Andy Burnham’s promise of a more collaborative style of politics survived approximately three questions at his first Prime Minister’s Questions.
The new prime minister began by inviting Kemi Badenoch to work with the government on welfare reform. By the end of their exchange, he was reminding MPs of her support for Liz Truss and concluding: “God help us.”
Between those moments came a serious argument over how Burnham intends to pay for his growing list of promises, whether taxes are heading up again and what rising government borrowing costs mean for the public finances.
Burnham looked comfortable at the despatch box and produced the session’s most memorable line. Badenoch, however, found a weakness in his pitch that Labour will need to address before the Budget: the prime minister has announced what he wants to do, but has not yet explained all the difficult choices required to fund it.
Badenoch calls Burnham a ‘people pleaser’
The Conservative leader began by congratulating Burnham on his “stamina” after he spent three hours answering 125 questions from MPs on Tuesday.
She then asked whether he could name a single spending request he had rejected.
Burnham did not provide one. Instead, he turned to welfare and said he could not defend the number of people in their twenties who were not in education, employment or training.
He said:
“I want to change that by giving more support to young people, so that we start investing in their success rather than paying for failure.”
Burnham invited Badenoch to join him in “problem solving rather than point scoring”, but she was not in a particularly collaborative mood.
“A prime minister needs to be a leader, not a people pleaser,” she replied.
Badenoch argued that bringing down the welfare bill would eventually require cuts and accused Burnham of proposing to reduce spending by spending more money upfront.
She then returned to her original question: what had he actually cut?
Burnham’s answer was “tax”, pointing to his decision to remove VAT from household electricity bills and cut business rates for pubs, social clubs and live music venues.
That did not answer what Badenoch had asked. Tax cuts reduce government revenue; they are not spending reductions.
Burnham said the measures had been funded by abandoning the previous government’s digital ID plans and reallocating the money. Badenoch disputed that explanation, arguing that funding for digital ID had never been formally allocated and therefore could not be used to pay for anything else.
It is a row that will now follow the government into its first Budget. Burnham says the commitments are fully funded. The Conservatives want the Treasury to publish the figures showing exactly where the money has come from.
Borrowing costs give Badenoch an opening
The argument took place against an uncomfortable backdrop for the government.
Britain’s borrowing costs climbed again on Wednesday, with the yield on ten-year government bonds reaching its highest level since 2007. Thirty-year borrowing costs were also close to levels not seen for almost three decades.
Bond yields have been rising across several countries amid higher oil prices and renewed uncertainty in the Gulf. Britain is particularly exposed because of its high debt, persistent inflation and the large amount the government spends servicing that debt.
According to Reuters, the ten-year gilt yield briefly reached 5.294 per cent. Economists at Pantheon Macroeconomics estimated that the movement in the markets could reduce the chancellor’s fiscal headroom from £23.6 billion to approximately £13 billion.
That does not mean the increase was caused solely by Burnham’s announcements. Global markets were already under pressure. It does make his refusal to spell out future tax and spending decisions more politically difficult.
Badenoch quoted economist Jim O’Neill, a friend and former adviser to Burnham, who warned that Tuesday’s statement was not what investors wanted to hear.
Burnham said he had worked with O’Neill for a decade and valued his candid advice, even when they disagreed. He then blamed Britain’s vulnerability on the economic record inherited from the Conservatives.
He pointed to the UK recording the fastest growth in the G7 during the first half of 2026. The Resolution Foundation calculated that the economy grew by a combined one per cent across the first two quarters, putting Britain ahead of the other G7 economies over that period.
Burnham also said borrowing was at its lowest level in six years and that the deficit was falling faster than in any other G7 country. The government’s Spring Forecast projected borrowing to be nearly £18 billion lower than previously expected and the lowest for six years.
Those figures supported Burnham’s defence, but they did not remove the immediate question about what comes next.
Burnham refuses to rule out tax rises
Badenoch eventually put the choice to him directly.
If Burnham wanted to pay for his promises, she argued, he would need higher taxes, more borrowing or spending cuts.
“Will he be honest and tell us: is he preparing to raise taxes again? Yes or no?”
Burnham refused to give her the answer she wanted.
He said his first decisions as prime minister had been to cut taxes, but added that he was not going to write the Budget at the despatch box. That, he said, was a matter for the chancellor.
He also argued that the government had deliberately chosen an early Budget date to limit the period of speculation.
It was a defensible reason not to announce tax policy during PMQs, but it was still not a denial. The government may now face weeks of questions about which taxes could rise and whether its fiscal rules can be met without reducing spending elsewhere.
Burnham reaches for Liz Truss
Burnham’s best attack came when he turned the argument back onto Badenoch’s reshuffled frontbench.
He noted that she had removed a shadow chancellor who described Liz Truss’s mini-Budget as a mistake and replaced him with someone who had served as a senior Treasury minister when it was produced.
He then reminded MPs that Badenoch had previously said Truss was “100 per cent right”.
“What other thing can I say in response to all of that other than: God help us?”
Labour MPs enjoyed that one.
Badenoch said Burnham was trying to avoid scrutiny by returning to a Conservative government that lasted only 49 days. She argued that borrowing costs were now higher than they had been during the Truss crisis and accused him of repeating the central mistake of announcing spending before explaining how it would be funded.
Burnham responded that the Truss mini-Budget had directly damaged confidence and pushed up mortgage costs. He promised that his government would remain “grounded in fiscal responsibility”, stick to its rules and reduce living costs.
The clash turns to defence
Badenoch used her final question to move onto national security following Germany’s claim that Russia was responsible for an attack at Leipzig airport.
She called for defence spending to reach three per cent of GDP immediately and proposed paying for it through welfare cuts.
“The honeymoon is over,” she told Burnham. “Isn’t it time for the prime minister to ditch the vibes and get serious about defending our nation?”
Burnham condemned the attack, expressed solidarity with Germany and Ukraine and said the government would fully fund its defence investment plan.
He said further details would be set out at the spending review, alongside a path towards meeting Britain’s NATO commitments by 2035.
Burnham finished by returning to the central message of his premiership: growth in every part of the country and a government attempting to restore a sense of optimism.
It was a confident conclusion, although confidence alone will not settle the questions Badenoch raised.
His first PMQs showed that Burnham is comfortable thinking on his feet and considerably more willing than his predecessor to improvise a cutting line. It also showed where the opposition intends to focus: every new promise will be followed by the same question about how it is being paid for.
The “God help us” line won the loudest reaction. The unanswered questions about tax and borrowing may matter for longer.
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