Burnham Makerfield Field Settled at Five Candidates; 20 Days to Polling Day
Andy Burnham’s Makerfield by-election field is now settled at five candidates with 20 days to polling day on 18 June. Burnham (Labour) faces Reform UK’s Robert Kenyon, Conservative Michael Winstanley, Liberal Democrat Jake Austin and Green Chris Kennedy. The Green candidate Kennedy, a nurse, said: “We can’t let this election be dominated by a Westminster psychodrama.” Reform UK comfortably won every ward in the Makerfield constituency at the 7 May local elections; Burnham himself won 66% of the vote in Wigan in the 2024 Greater Manchester mayoral election. Sir Keir Starmer has said he will be “100% behind” Burnham and would campaign personally for him.
The five-way race is structurally helpful for Burnham — the Reform-Conservative-Lib Dem-Green split of the protest vote complicates Reform UK’s “David versus Goliath” framing. Polling internal to the Burnham campaign reportedly puts him ahead by 12-15 points but with high don’t-know counts. The campaign slogan — “Vote Andy — For Us” — is positioned around Burnham’s personal brand rather than the Labour Party. Burnham secured music rights from Oasis for his first campaign video. The 18 June by-election is the operational test of whether Labour’s migration tightening and Burnham’s personal pull are enough to check Reform’s advance into traditional Labour territory and whether Burnham has the seat needed to formally challenge Starmer.