Manchesterism

So that's where the muddle is.

I think if we're defining Manchesterism around the sort of Bern, should we call it Bernsteinism? I think Bernsteinism is easier to define than Burnhamism, put it that way.

So there are different visions of how to do things going on here.

So many isms flying around at the moment, aren't there? I was actually going to ask, do you think that Burnhamism is Manchesterism or is there an evolution? Is there a coherent philosophy that's being carried through or are we still, as you talked about on Newsnight recently, can those two or even three versions of Burnham comfortably coexist or are we moving into a new phase?

I don't know, because Henry talks about how really what economic growth is going to be about in the North is facilitating private investment, right? So we just need to make sure that the proper infrastructure goes in, proper schemes go in, so that private companies can make the investments they need to make.

Sure, but they're not going to do that if you think they're about to nationalize their business, right? They're not going to, you know, they're not going to do that because who would invest in that way? If during his time as mayor, Andy Burnham had said, I might be nationalizing all the housing in Manchester, then the people in the UAE wouldn't have invested hundreds of millions of pounds in all the Bavarian pension fund or the Canadian, whatever.

So, you know...

I don't think there is a Burnhamism.

I, I do increasingly think that this is kind of what Andy Burnham brought in, a sense that it doesn't have to be done like that just because that's how it's always been done.

We talked about this a couple of weeks ago, didn't we? That, that we're trying to just pin down what Burnhamism was, if there was such a thing.

And Stockport, oddly, being a wonderful example of how, yes, you can actually regenerate a town center, for example.

You don't have to sit with managed decline or accept the inevitability of, of downward momentum.

[laughs]

Um, and so you end up with people sort of being like, "Well, actually, of course, we need Burnhamism, but Burnhamism is this," right?

Yes.

And the interesting, another, the, the...

He liked spending the proceeds, I think it's fair to say.

Yeah.

And there's this amazing, there's this amazing, um, profile of him from the Manchester Mill, which is basically like, "I've spent, I've spent years looking for Burnhamism and never found it," which basically points out that his skill was basically standing next to Manchester's local government and, and emoting And so you can, you can just sense it if you've been traumatized by covering the Conservatives doing the exact same thing.

You can just see the shape of the problems that are gonna come up-

And you can't have a rigorous curriculum without interpretive dance.

And so you end up with people sort of being like, well, actually, of course we need Burnhamism, but Burnhamism is this.

And the interesting, he's vulnerable to this because I think that there has been a determined effort by people, by some elements of the sort of progressive commentariat to present Burnham as having a concrete agenda, which he simply doesn't possess, right? This Manchesterism idea, right? Because If you actually look at what's been done in Manchester, most of it preceded Andy Burnham.

And there's not all that much evidence that Burnham liked it, the stuff that actually worked, right? Like Richard Lease hand-waving developers so that they didn't have to do affordable housing requirements.

No evidence whatsoever that Andy Burnham actually liked that sort of policy agenda.

He liked spending the proceeds, I think it's fair to say.

Yeah, and there's this amazing profile of him from the Manchester Mill, which is basically like, I spent years looking for Burnhamism and never found it, which basically points out that his skill was basically standing next to Manchester's local government and emoting.

And so you can just sense it if you've... been traumatized by covering the conservatives doing the exact same thing.