The majority of Britons agree with Andy Burnham that the country took a wrong turn by leaving the European Union, but they are split over his belief that Margaret Thatcher’s premiership set the country on the wrong path.
Addressing the House of Commons for the first time as prime minister on Tuesday, the former mayor of Greater Manchester took aim at deindustrialisation and privatisation of the 1980s, and the impact of austerity and Brexit on regions of the UK outside of England’s South East and London.
He listed the “series of wrong turns” the UK has made since over the past 40s years and warned that Brexit had embedded the problems in the last decade.
Mr Burnham told MPs: “From the 1980s, this country took a series of wrong turns. Political power was centralised, economic power privatised.
“The country deindustrialised. Austerity followed, hollowing out councils and depriving them of the agency to act to reverse any of this, and then Brexit, compounding the damage, ushering in a decade of low growth and stalled regeneration.”
According to new polling from YouGov, 55 per cent of British people agree with the prime minister that Brexit was a wrong turn, with 21 per cent disagreeing. 11 per cent said neither and 13 per cent said they did not know.
Among Labour voters at the 2024 general election, 78 per cent believed it to be a wrong turn, while 59 per cent of Reform voters claimed it was a right turn.
The Makerfield MP’s comments were welcomed by pro-EU campaigners just days after The Independent revealed the £11.7bn a year loss in exports Brexit has caused for British business as well as a survey showing 98.2 per cent of businesses want the UK to rejoin the single market.
Naomi Smith, chief executive of Best for Britain, said: “It’s hugely welcome to hear a prime minister stand at the despatch box and say loudly and clearly that Brexit harmed Britain; far from taking back control, it shrank our economy, left us poorer, weaker, less safe and more divided.”
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When it comes to Baroness Thatcher, whose 11 years in Downing Street from 1979 to 1990 made her the longest-serving British prime minister of the 20th century, 35 per cent of Britons believe her premiership represented a wrong turn for the country.
28 per cent said it was more of a right turn, with 14 per cent saying neither and 23 per cent not knowing.
60 per cent of 2024 Conservative voters and 57 per cent of Reform voters said it was a right turn, while 58 per cent of Labour voters believed it to be a wrong turn.
Regarding the privatisation and centralisation of power prominent during the Thatcher years – and the legacy he believes it has left – Mr Burnham claimed this was a “failed economic model”.
He said it had led to high streets across the country being left desolate and described Britain’s water industry as “a leaking monument to that approach, a country run in the private rather than public interest”.
“For a long time, the country did not have ambitions for its regions outside of London – it even talked of the managed decline of Liverpool,” the prime minister told the Commons.
“It took the devolution of power out of this place to allow our big city regions the ability to set new ambitions for themselves.
“Now, I want every single place across our regions and nations to be able to do the same, creating the conditions for good growth in every postcode.”
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