The PM is right to say people want him to tackle the problem of living standards. The cost of living has risen too far too fast, with the Starmer government presiding over another lurch upwards in inflation from the 2% they inherited. Energy costs are too high thanks to the UK policy of ultra dear energy with very high carbon and energy taxes. Rents and mortgages are too dear for many, thanks to a shortage of supply of homes and very high levels of migration in recent years creating so much more demand. Mortgages were driven up by rate rises needed to curb the covid and war generated excess inflation, and then by a Labour government adding to UK public spending and borrowing.
The government’s cost of borrowing has been well above the one day worst Liz Truss spike in rates for the last year and a half. That is the cost of Labour overspending. The interest rate bill is now a major government headache, being far too high and rising too much with new borrowings and higher rates of interest. If Mr Burnham just wants to add more to the debt he will burden taxpayers with ever large interest rate bills which have to take priority over the public services we need when it comes to allocating the money.
Mr Burnham has three theories of how to tackle the cost of living crisis. The first is to continue the policy of sell out to the EU in the mistaken belief this will generate more growth. The second is to create more regional Mayors and give them all more powers to promote growth and prosperity. The third is to continue the high spend policies of more benefit payments for more people, and more subsidies and cheap or free services for those on lower incomes. These three will fail to deliver more and better paid jobs which have to be the key to greater prosperity for the many.
Sell out in Europe will mean larger financial payments by hard pressed UK taxpayers to the EU. In return we will get a worse and much dearer student support scheme, we will have to accept a wide range of EU laws that will often impede our companies, and we will sign up to yet dearer energy by joining their emissions trading and carbon tax scheme. To round off the damage we have given away £6bn of our fish over 12 years short changing our own fishing industry. We will have to impose tariffs on imports from non EU sources through the carbon border tax they want to set. Their legal impositions may well interfere with our innovative food, agriculture and digital industries. Since Brexit these industries have been freer to innovate and to grow with new ideas.
The belief in the power of Mayors is at loggerheads with the PM’s wish to ensure prosperity spreads to every postcode. Trusting local government means local and regional differentiation. Some may succeed, some will surely fail. If you believe in devolution you accept the right of Wales to lag England as it has thanks to poorer policy choices and higher taxes. The PM will have to deal with the feeling in local government that those places with City region Mayors are going to get a better deal than all the rest, and with the obvious differences there will be in the national treatment of Manchester compared to Essex.
Mr Burnham has never explained how City region Mayors can promote much faster growth as they do not determine interest rates, nor the main taxes and money and credit policies. These decisions have such a dominant effect on whether private sector companies can expand or not. He seems to think all growth comes from higher public spending and borrowing, and sees the Mayors as agents of change by putting in new facilities themselves or grant aiding those who do. This ignores all those crucial goods and services from fuel to heating and from clothes to the family car that are supplied by the private sector who have to pay the taxes to support the Mayors. A few cheaper bus fares from more subsidy is not going to crack the cost of living crisis.
I am all in favour of generous benefit payments to those who through sickness or old age cannot afford the things they need for a decent life. I am not in favour of the current benefits system which puts far too many people of working age onto benefits with no requirement for them to look for work in a new culture of sicknotes for life. Now am I in favour of more and more concessions and free passes to people on benefits for nice to have spending items to make it even more difficult for them to be better off in work. The essence of a good benefits and tax system is it looks after those who cannot fend for themselves but leaves good incentives to everyone else to get a job.
The new PM says he wants to make savings on the benefits bill by getting more people into work. Good idea but not a new one. That will require him to review how to make it more worthwhile to go to work and to review the conditions you need to meet to be on benefits. There are no short cuts or easy options to getting the benefits bill under control. Does he have the wish to understand the detail and the political toughness to push through what needs to be done to bring some reality to the out of control benefits bill?
