Burnham’s actions since becoming PM scream ‘business as usual’

Right then. Let’s not mess about. Andy Burnham has been Prime Minister for two weeks and already the man who promised real change and a break with the past, has filled his top team with so many Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) veterans, pro-Israel donors, and establishment re-treads you’d be forgiven for thinking Starmer never actually left.

Burnham offers just more of the same

We were told it would be different. Burnham said he had heard the anger. He knew people were sick of being ignored and sick of lobbyists calling the shots; sick of foreign governments dictating our foreign policy while our own people go hungry. And then? He turns around and hires the exact same people who’ve been doing exactly that for the last decade.

Let’s run the numbers, because they tell a story even the BBC can’t spin. Almost 40% of Burnham’s cabinet are affiliated with LFI — the lobby group that works hand-in-glove with the Israeli embassy. It doesn’t expose its funders, and LFI’s former director went on to become a spokesperson for the Israeli government.

Not some of them. Not just a few bad apples. Two in every five. And that’s just the ones we can name. The real figure is almost certainly higher. And it’s not his cabinet. It’s the people he’s put in the most powerful jobs around him. The ones who actually write the policy. The ones who decide who gets listened to and who gets shown the door.

Take James Purnell, Burnham’s new chief of staff. The most important job in Downing Street outside of the prime minister himself. And who is Purnell? The former chair of LFI.

Purnell ran the lobby group between 2002 and 2004. A Blairite through and through, and it should go without saying, Purnell voted for the Iraq war. Now, he’s running Burnham’s operation.

The list goes on and on

Then there’s Bridget Phillipson. Burnham’s first big appointment as Labour Party chair was announced in the last few days. She’s been in the role for barely a week and it’s already been reported that she’s received two £40,000 donations from Stuart Roden, a financier whose Tel Aviv-based venture capital firm employs “an array of former Israeli soldiers, many of whom have served in elite intelligence units”.

Roden holds private meetings with the Israeli ambassador.

And it’s not just Phillipson — Lisa Nandy, another top Burnham appointee, also took £40,000 from him. And we’re supposed to believe that doesn’t matter?

But it somehow gets worse because it’s not just money, it’s the policy. Burnham spent months hinting he’d be different on Gaza and has apologised for Starmer’s slow response. But he then, of course, reappointed Ian Austin as UK trade envoy to Israel. Yes, that Ian Austin.

The man who quit Labour over Corbyn, was ennobled by Boris Johnson, has falsely smeared pro-Palestine campaigners as antisemites and Holocaust deniers. He was forced to apologise in court. This is the man who has openly defended Israel’s actions in Gaza even after the UN said it found a plausible risk of genocide and Burnham put him back in the job as if nothing happened.

Poor judgement and poor leadership.

Of course Burnham won’t say the ‘G’ word

Let that sink in. While millions of people in this country are horrified by what’s happening in Gaza — marching, protesting, donating, begging for our government to stop sending arms and start speaking up — Burnham’s response is to promote the lobbyists, reinstall the smeer-merchants, and pack the cabinet with LFI veterans.

It is insulting and frustrating in equal measures. Burnham had a clean slate. He could have done anything. He could have reached for people who’ve actually stood up for Palestine and who’ve actually fought for public services. Those who answer to us and not foreign lobbyists. Instead, Burnham gazed at the list of Starmer’s most loyal pro-Israel ministers, crossed out the ones the papers didn’t like, and put the rest in charge.

Wes Streeting — LFI.

Ed Milliband — LFI.

John Healey — LFI.

Yvette Cooper— LFI.

The list goes on. These aren’t accidental appointments. These are not the best people for the job. This is the establishment’s safety net.

They let Burnham have the job because they, and we knew, they were guaranteed; that when it came to things that actually matter to power, he’d pick the same team.

I’m not claiming any of these people are inherently evil. It’s that there’s no fresh start here. There’s no break with the past. There is no Burnham revolution.

There’s a man who rode public anger into power on the back of a promise to change things. Then, the very first thing he did was hand the keys to the same people who’ve been driving us off a cliff for 20 years.

Did you really expect change?

If your top team is stuffed full of people with deep, documented financial and political ties to a foreign government — and that government is still slaughtering innocent civilians by the thousands — you cannot claim to be putting Britain first. You cannot claim to be different.

We can see the appointments, can see the donors and the lobby groups. Actions speak louder than Northern accents and so far, every single action of Andy Burnham’s since walking into Downing Street screams one thing loud and clear: business as usual.

Burnham hasn’t sailed into a new era. He’s just taken the wheel of the same ship, and the passengers he’s supposed to be carrying aren’t you and me.

They’re the one’s paying for the voyage and we all know who they are.

Featured image via the Canary

By Rachael Swindon