Open sesame!

Infantino is going to be hard to extract from FIFA. He’s tight with the Oiligarchs that are busy using soccer to sportswash their climate destruction, and he spreads the wealth to the member representatives from the Global South to counterbalance any threat to his rule from the UEFA contingent. If he manages to expand the Club World Cup, then I think it sets up a big confrontation between FIFA and UEFA, and that will be interesting, given the ownership situations of the biggest European clubs.

I think Infantino would turn down a UN position. His current grift is lower profile, lower risk, and high enough reward.

Has anyone here ever eaten a dish charmingly named “Toad In The Hole”?

And if so, how was it?

I suppose all English commentators here have eaten it many times in their youth – I know I have.

I can’t say I like it much – I’m generally not keen on anything made from batter, apart from maybe the occasional indulgence in Crêpes Suzette.

And since this is still an open thread, I thought some of you might like to see what Sam Freedman of Comment is Freed makes of some of Andy Burnham’s early steps (links taken out as usual – sorry):

A theory of power
Burnham’s cabinet choices and changes to No. 10
Sam Freedman
Jul 21
 

There are many considerations in appointing a cabinet: rewarding loyal supporters, balancing factions, keeping rivals away from the spotlight, and, ideally, competence. They tell you a lot about what new prime ministers are worried about and how they intend to govern.

One thing we learnt from yesterday’s appointments, and some of Burnham’s other early moves, is that he has a much stronger theory of power – a view about how he wants to use the office and what he wants to prioritise – than his recent predecessors.

Throughout his time in office Keir Starmer was strangely passive, waiting for decisions to be presented to him and refusing to settle disputes between ministers. His government looked buffeted by events and u-turns. It is telling that in valedictory interviews he has talked of scrapping the two-child limit as a signature achievement, given it took eighteen months of lobbying by MPs and a mass revolt on welfare to make it happen.

Burnham, though, has indicated not just that he has priorities but that he is willing to make the institutional changes required to make them happen. John Healey’s appointment as Chancellor was part of a wider move to shift the locus of economic policy towards No. 10. I said back in May that I didn’t think Ed Miliband would be Chancellor, not just because of criticism from the right but also because he could create an alternative power base, given support within the party.

Healey isn’t a pushover, and certainly isn’t going to sanction a big increase in borrowing, but he is not going to threaten Burnham. And his views on economic policy are broadly in-line with the prime minister’s. He was responsible for regional economic policy under Gordon Brown, and has since argued that fiscal devolution hasn’t gone far enough. And he pushed for more social housing when he was the minister responsible back in 2009. He is, of course, keen to find more money for defence.

Notably, Healey was appointed after Burnham had given an interview on economic policy, saying that he thought there was flexibility in the fiscal rules and hinting at changes to income tax thresholds. Not the behaviour of someone who plans to sit back and let the Treasury manage the economy. This morning VAT on electricity bills was scrapped. This is the first in what will be a series of “cost of living” announcements that had been lined up by Burnham’s team well before Healey was offered the job (as per my assessment of his policy agenda from a few weeks ago).

In the rest of this post I’ll look at why changes to the No. 10 machine point in the same direction and then at what the rest of the cabinet appointments tell us about Burnham’s likely priorities and concerns, as well as the challenges to come.

No. 10

Downing Street has long been seriously underpowered, as I discussed in a recent post on why prime ministers keep failing. It is not possible to run a highly centralised state, spending well over a trillion pounds a year, with a handful of policy advisers. It also means the Treasury tends to run things in practice because they have so much more capacity, including policy teams shadowing every other department.

This is a longstanding problem for prime ministers and Starmer was strongly encouraged to expand his operation, including by members of his core team. For reasons that remain unclear he ignored the advice, or at least failed to pay attention until it was too late. But it looks like Burnham is going to move on this.

Much of the attention so far has been on the establishment of a “Number 10 North” in Manchester, which is expected to focus on devolution and will be led by Caroline Simpson, Chief Executive of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA). I suspect quite a few current and former GMCA staff will move across, which makes sense given they know the challenges and opportunities that devolution offers better than anyone. The obvious risk here is that the two number 10s become competing power centres, but as long as responsibilities of the northern outpost are clearly defined this should be avoidable. Burnham’s Chief of Staff, James Purnell, based in London, will be in charge of the overall operation.

Perhaps more importantly Burnham is planning to add more a lot more capacity to his operation, particularly on economics. Whether or not No. 10 is formally designated as its own department – “The Office of the Prime Minister” – it will act more like one. Louise Haigh, who as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and first Secretary of State will be the minister responsible for the centre of government, told the BBC earlier this month that there should be a “proper beefed-up economic unit in Number 10 that both the prime minister and the chancellor have access to”. (It’s possible she got that idea from my book, which she kindly called “required reading for ministers”).