His choice of ending rough sleeping as his first distinctive national policy shows the contradictions of his thinking. Finding accommodation for people and helping people to a better life than being on the streets are the responsibilities of local government. So is the PM going to take powers away from localities to roll out a national rough sleepers policy? Or is he going to find money for new specific grants for local government to do this better, and hope they will take up the money with the conditions? It is not clear how this will work. Meanwhile critics point out that after some welcome initial success in Manchester as a Mayor with a rough sleeper policy, in recent years the problem has again got worse.
Warm words of hope and communicating a sense that he does want people to be better off is fine. That will only work if these words are true. That will require an altogether more professional and thought through set of policies, backed up by proper control of borrowing and lower levels of taxation. So far there is no sign of either. We have government by PM soundbite and wish list. These now will collide with reality.
July 26, 2026
As a socialist Burnham believes state spending is good. Currently only around 25-30% of local government finance comes directly from central government. No doubt he intends to increase this substantially and also to favour councils of which he approves, ie. Labour controlled with socialist agenda, and no doubt also he will offer more for authorities willing to take more illegal migrants. Perhaps he will copy the EU in allocating illegals around the country on a pay per illegal migrant basis. And of course, since the regions are structured to mirror the EU’s regions of England, he can facilitate more EU regulation region by region, by-passing Westminster and all that Conservative and Reform opposition to EU rule. Basic divide and rule. Some of them, clearly, might become caliphates.
July 26, 2026
Burnham is a Fabian and believes in bigger government and open borders. Both of which will reduce growth. It is obvious he has no plan and intends winging it from day to day.
I think his first wake up call will come when there are no takers for government debt.
Every policy be it energy, transport, immigration or defence needs radical change to improve productivity and lower costs. Not something to be found in the Marxist playbook.
July 26, 2026
And in net zero and rip off energy and in road blocking. They say they want growth, growth, growth but deliver the reverse.
ALL SENSIBLE stuff from JR as usual but Burnham will not listen.
Not much coverage at all from the BBC on the terrorist attack in Germany (as usual for these types of events) but loads claiming suncreams are perfectly safe are they paid for this? It seems to me that suncreams enable people to stay uncovered in the sun far longer so many people do this – rather put a shirt on or sit in the shade. They also have many chemicals in them that can certainly, to a degree, react with the skin especially in strong sunlight.
They perhaps have their place on parts of the body like the face that have to be exposed but slapping them on just to spend more hours in the sun rather than put a shirt on?
July 26, 2026
There is a live reporting on the German attack on the BBC website since 22:54 yesterday night with more than 50 updates at 14:54 today.
July 27, 2026
Very little coverage on the usual news on BBC1 or radios four.
July 26, 2026
“As a socialist Burnham believes state spending is good” despite all the evidence of the real world. To have state spending you have to take money of people and businesses who would almost invariably have spent or invested it far better plus you have all the costs of collection, distribution and costs for the people being mugged.
Burnham today say no early election and he will stick to the manifesto – so I assume he will reverse the vast NI increase, start to smash the gangs and start to go for growth, growth, growth rather than suffocate, suffocate, suffocate?
July 26, 2026
I think we need to build bridges with Labour. The CEO of JP Morgan said Rachel Reeves was doing a great job when she was Chancellor. Not sure I’d go that far. But at least the CEO is trying to build bridges. If we just focus on how awful Labour are, then they will just baton up the hatches and go even more extreme.
I don’t think Burnham is actually a socialist. I think those days are gone. The reality is that Labour no longer have a raison d’être. But they don’t want to be like the Tories (otherwise why vote them). So they play around with being socialist. What they really want is to do well but without looking like the Tories. They’re rather like teenagers, that if you malign them, they will turn even more rebellious and unruly (i.e. socialist). But if you encourage them whilst challenging them, too, in a healthy way, then they will act more grown up (i.e. reducing taxation, reducing immigration and so on).
Reply I think you meant batten down the hatches.Burnham is socialist, wanting to increase public spending, nationalisation and state control.He will overtax leading to a further collapse in business and exodus of talented people.
July 26, 2026
So the EU, Mayors and benefits. Yes all huge expenses.
The first two have yet to balloon. They are problems to come. They could easily be avoided if Burnham had any common sense. Self inflicted wounds for the future.
