 10am), he said he would “look at the issues being raised by the community and in the referendum”. But he said the government had a plan to get the number of small boat arrivals down and that it was working.

He said:

I understand the strength of feeling, and that’s something that is across the country. But the only thing to do is to get the number of crossings down, and they are significantly down.

Here is Ben Quinn’s story about the Piddington vote.

Burnham declines to commit to impose cap on amount individuals can donate to political parties

Andy Burnham has refused to commit to imposing a cap on the amount individuals can donate to political parties.

He has also declined to say whether he thinks the laws currently being passed by parliament, which will restrict the amount Britons can gave give to parties if they have recently move to the UK after living abroad, will result in Reform UK having to give back the £72m it has had from Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne, the two cryptocurrency billionaires.

Asked specifically if these donations would become impermissible, and if he would now back a cap on individual donations, Burnham replied:

The details of those donations are a matter for Reform, and they will have to account for the detail of how those donations have been made and whether they are permissible within the law. The government set out plans in the representation of the people bill to cap overseas donations. And that bill is going through parliament as we speak.

So it’s really important that we uphold the highest standards of trust, confidence, cleanliness in British politics. And that is incumbent on all politicians and all political parties.

Burnham said he was in favour of a cap on donations before he became PM. But many Labour-supporting union leaders do not back the idea, because they fear this could limit their ability to donate to the party, and Burnham has more recently backed away from the idea.

Andy Burnham inside a McLaren W1 on a visit to that McLaren Technology Centre, with Nick Collins, chief executive officer of McLaren Group looking on. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

Burnham rejects suggestion he’s just ‘traditional tax and spend socialist’, saying he will take ‘difficult decisons’

In his pooled TV clip, Andy Burnham firmly rejected suggestions that he is a traditional tax and spend socialist.

That doesn’t tell the story. We are not that.

Already I have taken difficult decisions in this job, in relation to re-prioritising government spending, putting digital ID on hold, for instance.

So it’s not the case that we aren’t going to take difficult decisions.

We will take difficult decisions to make sure the economy remains on track.

Burnham says budget will be ‘challenging’

Andy Burnham has said the budget will be “challenging”.

In his pooled TV interview, asked if the budget would be “difficult”, Burnham replied:

It’s going to be challenging because the picture around the world is challenging and particularly the situation in the Middle East. And we will look carefully at all of those things.

We won’t take risks with people’s living standards or with the economy as a whole. So we will take it all into account.

It’s why we wanted to do an earlier budget. We didn’t want to leave a long period of speculation. I think that’s been shown now to be the right decision.

It will mean taking whatever action we can to help people while also making sure we apply the highest degree of prudence to the running of the economy.

Talking about the state of the economy generally, he said he thought it was resilient.

If you look at the the detailed picture underlying today’s inflation figures, it shows resilience across the board, actually, in the British economy.

Burnham said the inflationary pressures were “driven by the situation in the Middle East”, which was a problem for countries around the world.

Andy Burnham being interviewed this morning Photograph: Sky News

Burnham says his dad ‘would want me back out there’ as he returns to work after father’s death

Andy Burnham has said that his father would have wanted him back at work.

In a pooled TV clip with Beth Rigby from Sky News, the PM spoke about the messages he had received since his father died on Monday.

He told Rigby:

It is hard, and it will be hard for a little while. But better to get back to the job.

But I also want to thank the leaders of the other parties, all of whom sent a message. It shows there is decency in British politics still, and that’s that’s what we need to see.

So it’s a thank you from us all, the whole family. But my dad would want me to be back out there … bringing some of the changes that he always pushed me to make.

Andy Burnham looks at a car on the production line during a visit to the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking, Surrey, this morning. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

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