Burnham Pledges Sweeping Reform in High-Risk Conference Speech

Prime Minister Andy Burnham used his address to the Labour Party's annual conference on Tuesday to promise a far-reaching overhaul of Britain's social and political settlement, coupling an ambitious reform agenda with a blunt warning that delivering it would carry significant political risk.

Speaking in Liverpool at a gathering held under the slogan "Hope again," Burnham told delegates that incremental measures would not suffice in difficult times. He set out plans for more social housing, improved education and more affordable care for the elderly, but said the money would have to come from welfare and pension spending.

The centrepiece of the hour-long speech was a pledge to create a "national care service" to repair what he described as a broken social care system. Modelled on the National Health Service, it would be free at the point of use and funded through taxation. Burnham, who became emotional while recalling his late father's experience of the care system, said he would stake his political legacy on the project.

To help pay for it, he said he would dilute the pensions triple lock, the long-protected guarantee that pensions rise each year by whichever is highest among consumer price inflation, average wage growth or 2.5%. Acknowledging the likely backlash, he said he accepted he might pay a political price but that someone had to absorb the pain.

Burnham also said Labour would fight the next election on replacing Britain's winner-takes-all voting system with a form of proportional representation, and promised a rethink of the country's relationship with the European Union, arguing that Brexit had done more harm than good. Other commitments included ending street homelessness, cutting youth unemployment and asserting greater control over privatised utilities, even as he insisted the government would keep to its fiscal rules to bring down borrowing and debt.

The speech came against a difficult backdrop. Five men were arrested on suspicion of explosives and terror offences outside the US-run RAF Fairford base in western England, and were released on bail as police examined possible links to a hostile state, prompting questions about security lapses and state threats. Treasury chief John Healey is due to deliver the budget on October 28 amid rising oil prices, inflation and government borrowing costs linked to the US-Iran war, with diesel hitting a record high.

Although the next general election need not be held until 2029, Labour's improved standing has fuelled speculation about an early vote. Burnham has ruled that out. Political scientist John Curtice said the prime minister had given the party a halo effect from a popular leader, but that Labour must now transfer that advantage to the party itself before it can contemplate an election.