Benefits will continue to be a problem as more scroungers enter the country illegally.
There is also the problem of the disappearance of jobs. Industry is in decline and there is nothing to promote growth in the private sector. A benefits culture is ingrained in sections of society that has to be tackled by cutting the benefits. There is no sign Burnham will do this.
July 26, 2026
I thought Burnham & Starmer visited a pub together. However, it seems it was just Starmer and his allies, many of whom would be purged later that night.
I am glad it was not The Pineapple or The Southampton Arms, both of which I like, but The Grafton. I assume Starmer’s people checked to see he would not be refused service – like in the pub in Bath.
It’s Grim Up North London, as they say.
July 26, 2026
Benefits are too easily qualified for and over generous. The burden is for too heavy on the hard-working people who provide the funds.
Paying benefits to people in work to subsidise their worked-for income is also crazy. If a job is not worth paying a commercial rate to hire someone it is not worth doing.
Burnham seems to want to distort simple economics and present it as a novel formula to create success. His intentions seem as twisted as a nine bob note and he’s only just started on a path to economic idiocy.
July 26, 2026
There is something bizarre going on at the heart Labour policy development. All of the things that have made the economy less dynamic they want to expand. Things like energy cost increases, unemployment, higher taxes, increased borrowing, increasing public sector employment numbers, under maintained public infrastructure etc. The solution offered to increase growth against that background is more houses to be built with 1.5 million the target in this parliament. That single tangible policy is going backwards with house completion lower than its previous lowest level back in the 2008 financial crisis. The new Labour PM riding in over the hill from Manchester has a fix for the absence of policy successes this past two years. His big idea is to place the growth objective into the hands of untested Mayors? His other reassuring ( in his mind) idea is to submit to the EU in every and all possible ways that have resulted in a growth rate less than half that of the USA over the past ten years and even lower than our own meagre growth over that same period.
It requires a special capacity to ignore the truth for a politician to champion the negatives, and suggest they will be positives going forward.
The only policy thus far announced is a commitment to increase defence manufacturing and reindustrialisation expenditure in general with defence acting as a catalyst. That is not without merit but the results of that policy will not be evidenced in this parliament.
As one political leader recently advised, Drill baby Drill, may be the only early fix to our lack of growth and the high energy costs driving the current negative economic conditions.
July 26, 2026
What can be said about Trump’s renewed hostilities against the Iran regime? There has been an immediate reaction to the price of ICE fuel here – up 15p a litre. Again.
The Americans have been bombing some targets for the second and even the third time. Despite this, the IRGC have been able to attack numerous US bases in the region, including in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Iraq, Bahrain and UAE. Sadly, yet again, American service people have lost their lives. Only we are not allowed to know how many, because it affect’s Trump’s ratings.
The problem is Trump’s mouth. He just cannot keep it shut when it comes to making threats against Iran. Never mind opsec, almost every military option is telegraphed in advance, which gives the IRGC time to move their assets, disguise them, put in place decoys etc
Last week it came to light that Iran has successfully managed to strike secret CIA bases in the region with precision missiles. The targeting information may have come from Trump’s chum, the war criminal Putin and his Russian intelligence services. Or, the Chinese. Reuters and other media have reported — and U.S. officials have acknowledged — that Russia has provided targeting and other support for Iran in it’s strikes on U.S. targets in the Gulf region
But it’s OK. Last week at the ASEAN conference Rubio had a meeting with his foul-mouthed counterpart, the obstreperous Russian Lavrov. Who took the opportunity to blame NATO for starting the war and who reiterated Russian maximalist demands for the capitulation of Ukraine. Lavrov complained that the Americans were not complying with an “agreement” that was reached with Trump at his Alaska summit with Putin last year
Maybe it’s time that one of Hegseth’s Pentagon leakers told us what was agreed.
July 26, 2026
How did your comment about an entirely different subject get accepted as a valid contribution to this piece about UK economic activity?