It is also in line with a 2024 Institute for Government (IFG) report on transforming the centre of government. Emma Norris, who was Deputy CEO of the IFG when it was published, has been appointed as an adviser to work on this overhaul with Haigh.

That report proposed a Department for the PM, that would have a much expanded policy and delivery function, setting the direction for government. As per Haigh’s comments, it also argued for a strategy, budget and performance management office, that would run spending reviews from number 10, with the Treasury feeding in rather than controlling the whole process. That would give Burnham much more leverage over the economy, and particularly public spending, than previous prime ministers.

As noted in last week’s post, the spending review is going to be one of Burnham’s trickiest domestic challenges over the next year. The lack of a coordinating strategy/economic function controlled by the prime minister has meant previous reviews have ended up coming down to bilateral negotiations between spending departments and the Treasury. This is not a recipe for strategic decisions. If the next SR is to actually prioritise spending where it is needed then it will require at least some direction from the prime minister’s office. It’s another sign of a more politically aware operation, that at least understands the problem with the status quo, that this is being seriously considered.

The cabinet

Beyond Healey’s appointment there were other indications of what Burnham intends to keep close to him in a strengthened centre of government.

For instance, he plans to use the Milburn review in the autumn to launch a set of welfare reforms focused on youth unemployment. So it made sense to keep Pat McFadden in place at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), given he has worked closely with Milburn on the plans.

Graeme Cooke, the No 10 policy adviser on welfare, who has also been working with Milburn, has been promoted to (temporary) head of the policy unit. Cooke was Purnell’s adviser back in 2009, when the new Chief of Staff was running DWP under Gordon Brown. They had big plans for reform before Purnell quit in an attempt to force Brown out. All this suggests it will be a major area of focus. But it’s not going to be an easy way to find savings, as some seem to think. It will likely cost money in the first few years.

Devolution and social housing are two other priorities, so Angela Rayner has been given back her old job running the housing and local government department. She is a big supporter of the state building more homes and wrangled significant additional funding out of the Treasury in the last spending review, which will now likely be repurposed to focus more on social rather than affordable housing. I suspect a lot of the running on devolution will be done from the beefed up No. 10 but Rayner is also supportive of that agenda having piloted the new Devolution Act through its initial stages in Parliament.

There’s a question as to where social care reform will sit, given that’s another priority. Yvette Cooper has been appointed as health secretary but I wouldn’t be surprised if Rayner was asked to do more on social care, given a lot of the big questions are about funding, which sits with local government. Either way it’s another topic that a strengthened centre of government will work on. In any case Cooper will need to focus on keeping the fragile improvements in waiting times on track (they’ve gone up again in the last two months).

Outside of Burnham’s core priorities there is plenty of continuity. Keeping Shabana Mahmood at the Home Office shows that, as I keep saying, Burnham is not going to shift hard to the left on cultural issues like immigration. His approach will be to focus on issues that unite his potential voter coalition (cost of living, nationalisation, social housing) rather than divide it. But he will want to be able to say immigration has fallen, and has made clear he broadly supports Mahmood’s approach. The number 10 policy adviser responsible for this area – Harvey Redgrave – has also been kept on.

There will be concessions on Mahmood’s proposals around indefinite leave to remain, at minimum reducing the time care workers will have to wait before applying. These have been in the works for a while and she understands they are necessary to avoid a rebellion. The question is whether what she offers will be enough to placate MPs, and whether she will be willing to go further if it’s not.

There’s also continuity in the other big economic jobs. Jonny Reynolds is back in his former role at an expanded business department, overseeing the industrial strategy he developed (this is one department for which prime minister’s seem to ignore the rule that machinery of government changes are a costly waste of time – this is its sixth iteration since 2007). Miatta Fahnbullah, a close ally of Burnham who was one of the first ministers to resign from Starmer’s government and has been advising on policy, has replaced Ed Miliband at Energy. But she will likely keep the core of his agenda in place, as she written extensively in the past on the importance of net zero.

So far, so logical. But some of the other appointments have more of a feel of needing to find jobs for people, which is always risky, if somewhat inevitable given the nature of constructing cabinets. Miliband has been given the foreign office as compensation for not being made Chancellor, but he’s not an obvious fit. Burnham has indicated he wants to spend more time on domestic issues but he can’t hand off Trump-handling to Miliband given the negative view of him amongst the President’s advisers. Plus Miliband is likely to be constrained on issues which he has indicated are of interest, like closer EU ties and international development. It could prove a frustrating appointment for all involved.

