Far from the gilded corridors of Westminster, an unremarkable community center – low, utilitarian, with a parking lot whose holes fill with water every time it rains – has become the center of power in British politics.
Here, in a space more used to hosting bingo nights, dance classes, sports gatherings and weddings, Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham's campaign team is planning his return to parliament. If successful, he would likely challenge British Prime Minister Keir Starmer for the leadership of the ruling center-left Labour Party, and therefore the job of prime minister, CNN reports.
Burnham is widely considered the most popular politician in the country, but he cannot challenge Starmer’s waning authority unless he is an MP. And without Burnham’s presence, no serious race for the Labour leadership can truly develop, despite seven ministers leaving Starmer’s government after the party’s heavy defeat in local elections in May, which do not affect national power but are an important indicator of public sentiment.
Burnham has been considering running for a seat near Manchester for months. In February, the party’s governing body blocked him from running in another by-election. But as Starmer’s political capital continued to dwindle, he was left powerless when Burnham’s ally Josh Symons resigned as MP for Makerfield last month. Burnham was quickly elected as the Labour Party’s candidate, making Thursday’s by-election perhaps the most significant in British history.
The electorate of around 76.000 people now holds the fate of the British prime minister and the direction of the Labour Party in their hands, as many loyal members of the party believe that only a new leader can save its deteriorating electoral prospects, while its traditional voter base is being dissipated – attracted by the populist left-wing Green Party or the populist far-right Reform UK party, often in once-safe Labour strongholds like Makerfield.
Underneath all this is an existential question for the Labour Party: if Burnham, often called the “King of the North”, fails to defeat Reform candidate Robert Kenyon in Makerfield, there is little hope for other party candidates in similar constituencies.
Both Burnham and Kenyon declined to speak to CNN, stating that they are focused on speaking directly with voters, not the media.
The stakes have turned this otherwise neglected area into the de facto centre of the British political universe. Activists and MPs have flocked from all over the country to help with the door-to-door campaign, while senior government ministers have travelled “up north” from London to lend their support to the campaign, implicitly endorsing Bernama, who has effectively promised to sack Starmer, their current boss.
Journalists in suits gather in a local café, phone their London offices and relay the latest political gossip, exchanging information about how many MPs support Burnham's ambitions to take over the party leadership or his plans to officially launch a leadership campaign if, as is widely expected, he wins this election.
Outside a row of shops in the centre of Ashton-in-Makerfield, anti-Reform activists and Labour Party supporters stop weary passersby to discuss politics.
But outside Ashton, which has attracted national media attention thanks to its rail links to London and large numbers of commuters, life in the other small towns that make up the constituency is largely as it was before. Only complaints from residents about the amount of promotional material arriving in their mailboxes every day and the occasional poster sticking out of hedges or living room windows (“Vote for Andy,” “Makerfield Needs Reform,” or “Let’s Rebuild Britain”) indicate the significance of the election being held here.
"King of the North"
By-elections are usually important for their ability to serve as a political barometer, offering an imperfect glimpse into voters' preferences between general elections. They are not usually the means by which prime ministers are chosen. But these are extraordinary times in British politics.
Since coming to power in a landslide victory for the Labour Party almost two years ago, Starmer has fallen into a spiral of increasing unpopularity that now finally seems to have no escape. Despite governing with a huge majority, he has failed to clearly define the nature of the “change” he promised to bring, retreated from several key policies and left himself with little scope for increasing government spending.
The Labour Party's popularity has consequently declined, reminiscent of the fate of the centre-right Conservative Party. The two parties have dominated British politics for more than a century, and their waning control could further strain an electoral system accustomed to balancing two or three parties, rather than the five that now command a significant share of the vote. Nigel Farage's Reform Party, currently leading in most national polls, is Burnham's main challenger in Makerfield.
For now, his position outside Westminster has largely shielded him from association with this government.
A warm-hearted and naturally skilled communicator, Burnham has maintained his popularity even as his party has gone through a crisis, and he has managed to build a political narrative that the Labor Party lacks, even though the national policies he has advocated during this campaign are largely aligned with the current government's positions.
Burnham's identity is strongly tied to his upbringing in the northwest of England – he is a passionate supporter of Everton football club from Liverpool, and his musical taste is distinctly Manchester.
It helped him portray himself as an outsider, despite having been MP for the neighbouring constituency of Lee for 16 years, serving under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown in Westminster. Under Brown, he eventually became health secretary before running unsuccessfully for Labour Party leadership twice, in 2010 and 2015.
In 2017, he left parliament to become mayor of Manchester, where he practically built a new political identity.