Just curious, because my contributions outside the core focus never get loaded for sound reasons of relevance no doubt. How come your disconnected rambling gets a free pass?
July 26, 2026
The Anchorage meeting allowed Trump to hear what the Russian side is actually saying in this conflict, rather than having it filtered through his aides and Russophobe media. That was a good start. In his press conference statement at that time, SG, Trump said that many things were agreed at the meeting, btw, though he indicated this didn’t include an agreement on how to end the Ukraine war. But you don’t get everything done at once.
My reading of the event is that the Russians saw it more as an opportunity to restart productive discussions with the Americans, especially about business arrangements. However, the powers-that-be in Washington do not want peaceful relations with Russia, so not much came of it.
July 26, 2026
Good morning.
The City Mayors is an EU thing designed to break up England into smaller manageable pieces. Through central funding they can be controlled much like the former States of the Soviet Union. Which reminds me to see how that all worked out.
The second aim of the City Mayors is to give jobs to the boys and girls. Rewards for political friends like Sadiq. 😉
The third aim is to put in another layer of non-accountability. Much like the EU is used. ie It was not us, it was them.
The only good thing, and one sees it in the former Warsaw Pact countries like Poland, is that their policies and ideology (Socialism) will go much like the Dodo. But it is going to be hard going, but in the end worth it just to get rid of these parasites.
July 26, 2026
Thames Valley local authorities were aiming for mayoral elections in May 2028, under a Mayoral Strategic Authority. The Starmer government turned them down, and they may have to settle for Foundational Strategic Authority (FSA) status instead, with no Mayor, but some kind of ‘Council of Leaders’ running the show, at least for for the time being. Even so, FSAs will mean the end of local government accountability. Earlier this year the government’s Minister for Devolution stated: ‘Foundation Strategic Authorities will have devolved powers over transport and infrastructure, skills and employment support, housing and strategic planning’ etc. So these matters will be decided by 13 ‘leaders’ (i.e. local politicians) sitting in a room somewhere (probably Reading), spending much of their time on bids for central government funding, and precious little time listening to what their local residents want. If that is devolution, I say No thank you.
July 26, 2026
@Clough – restore the Counties, restore democracy and there would be no need for central government stooges to be in-place to ensure the Politburo can look good.
July 26, 2026
I’m with you on this, Ian. But who’s with us: Badenoch, Farage, anyone in politics? Not a peep out of local politicians in the Thames Valley, whose decision-making powers are going to expire if this ‘devolution’ goes through.
July 26, 2026
@Clough – its a pipe dream, this Parliament and for the matter most this century have warped common sense, decency, dignity and democracy so far without a total clear out the future looks grim.
‘Simples’ who in the UK Parliament is believable, when at each election they say one thing to get elected then renege the day after. We now have Burnham wondering off in every direction, loading us all with taxes and things not needed for anything yet he has the support of the majority in Parliament, otherwise he wouldn’t be there. A house of disrepute?
July 26, 2026
Starmer, Burnham, Labour. Clueless Lefties. Nothing will change for the better until they are gone.
July 26, 2026
No sure they will be ‘gone’ given the Muslim vote and the benefits vote.
July 26, 2026
@Old Albion – sums up the dire state of this Socialist UK Parliament – get rid of the lot and get back to real democracy
July 26, 2026
Stop paying benefits to people living abroad. It’s a scandal and wide open to fraud.
July 26, 2026
“There are no short cuts or easy options to getting the benefits bill under control.”
I have a suggestion – scrap the benefits bill and move it to the charity sector. Split the saving between tax cuts and paying down the national debt. The tax cuts will enable people to contribute the shortfall to charity, which they can do more efficiently without government waste. If needs aren’t met the charities need to plead more.
At the moment we have state welfare as well as charity fund raising. As a taxpayer I’m scratching my head asking why I’m being asked to contribute for things I thought I paid for through my taxes. If the benefits system was scrapped I would have no doubt.
July 26, 2026
Actually the “charity sector” is another thing that needs a good looking at.
Many so-called charities are political campaigning organisations, yet they receive state funding.
