Make-or-break-erfield: what happens next?

The Makerfield by-election is shaping up to be one of the most consequential
votes in many years. Here’s what could happen next.

Makerfield is an odd parliamentary constituency. It has no real epicentre,
rather it covers the humdrum fringes of several towns in the North West,
including Wigan and the eponymous Ashton-in-Makerfield.

The constituency is tribal Labour Party territory having never returned any
other kind of MP. At the 2024 General Election, Labour took a 45.2% vote share
– not atypical over the course of the decade but down from historic numbers
where 60%+ was not unusual.

This by-election is of course anything but typical. MP Josh Simons stood aside
in the wake of the near-coup attempt on Prime Minister Keir Starmer to make
way for the ‘King in the North’ Andy Burnham to return to Parliament and
challenge for the Labour leadership – Wes Streeting having bottled his
opportunity.

Of course, we have had some precursory polling which shows Burnham in the
lead, but these polls are notoriously unstable given the small samples. If we
can use past examples as a precedent, there is a by-election consigned to the
annals of history where something similar took place.

The 1965 by-election in Leyton, East London, was engineered when Labour MP
and foreign secretary Patrick Gordon Walker unexpectedly lost his seat in the
1964 General Election.

If there is a lesson to draw from this episode, it is that the electorate did not
much like being treated like an on-ramp for a minister on the make.

Leyton duly elected a Tory, Ronald Buxton, on 42.9% of the vote to Walker’s
42.4%. It was a very narrow – but significant – repudiation of such behaviour.
I am not going to make a prediction on the result in this column, but the
ramifications of the outcome matter for two very distinct reasons:

1. Burnham wins
   Burnham winning the by-election will more or less clear the way for him to
   become PM. Starmer could quite likely fight a leadership battle, but my guess
   is he wouldn’t win.
   Burnham has had to make several screeching u-turns already on some of his
   more radical views, but many of the indications are that he would be a
   dramatically more left-leaning leader than the current incumbent.
   This could lead to either years of complaints about his lack of a mandate – or
   what is more likely – he could go to the country to look for one in a snap
   election.
   Disregarding the outcome of that for now, what this would do is junk much of
   what is on the legislative agenda and essentially create political paralysis for
   some time depending on how the chips fall. Remember, we have to have a
   leadership election before all this. 2027 at the earliest looks likely.
   It will also cause ongoing instability in the gilt market thanks to his past
   comments and attitudes toward public spending.
2. Reform upsets
   If Reform wins then the Burnham insurgency is dead on arrival. Starmer will
   stagger on as no other candidate in the party has the strength (currently) to
   make a challenge, although this might change, with Burnham in the political
   dustbin.
   The momentum this would hand Reform could also be of significance. It would
   tell the country that they now have the strength to beat Labour almost
   anywhere.
   An interesting bit of polling out this week suggests Reform is now as popular
   among trade union members as Labour. That would put Reform on course to
   win the next General Election – whenever that should then occur.
   Its popularity is broad-based in demographic terms. Although it doesn’t poll
   beyond 33% with anyone (its favourite demographic is the elderly), when you
   have around 30% of everybody – young, old, workers, non-workers, etc. – the
   First Past the Post system tends to reward you heavily. Labour’s entire 2024
   General Election success was built on that.
   It would likely be in Labour’s interest to hold tight and see what happens, in
   the hope that something better comes along.
   June 2026
   By contrast, elsewhere in June is a relatively quiet month for major ‘on diary’
   events. The latest ONS inflation figures are on 17 June, while labour market
   stats are on 18 June (the day of the by-election), as is the latest Bank of England base rate decision.