The New Statesman.

Will Andy Burnham ever become Labour leader?

He's already stood for the role twice, finishing fourth in 2010 and second in 2015, and he doesn't

even have a seat in Parliament.

Can he make the move down south and secure a spot in Westminster in time?

And if so, how? I'm Anoush

Shackleian and this is the New Statesman podcast. Joining me is our senior editor, George Eaton, and our political

correspondent Ethan Croft, who have both been writing about Andy Burnham's prospects this week. George,

let's start with you. Can you give us an insight into why Burnham might be a good prospect as the next Labour leader? I mean, how popular is he in the country?

Yes, so there was an Ibsos poll over the weekend, which showed that he's the only senior politician to lead Farage as preferred Prime Minister by four points, and he has a 13 point lead over Kirstama. And that's one reason why Labour MPs, even though Burnham doesn't currently have a seat,

as he points out, his name still comes up because a lot of people think the essay question

essentially of the next leadership contest will be who has the best chance of beating Farage.

Yeah, and he's popular among the Labour membership as well, is that right?

He is a though. There's actually a very interesting new Labour list poll out today. I think it shows

his approval rating has dropped from what I described as some North Korean levels of plus 78.

It's dropped about 30 points, I think, because of how the party conference paid out, where he was

framed as being, you know, they're disloyal to Stama,

and we know Labour members, even when they're unhappy with the direction of the party in the

government tend to be quite instinctively loyal to the leader. It's one reason Labour leaders are

quite hard to get rid of. He's still second just behind Ed Miliband among members. And because he's a mayor and

sort of separate from the party in Westminster, he's been able to put forward his own platform,

his own idea of how he would lead the country differently, much of which he told to our

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