July 26, 2026
Like GWPF, Policy Exchange or the Institute of Economic Affairs?
July 27, 2026
The GWPF does not get Government funding.
The Policy Exchange does not get Government funding.
The Institute for Economic Affairs does not get Government funding.
July 27, 2026
References please.
All three are charities and have among their objectives ‘to enhance community well-being through various programs’ in particular their educational programs.
All three have during the recent years rejected freedom of information requests to disclose their sources of funding and are among the least financially transparent of think tanks.
July 27, 2026
It was your original claim hefner
Come forth with YOUR proof your claim is correct
Your other paragraph is just completely irrelevant waffle to your claim.
July 27, 2026
Learn to read please: I just gave the name of some charities, and with a question mark. KB is the one who talk of ‘political campaigning organisations’ receiving ‘state funding’.
July 28, 2026
Keep digging hefner
Original comment of KB “they receive state funding…
hefner response ” like……and names 3 charities…
Who do not get state funding.
July 28, 2026
And another thing: They indirectly get state funding as everything that a taxpayer gives a registered charity can be (at least partly) deducted from this individual’s tax return. So whatever organisation with the charity status and receiving donations benefits from the state not receiving the tax it would have got in the absence of the charity status.
July 28, 2026
Hefner, you don’t even know when you have been totally snookered.
It’s pathetic really.
July 28, 2026
Completely ridiculous and totally irrelevant argument hefner.
Keep digging.
July 26, 2026
That’s why they receive state funding.
July 26, 2026
In my experience local politicians are even more incompetent than national politicians. Historically they also tend to be more corrupt. So devolving power and cash to them will not be effective. You only have to look at Wales and Scotland and Birmingham.
July 26, 2026
There are some very easy sources of revenue that the PM could use to fund the soundbites specials he wrote on the back of a fag packet as he was waiting for the train to take him to London and fame.
All spending priorities should be reviewed of course, but most high spending departments that look after things like HS2, nationalisation and the NHS need a revolution in how they are managed while getting less funds. Ineptitude reigns in so many state managed institutions. We pay far too much for quangos that don’t do a proper job – reduce their income by half and insist they work more effectively.
Put a limit on what quango and state employees can walk away with each month. Salaries over £100,000 are an insult to the working man.
Net-0, so easily accused of gluttony where national finances are concerned could so easily pay for Burnham’s soundbites, and a lot more, by stripping out a few percent of it’s income. Delaying implementation would only help the country!
July 26, 2026
“The military has been called in to fight a raging wildfire in the Cairngorms National Park in Scotland, the First Minister has said.”
Then the same people wanting to help bail them out of a predicament, for not maintaining sufficient emergencies want to ensure our military gets persecuted through the courts for doing as trained and ordered to stroke their own personal ego.
July 26, 2026
What is never mentioned by those wishing the extra costly layer of administration, is who does the selecting of the candidates – is it the people they wish to represent or the ‘Gang Bosses’ that want their puppets as controlling stooges?
Another costly fudge
July 26, 2026
The City of London has had a Mayor since 1215, always selected and elected by those involved in the City. We now have the 697th.
Since Parliament forced another Mayor selected by ‘Gang Bosses’ on top and running concurrently with the original, what and how has the UK’s Capitol City improved?
The original Mayor is paid by the City, the new one scrounges from the public purse costs everyone one and anyone a fortune for nothing in return
July 26, 2026
The Lord Mayor is nothing like the modern Mayors and The City of London is a tiny and exceptional place.
July 27, 2026
@Lynn Atkinson – the point, what has this additional Mayor ever done for London?
July 28, 2026
He is not the Additional Mayor, he is the original Lord Mayor, only of the City of London – the Square mile.
I suspect more than we will ever know by providing meeting places and occasions for those at home and abroad conducting business in The City.
July 26, 2026
What’s the point of History? It teaches nothing other than keep repeating the same mistakes and you keep getting the same results.
July 26, 2026
Bonhoeffer’s Theory.
