Burnham’s rise may be Westminster’s gain, but devolution is where the real transfer of power is taking place

Andy Burnham has spent much of the past decade arguing that the future of British politics lies not in the old habits of Westminster centralisation, but in a redistribution of power towards the country’s cities and regions. Now, as the Manchester mayor is again discussed in the language of national ambition, his allies suggest that the movement of authority is continuing in the direction he has long prescribed. The irony, of course, is that his personal ascent may coincide with a deeper institutional shift that could outlast any one politician.

Burnham’s name has become one of the most talked-about in Labour politics, and not merely because of the speculation that he could one day make the journey from Manchester to Downing Street. He is, after all, a figure who has built his reputation on speaking for places that have felt ignored by the political class, and on presenting devolution as more than an administrative reform. For Burnham, it has been a constitutional argument as well as a practical one: the idea that Britain’s regions should no longer be treated as supplicants waiting for Whitehall’s permission to act.

That argument has gained force in recent years because the logic behind it has become harder to resist. Central government has repeatedly discovered that it cannot deliver local renewal from a distance, whether on transport, housing, skills or public services. The mismatch between national promise and local need has become one of the defining failures of modern British governance. In that context, devolution is no longer a fringe cause or a slogan for civic-minded mayoral campaigns. It is increasingly the only plausible route to anything resembling responsive government.

Yet Burnham’s political fortunes should not be confused with the broader reality of power. If anything, his rise highlights how far the gravitational centre of British politics has shifted. A generation ago, ambition in the Labour Party, and across Westminster more broadly, meant proximity to the machinery of central government. Today, the most significant experimentation often takes place in mayoralties, combined authorities and devolved administrations. Burnham has been one of the most effective advocates of that change, but he is also a beneficiary of it. His authority rests not just on personal style or rhetorical confidence, but on the fact that regional power has acquired real institutional weight.

The significance of that shift should not be overstated. Devolution in Britain remains incomplete, uneven and in many respects compromised. The mayoral model gives leaders some room to act, but far from the kind of self-government found in federal systems. Funding remains constrained, policy is still shaped by Treasury orthodoxies, and central government retains the ability to interfere when it suits. The state’s habit of devolving responsibility without surrendering enough control is one of the reasons the system often disappoints. Local leaders are expected to be bold, but rarely given the fiscal freedom to be so.

Even so, the direction of travel matters. Burnham’s appeal lies partly in his ability to articulate the frustrations of places that have long felt that London does not understand them, but it also lies in his understanding that the constitutional structure of Britain is itself part of the problem. His allies’ suggestion that power is heading away from Westminster captures a wider truth about the country’s politics: authority is no longer wholly concentrated in the capital, and the old assumption that national renewal must be designed from the centre is losing credibility.

This helps explain why Burnham has become such a resonant figure at a time when Labour is still searching for a language of government that can bridge its metropolitan and provincial constituencies. He has managed to speak to voters who are sceptical of the political establishment while remaining unmistakably within the mainstream of the party. That balance has made him unusually durable. He is seen, by supporters and critics alike, as someone who understands that political legitimacy now depends on offering places outside London not just attention, but agency.

The symbolism of a Manchester politician being imagined as a future occupant of Downing Street is striking in itself. For much of modern British history, the route to power ran in one direction, from the provinces to the centre, but only after candidates had been transformed by the institutions and assumptions of Westminster. Burnham’s trajectory suggests something different. He has made his base in the north-west not as a stepping stone but as a source of political identity. That matters because it signals that regional leadership is no longer merely preparatory to national office. It can itself be a platform of consequence.

There is, however, a tension at the heart of Burnham’s appeal. He embodies a politics of place, yet the more he is discussed as a national leader, the more his personal brand risks overpowering the structural case for devolution. Britain has often mistaken charismatic figures for constitutional solutions. That temptation should be resisted. If Burnham is to matter beyond his own prospects, it will be because he represents a settlement in which power is genuinely shared, not because he is personally capable of transforming the relationship between regions and the state.

That distinction is crucial. Devolution has to be judged not by the careers it creates, but by the institutions it strengthens. Manchester, like other major English city-regions, has shown what can be done when local leaders are allowed to shape strategy over transport, economic development and regeneration. But the limits are also clear. The nation still relies on a patchwork of arrangements that can vary dramatically from one part of the country to another, producing both innovation and inconsistency. In some places, devolution has released energy. In others, it has merely added another layer to already confusing structures.

What Burnham and his allies appear to understand is that this confusion is no longer politically sustainable. The public is impatient with systems that cannot deliver visible improvement, and sceptical of institutions that absorb responsibility without accepting accountability. If the old model of command from Westminster is failing, the alternative cannot simply be more rhetoric about empowering places. It must involve real transfers of money, authority and political risk. Otherwise devolution becomes a performance, not a reform.

That is why the current speculation around Burnham is more revealing than it may first appear. It is not only about one man’s prospects. It is about the changing architecture of British politics, in which the energy of reform is increasingly found outside the centre even as the centre remains politically dominant. Burnham has spent years arguing that the country needs a new settlement. The growing prominence of his own name suggests that the argument has travelled further than many in Westminster once expected.

Still, the deeper question is whether the establishment is prepared to follow where the logic leads. A true transfer of power to the regions would require Whitehall to give up habits it has long regarded as natural. It would mean accepting that local leaders may know better than ministers what is needed on the ground. It would also mean trusting the public to judge those leaders on results rather than on their proximity to the machinery of national politics. That is a substantial cultural adjustment for a state that has spent centuries pulling authority inward.

Burnham’s allies may be right that he stands on the threshold of greater things. But the more important story is that the political ground beneath him has already shifted. In a country still struggling to recover from years of economic frustration, institutional mistrust and regional imbalance, the movement of power away from Westminster is no longer a theoretical project. It is an overdue response to the failure of excessive centralism. Burnham has helped make that case with unusual persistence. Whether or not he ever reaches Downing Street, the argument he has championed is already reshaping the terms on which British politics must now be conducted.