A Labour MP has said he would “give up his seat” to allow Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham to rejoin parliament and mount a leadership challenge against Sir Keir Starmer.
Burnham has been touted as a possible successor to the Prime Minister, but would need to return to the Commons to launch a bid for the top job.
The former New Labour minister and ex-MP for Leigh has dropped repeated hints he was eyeing a Westminster comeback ahead of Labour’s September conference.
Speaking about a potential Labour leadership election Clive Lewis MP, who represents Norwich South, told the BBC’s Politics Live it was “hard to see a way out” of where Labour currently found themselves.
“Whoever came in next, and this is speculation, we saw that with the Conservatives, the democratic legitimacy of the person that comes in next, after Boris Johnson, is reduced, I mean it was Liz Truss, because they haven’t won an election, it becomes difficult,” he said.
“I know exactly the problems that we face… we’re in a quandary, it feels like we are in checkmate, it’s hard to see a way out of it.”
When asked by presenter Vicki Young whether Burnham could be the one to take on the job, he confirmed the two had spoken about it.
“You’d have to ask Andy Burnham,” he added. “I have spoken to him, yeah.”
When asked if he would give up his seat, the MP responded: “It’s a question I’ve asked myself, and I’d have to obviously consult with my wife as well and family.
“But do you know what, if I’m going to sit here and say country before party, party before personal ambition, then yes, I have to say yes, don’t I?”
When asked directly: “So, you’d give up your seat to Andy Burnham?” Lewis replied: “I would yes.”
Clive Lewis MP Credit: ITV News Anglia
Burnham first sparked rumours over a potential Labour leadership challenge following interviews with the New Statesman and the Telegraph in September.
Speaking ahead of the Labour Party conference, which was held in Liverpool in October, he criticised Sir Keir Starmer’s approach, saying the “challenge we’ve got in front of us cannot be met by a very factional and quite divisive running of the Labour Party”.
The Greater Manchester Mayor insisted he was not planning an immediate return to the Commons, but set out his vision for a “plan to turn the country around” in an interview for the cover of the New Statesman.
Just a day later, in an interview with The Telegraph, Burnham went further and told the newspaper MPs had contacted him throughout the summer to urge him to run for the top job.
However, he said he told the MPs that it was “more a decision” for them, “than it is for me”.
Burnham later added that he was “completely committed” his job as mayor, and dismissed suggestions that his interventions were a disservice to Labour.
No 10 declined to comment.
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