Behind the “All Together Now” conference slogan was an ambitious programme of constitutional and economic change that could reshape how Britain votes, how pensions rise, how essential services are run and, ultimately, Britain’s relationship with Brussels.
And despite promising a country in which “everyone’s vote counts and everyone’s voice is heard”, Mr Burnham has put the future relationship with the EU back on the political agenda a decade after 17.4 million people voted to leave.
Brexit back on the table
Mr Burnham used his speech to launch a direct attack on Brexit.
“Brexit hasn’t given us control,” he told delegates. “We’ve lost some of the control we had over our economy… And we’ve lost some of our control over immigration.”
He later declared: “Brexit has done more harm than good.”
The Prime Minister said a UK-EU summit before the end of the year would consider different options for Britain’s long-term relationship with its European neighbours.
Pressed on the Today programme, he made clear just how far that discussion could go.
“We could stay as we are. That’s definitely an option,” he said. “We could look at what George Osborne has said about a customs union, we could look at what the Liberal Democrats said at their conference about the single market, or we could go all the way.”
Mr Burnham has previously written that he wants Britain to rejoin the European Union during his lifetime. Asked about that position this week, he did not retreat from it.
“I’ve said in the book I would like to see Britain rejoin in my lifetime, so there’s no point in me saying otherwise,” he said.
For clarity, current Government policy has not changed. Labour’s 2024 manifesto ruled out rejoining the EU, single market or customs union during this Parliament and Mr Burnham says he will respect those red lines.
But the longer-term direction is now unmistakably back up for debate, with everything from the status quo to a customs union, single market participation and ultimately EU membership among the possibilities being discussed.
That debate is being reopened despite the result of the 2016 referendum, when 17.4 million people voted to leave the European Union and 16.1 million voted to remain.
Claire Bullivant, chief executive of the Great British PAC, said:
“Andy Burnham says he wants to restore faith in politics, yet in the same speech he opened the door to revisiting one of the biggest democratic decisions the British people have ever made.
“That is extraordinarily dangerous territory. Millions of people voted in the EU referendum on the clear understanding that their decision would be implemented. If politicians simply keep reopening a question until Westminster gets the answer it prefers, why should anyone trust a referendum, an election or even the ballot box itself?
“Brexit was not a suggestion. It was an instruction from the British people.
“And sovereignty matters more now, not less. We are entering the age of artificial intelligence, when control over technology, data, regulation and economic policy will help determine which nations lead and which nations follow.
“This is precisely the moment Britain should be defending its freedom to make its own rules, not contemplating handing influence back to Brussels.
“By all means cooperate with our European neighbours. Trade with them, work with them and be their friends and allies. But cooperation does not require political submission.”
Change the voting system
Europe was not the only constitutional question Mr Burnham reopened.
The Prime Minister announced a national commission on electoral reform and committed Labour to fighting the next general election with a manifesto pledge to change the voting system.
“We will contest the next election with a manifesto commitment to change the electoral system so that everyone’s vote counts and everyone’s voice is heard,” he said.
Mr Burnham argued that politicians would have “failed in our public duties” if the present system remained and allowed what he called a “divisive government” into Number 10 with less than 30 per cent of the vote.
There is an obvious political irony.
Labour itself secured a large parliamentary majority at the 2024 general election despite winning only around 34 per cent of the national vote.
No replacement for first past the post has yet been selected.
Mr Burnham has long supported proportional representation and previously declared that “PR’s time has come”.
Possible alternatives include the single transferable vote, used in Scottish council elections, and the additional member system used at Holyrood.
There is disagreement even within Labour. Deputy leader Lucy Powell supports reform but has acknowledged that parts of the party oppose it, while skills minister Baroness Smith of Malvern has said electoral reform “isn’t top of my list of priorities”.
Pensioners to help fund Labour’s care plans
Mr Burnham is also preparing to change the pensions triple lock to help fund his proposed National Care Service.
The existing triple lock guarantees that the state pension rises every April by whichever is highest: inflation, average earnings growth or 2.5 per cent.
Mr Burnham says it will remain untouched for the rest of this Parliament.
From April 2030, however, the automatic annual earnings component would be removed. The pension would instead rise by at least inflation or 2.5 per cent, alongside a mechanism intended to maintain its value relative to earnings over time.
The Government estimates the change will reduce state pension spending by around £15 billion a year by the end of the 2030s and £50 billion annually by 2050.
The money is intended to help fund a National Care Service providing free personal care for older people in England according to need rather than ability to pay.
But there is a sizeable question over the sums.
Jonathan Cribb, deputy director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, has said the savings are likely to be relatively small initially and warned that the reform should not be expected to save enough to fund universal social care in the next Parliament.
Mr Burnham himself acknowledged the political consequences.
“I accept I may pay a political price,” he said. “But someone has to go through the pain barrier and rip the plaster off.”
More of the economy under public control
The Prime Minister also outlined a considerably greater role for public institutions across water, energy and housing.
A strengthened Water Bill will repeal what Mr Burnham called Margaret Thatcher’s “ideological ban” on public ownership of water companies and begin what he described as a “10-year journey to a very different water system”.
His energy programme includes a “Great British Grid”, a publicly owned arm of Great British Energy intended to challenge private operators and accelerate connections to the electricity network.
Housing would also see considerably greater intervention.
Mr Burnham promised what he described as the biggest council house building programme since the post-war era, reform of Right-to-Buy for new homes and new powers allowing councils to take over empty properties and acquire some private rented homes.
Taken together, the programme represents a substantial expansion in the role of government across the economy.
Burnham blames Brexit for immigration problems
Mr Burnham also attempted to connect Britain’s immigration problems with Brexit.
“Immigration control weakened by Brexit,” he said, later arguing: “Control over immigration was weakened when we lost collaboration with our European partners.”
But there is an important distinction between legal control and international cooperation.
Since the end of the Brexit transition period, Britain has controlled its own immigration system, set its own visa rules and determined its own admission policies.
Mr Burnham’s argument is therefore that leaving EU arrangements weakened practical cooperation and enforcement, rather than that Britain lacks the legal authority to control immigration.
He pointed to falls in both net migration and small boat arrivals over longer periods.
Office for National Statistics figures put net migration at 171,000 in the year to December 2025, down from 331,000 the previous year and a peak of 944,000 in 2023.
But Channel crossings remain a major political problem.
Home Office figures showed 781 people arriving in small boats on a single day in late September, the highest daily total recorded at that point in 2026.
Mr Burnham says his Government will be “relentless” in working towards stopping small boat crossings altogether, although he has not set a date for achieving that objective.
“Every vote counts” – except the 17.4 million?
Mr Burnham says his programme is intended to rebuild public trust and make Britain work again.
Later this year, the Government intends to publish a ten-year plan setting out its wider programme.
But his first conference speech has already revealed the scale of the changes he wants Britain to consider.
The voting system is up for reform.
The pension settlement is being rewritten.
The state is being given a greater role across water, energy and housing.
And the question many voters reasonably believed had been settled by the largest democratic vote in British history has been put back on the political agenda.
Mr Burnham repeatedly says he wants a Britain in which “everyone’s vote counts and everyone’s voice is heard”.
Ms Bullivant said:
“The Great British PAC is cross-party, but on democracy we will not equivocate. Governments are temporary. The sovereignty of the British people is not.
“If Mr Burnham truly wants every vote to count and every voice to be heard, he could start by respecting the 17.4 million votes already cast.”
