Andy Burnham’s purge of the Starmerites may store up problems for the future
Andy Burnham’s ruthless cabinet reset may strengthen his authority now, but it risks creating a disciplined Starmerite opposition inside Labour later.
🔍 WHY THIS STORY MATTERS
Andy Burnham’s first cabinet choices reveal how quickly Labour’s internal balance of power has shifted, and how today’s sidelined Starmerites could become tomorrow’s organised resistance.
KEY TAKEAWAYS...
● Andy Burnham’s early premiership has been marked by a sweeping removal of Starmer-era ministers.
● The reshuffle is a Machiavelli’s lesson on power, enemies, and political control.
● Promoting figures such as John Healey and Wes Streeting may divide rivals while keeping them occupied.
● Excluded Starmerites could become a future source of leaks, scrutiny and factional challenge.
I f he were alive today, Machiavelli would have enjoyed watching the first days of Andy Burnham’s premiership.
An enemy of the Medicis, the Florentine diplomat (full name Niccolo di Bernardo dei Machiavelli) was a student of power. He would have appreciated the clarity, focus and – yes – the brutality of Burnham’s move against loyalists of former prime minister Keir Starmer.
This was not a purge comparable to Harold Macmillan’s “night of the long knives” in the 1950s. Back then, Macmillan sacked one third of his entire cabinet. But it does compare to Boris Johnson’s 2020 reshuffle when Sajid Javid was forced to resign as chancellor and other ministers were sacked as political power consolidated around Johnson’s chief adviser Dominic Cummings.
Apart from Starmer himself, ministers sacked or not reappointed in Burnham’s takeover include chancellor Rachel Reeves, deputy prime minister and justice secretary David Lammy, housing secretary Steve Reed, business secretary Peter Kyle, health secretary James Murray, and Cabinet Office minister Darren Jones.
Others, such as prisons minister James Timpson and science/innovation minister Patrick Vallance, jumped before they were pushed.
Many of these changes were expected and not all the ex-ministers were successful in office. Moreover, it is not unreasonable for an incoming prime minister, particularly one who so audaciously unseated a predecessor, to want to reward their supporters. Politics is, to use the cliche, a tough business and to the victors go the prizes of ministerial office.
Nevertheless, such an approach also has its risks. Jones pointing out that Burnham’s proposal to cut VAT from household electricity bills from October is “unfunded” is a timely reminder that there is now a group of disaffected and often still ambitious backbench MPs. Each has an intimate knowledge of how Whitehall works and a bulging address book of journalists from the lobby and beyond.
Creating enemies – lessons from Machiavelli
Despite Burnham’s protestations about how much he hates factionalism in the Labour party, this week saw raw factionalism in action. From now on, one is either for Burnham or against him.
And when the Burnham government’s honeymoon period ends and political capital is ebbing away, the potential for these excluded malcontents to seek revenge is obvious. So how does Burnham deal with this – and what lessons can be learned from Machiavelli’s treatise The Prince when assessing Burnham’s options?
The key takeaway is Machiavelli’s observation that power inevitably creates enemies. The wise ruler must manage, anticipate, and – if particularly deft at the political dark arts – cultivate these enemies for the purpose of overcoming them and being seen to do so.
This is because defeating an enemy publicly demonstrates strength, which enhances legitimacy and deters future challengers. So far, Burnham seems to have done this quite effectively. But so did his predecessor Starmer when he sidelined the Corbynites and eventually pushed Jeremy Corbyn out of the Labour party in 2024.
Some potential enemies are harder to manage, however. Machiavelli tells us that the wise ruler prevents rivals from uniting against them by keeping ambitious nobles competing with one another. This prevents one group from dominating.
He or she then uses reward, restraint and rotation of influence as disruptors. In other words, you lever ambition and rivalry to divide the opposition. Burnham’s decision to make John Healey chancellor of the exchequer, rather than Ed Miliband or Shabana Mahmood, is a classic Machiavellian move.
The conventional wisdom was that Miliband and Mahmood were rivals for the chancellorship. While Mahmood will be happy enough to retain her Home Office portfolio, Miliband’s failure to become chancellor (a job he apparently coveted) can be regarded as a modest but important clipping of the wings.
Similarly, the appointment of Wes Streeting as defence secretary is a shrewd appointment that places another potential rival in a demanding role that will keep him busy for now.
In the end, however, even the wise ruler run outs of political capital and luck. Burnham is the sixth prime minister since David Cameron resigned following the Brexit referendum of 2016. In his Downing Street speech following his visit to the king, Burnham expressed a desire to break the cycle of instability and push on with a ten-year national plan.
Starmer had a similar plan for “national renewal”, which is now in the dustbin of history. It would be unwise to bet against something similar happening to Burnham eventually. Which leads to another lesson from The Prince.
Machiavelli observes that all political acts – even those that are “good deeds” – create enemies in the end. After all, even beneficiaries resent feeling indebted. It may not be one of Burnham’s vanquished political enemies but rather one of the winners of this week’s political powerplay who eventually wields the knife.
🔮 WHAT MATTERS NEXT...
🎯 WHAT TO WATCH NEXT:
● Whether excluded Starmer-era ministers begin coordinating scrutiny from the backbenches.
● Whether Burnham’s first policy measures give former ministers credible grounds to challenge his fiscal judgement.
● Whether Healey, Streeting, Miliband and Mahmood remain contained by office or emerge as alternative power centres.
● Whether media briefings from former insiders start shaping the narrative around Burnham’s competence.
● Whether Labour MPs accept the reshuffle as renewal or begin to see it as factional revenge.
🎯 MOST LIKELY OUTCOME:
● Andy Burnham’s cabinet reset is likely to strengthen his grip in the short term, while creating a pool of experienced and resentful Labour figures who could matter when the honeymoon ends.
🎯 WHAT COULD CHANGE THE PICTURE:
● Early policy success, especially on living costs and public services, could blunt Starmerite resentment by making internal opposition look self-interested.
🎯 WHY THIS MATTERS:
● The way Andy Burnham manages Labour’s losers may determine whether his premiership stabilises the party or merely begins a new factional cycle.
GOING FURTHER
Why unelected power brings us a strange comfort | Europeans TODAY
The politics of feeling: why did ‘boring’ prime minister Keir Starmer provoke such visceral reactions? | Europeans TODAY
If you ask voters for a fixed term, shouldn’t you be prepared to serve it? | Europeans TODAY
Andy Burnham replaces Keir Starmer as UK prime minister | Associated Press
Starmer allies see ‘hint of retribution’ in Burnham reshuffle | The Guardian
Was Keir Starmer’s leaving party the boozy birth of a new Labour force? | The Guardian
Healey made chancellor, Miliband named foreign secretary and Yvette Cooper becomes health secretary as Burnham picks cabinet | The Guardian
Burnham surprises Labour MPs by choosing Healey as new chancellor | Financial Times
Sources:
▪ This piece was originally published in The Conversation and re-published in Europeans TODAY on 25 July 2026. | The author writes in a personal capacity.
▪ Cover: Flickr/Number 10. (Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.)