“There’s a joke going around about Burnham that he’s a bit of a chameleon,” says Lottie Hargrave, a political science researcher at the University of Manchester.
His main message in this campaign is that “Westminster is not working” for many communities. Instead, he points to the fact that Manchester has become the fastest growing economy in the country during his term and proposes that “Manchesterism” be applied nationwide.
This set of ideas involves “fixing the foundations of the economy, ensuring that essential services are affordable by returning them to public control... devolving power from Whitehall and Westminster to cities and towns across the country... and a culture that is pro-entrepreneurship,” explains Matthew Lawrence, founder of the think tank Common Wealth, who is considered one of the intellectual creators of Manchesterism.
"Typical post-industrial constituency"
Makerfield, despite being the most important place in British politics at the moment, does not actually exist. It does not appear on maps, except as an addition to the town names Ashton-in-Makerfield and Inns-in-Makerfield, and the locals almost never use the name. It is simply the name of a constituency that includes several smaller towns, each with its own character, south of Wigan and roughly halfway between Manchester and Liverpool.
Although formally part of Greater Manchester, the character of the area is more reminiscent of Liverpool than Manchester, says Peter Gray, a retired union representative who volunteers at a community shop in Breen.
“Liverpool is a warm city,” he says. “If you sit on a park bench, someone will sit next to you.”
This area has voted Labour for over a century. Under the old rules by which British politics operated for much of the 20th and early 21st centuries, workers, especially union members, tended to vote Labour, while landowners tended to support the Conservatives.
These small towns once depended on coal mines, steel mills and manufacturing, says local historian Peter Fleetwood. One resident, 66-year-old Shirley Clark, says she began her working life in textile factories, "going from one job to another."
But like most other towns in the north of England, the area's economy has been completely transformed over the past 50 years. Large industries have disappeared, and today the most common jobs are in construction, retail, education and healthcare. Local residents often say that there are not many opportunities for young people.
“Demographically, this is a typical post-industrial constituency,” says Hargrave. “The population is older than the British average. Almost all white people are born in Britain, there are relatively few people with higher education, the rate of home ownership is high and, crucially for Reform, the area supported Brexit.”
The politics of the area are also changing. In last month's local elections, which were disastrous for the Labour Party nationwide, Reform UK won 24 of the 25 seats up for vote in the Wigan area.
That result was “seismic,” Fleetwood says.
"It came like an explosion."
There is a sense of fatigue here, an almost total disillusionment with traditional politics and a deep doubt that any politician in Westminster can bring about real change. Some residents remain skeptical of Bernam's ambitions, an easy line of attack for Reform, which claims he will not prioritise this constituency.
One resident, eighteen-year-old Alex Moyo, who works as a home care caregiver, says he probably won't vote because he doesn't understand politics.
"From what I've seen, I probably wouldn't vote for Reform... they're saying what people want to hear, not what's needed," he told CNN.
Another undecided voter, David Young, says that “Labour is a mockery” and has forgotten its roots as a working-class party, while “the backbone of Reform is actually the Conservatives, and they have done Britain harm by taking us out of the European Union.”
Others are attracted to Reform's simple message that reducing immigration is the cure for Britain's problems.
"We stopped the German army from crossing the English Channel, but we can't stop a rubber dinghy," said Grant Fryer, 64, who trains service dogs and works with people with disabilities, referring to the small boats in which some migrants arrive from France.
In recent weeks, the far right has been accused of using two separate knife attacks to bolster its anti-immigrant rhetoric. Such messages are finding fertile ground.
During the campaign, Reform candidate Robert Kenyon, a plumber and local councillor, tried to combine anti-immigrant messages with veiled calls to defend “our Christian heritage”, while promising to fight for a close-knit local community.
But his campaign has been dogged by questions about old social media posts that have been deemed sexist and homophobic. Kenyon said the posts were made before he entered politics.
The rise of Rebuild Britain, another far-right party supported by Elon Musk and advocating the mass deportation of migrants, has also taken away some of Reform's support.
“This is the first test for Reform in terms of a political force emerging even further to the right of it... if Rebuild Britain does well in this constituency, it will be something that people will pay attention to,” says Hargrave.
Burnham, on the other hand, has avoided speaking openly about his ambitions to become party leader, and his campaign insists it is taking nothing for granted before Makerfield voters go to the polls.
But if he wins, it seems to be a question of when, not if, he will challenge Starmer for the leadership of the Labour Party.
Whether he will succeed in bringing about the changes that Starmer has been unable to achieve so far is another question entirely.
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