Wes Streeting was given the Ministry of Defence late in the day, which felt like another odd fit, especially as it was reported the job had initially been offered to Rachel Reeves. This suggests Burnham had another role in mind for Streeting, who doesn’t have much relevant experience. With Healey in the Treasury he will have support in advancing the MoD’s main agenda of increasing military spending. (It doesn’t follow, though, that Healey will automatically grant the MoD all the money he wanted when he was there. He will have new priorities now.) Streeting will presumably not mind being in a job that allows him to look statesmanlike on a topic where there is widespread political consensus, rather than having to deal with immigration or welfare.

As expected Lucy Powell was made education secretary, a reward for her long-term support for Burnham, with Bridget Phillipson demoted to the equalities brief. This is probably riskier than the PM realises as Powell will need to get up to speed fast on special needs reforms, which need a lot of care, and risks blowing up in the autumn. But Powell can be expected to support moves to prioritise skills.

A theory of power

Taken together this all looks like an attempt to create a much stronger centre of government that will focus on Burnham’s core priorities of economic regeneration, devolution, welfare reform and social care. On these issues he has a team of ministers who broadly agree with his positions and will be willing to stay in the political background, allowing him to take the public lead.

Critically there is a clear theory of power, a set of priorities, and an approach to how Burnham wants to go about achieving them. It’s also evident, from the way he’s set up his cabinet, and structured his early announcements that this prime minister will be much more politically astute than Starmer. Ending rough sleeping was a smart initial pledge on the doorstep of Downing Street, as it sound ambitious, is a genuine problem, comes up all the time as a signal of decline in focus groups, but is actually achievable because the numbers are quite small (and was almost achieved under New Labour).

Too much politics can be a bad thing if it means backing away from unpopular but necessary decisions, and spending too much time worrying about the papers. But if done well it can create the space for a proper policy agenda. There’s a reason why most other European countries don’t have different words for politics and policy.

But, while a theory of power, and political antenna, are necessary conditions for success they are only valuable if used in aid of a policy agenda that actually improves the country. Removing VAT on electricity bills and capping bus fares isn’t going to achieve much, unless it’s used to create permission from the public for more substantive and contentious changes.

By far the biggest problem Burnham has remains the broader fiscal situation. There is, as he said yesterday, some scope for flexibility with the fiscal rules. Loans given to independent organisations by the government count as assets when calculating debt under the rules adopted by Rachel Reeves, which offers some scope for creative investment in infrastructure. But it’s not going to solve the puzzle.

If he really wants to help people with cost of living, and reform social care, and put some more money into defence, and offset cuts pencilled in for the final year of the Parliament he’s going to have to raise a lot of taxes.

Having priorities, politics, and a theory of power is a good start. But achieving those priorities is still going to require a lot of difficult choices.

Ah, russell, that’s American Toad-in-the-hole. As mentioned, an entirely different deal from the British version. Only the name is there to confuse everyone.

(i.e.unlike most ordinary English ones which are generally full of bread and much other rubbish)

Sounds like scrapple – a dietary peculiarity in my broader home region. A lot of cornmeal, flour, and spices with ground up parts left over (possibly swept off the floor) after butchering swine and served as a breakfast “meat.”

I like it, having grown up eating it. I don’t know that anyone who hasn’t grown up eating scrapple tried it and thought it was good.

When I was growing up, my mother referred to the toad in the hole as the One-Eyed Egyptian.

I still make them for breakfast every few weeks.

In related news, I kind of liked Odysseus’ and his men’s encounter with the cannibal Cyclops in “The Odyssey”.

The sound of his roaring from the attack on his eye was fantastically deafening in the IMAX format.

Michael, it was Digital IMAX, where I live now, which is no longer Denver.

I’m glad you asked, because the complex also had a Dolby Cinema theater showing the film, which I now read that many theater-goers prefer to the IMAX.

I’ll remember that for future reference.

” have to be careful at IMAX shows because of the peripheral vision thing. I’m sensitive to motion that I see being different from motion sensed by my inner ears.”

Maybe their theater popcorn counter needs to stock Dramamine?

I must agree, Michael. Except I don’t think you’re really looking at alternatives.

Yes, the technical problem has a well known technical solution. Briefly: air gaps. There was, apparently, not the will (or willingness) to implement that solution. But it wasn’t unknown, or even particularly technically challenging to implement.

The non-technical problem also has a well known solution: law. Criminal law: gross negligence (failure to engage the known technical solution) on the part of the management of the companies involved, involving the usual penalties for gross negligence. Civil law: damages for any and all harms done, chargable to both the companies and the management as individuals. Whether there will be the political will to bring criminal charges is a question. As for civil cases, the question is whether the courts (specifically the Supreme Court) will invent some kind of Constitutional protection out of whole cloth. On recent evidence, I don’t think I’d place any bets on that.