We are living through another reenactment of it..
We did not need to do this if we had an understanding of historical events and the brilliant analysis and wisdom of past generations.
July 26, 2026
We already have local councils. We don’t need mayors or any other form of additional government. If Burnham wants to give councils more power then do that. I don’t want some other overpaid bureaucrat on the taxpayers payroll alongside all the non-jobs it will require.
How can anyone look at the current financial predicament of the UK and think we need
more government. Burnham is delusional, and has been ‘promoted’ beyond his capabilities.
July 26, 2026
Father Christmas with no presents, so must now play Robin Hood with Mafia tactics.
July 26, 2026
news that GCHQ took out the lease on what is now “Number 10 North” building before Burnham was even an MP comes as a surprise.
were our security services actively involved in the plot to install Burnham as PM ?
this and the amount of propaganda coming out of various government nudge units does not look good.
July 26, 2026
I used to be a proud Lancastrian but now am embarrassed by Burnham and especially by his entourage of ” Labour’s Northern Queens” who paint themselves as poorer than my family (who were effectively ravaged by WW2, just like millions of families) but rich in many other ways they wouldn’t ever have a clue about.
We got out of that by working anything for work experience and holiday jobs. These “get out of Gaol” opportunities for young aspirants has been cut off by Rachel Reeves and Angela Rayner and encouraged benefits instead.
“Benefits” don’t benefit the country, only Labour’s voting system, rewarding failure.
July 26, 2026
The mathematics suggest that the benefits experiment will soon be over.
July 26, 2026
240 illegals crossed the channel yesterday …….a group of known killers believed amongst those crossing https://www.gbnews.com/news/migrant-crisis-boat-killers-britain-french-beach-stabbing …and still no one cares
July 27, 2026
GC – Another Rest Day though the day after, on 26/7 – Zero. It has been rather windy though. To add to your figures, lest anyone prefers to forget or not care: ( Official figures )
Jul 01 to Jul 26 inclusive – 1466 arrivals in 21 boats.
January 01 to July 26 inclusive: 13351 arrivals in 203 boats.
Further, I understand that no data set exists that links illegal Channel arrivals with numbers of illegal Channel arrivals’ deportations. No doubt complex but would be interesting.
July 26, 2026
One important reason why the fish sell-out is vitally important, is because of the nutritional advantages of fish and seafood, sold in vast quantities in the 1950s and earl 1960s. No nation can flourish healthily on pizza and hormone-filled meat takeaways, which seem to be the staple diet these days.
I would gladly rip up the TCA and start again.
July 26, 2026
Be careful what you wish for,:
Farmed fish it is reported/alleged has very little nutritional value due to the food they are fed with, and the huge number of parasites which they are infested with and treated for with chemicals.
The dye used that gives them the right sort of flesh colour for the shops which sell it, is not so good either.
Check the labels very carefully.
July 26, 2026
The Lord Mayor of the City of London preserves the rights and privileges of The City.It’s police force(tiny
tho’ it be) is headed by a Commissioner and quite separate from The Met.King Charles has to wait at the
Temple Bar to be given entry.
Peter it’s grim up N.NLondon then move to the North of England.£476billion in gva .15.6 million population
and 8.1 million in jobs.
July 26, 2026
For every £10 ‘given’ to the north of England £9 was taken from them.
Of course the £9 was taken from entrepreneurs and the £10 is given to the blob.
Politicians have destroyed the North which at its best was the richest area in the whole world (the whole world included London and the South East).
July 26, 2026
Sidney,
There are some beautiful places in the North that I love to visit. However, I am retired and not the sort of person who moves home.
‘It’s Grim Up North London’ is a comic strip, just in case you were unaware.
July 26, 2026
The cost-of-living solution is simple. Raise tax thresholds instead of freezing them, and reduce personal and business tax. It ain’t rocket science!
July 27, 2026
For ‘cost-of-living’ (the kindergarten description) read ‘inflation’ over which the political class have total control.
If inflation is out of control it’s because they want it to be in order to impoverish the population.