There is an old military maxim, often attributed to Napoleon, that you should never interrupt your opponent while they are making a mistake. That may explain Andy Burnham's silence so far over the latest scandal to hit Nigel Farage, after two of his closest aides were forced to resign amid allegations of breaching political donation rules in a Channel 4 News sting. But it also points to a much wider shift in the Prime Minister's strategy for dealing with Reform UK, a move that some in Labour privately fear could be undermined by the party's internal battle over immigration.
Reform remains a serious electoral threat to Labour in key northern and Midlands seats, the so-called Red Wall, and in national polling. Even with the recent Burnham bounce, which has seen Reform overtaken after months of strong numbers, the danger has not disappeared. Farage's party has a proven ability to define the immigration debate and to put Labour on the back foot. The Prime Minister might therefore have been expected to pile in on Farage over the latest controversy, even allowing for the convention that parties do not seek political advantage during conference season.
Instead, Burnham has taken a strikingly different approach. He has concluded that the moralising tone adopted by Keir Starmer, his predecessor as Labour leader and prime minister, alienated the very voters Labour needs to persuade. Starmer's attacks on Reform, which included describing its policies as racist and immoral, may have pleased activists, but Burnham is convinced they simply hardened support for Farage. The Prime Minister has therefore abandoned that approach in favour of a more positive strategy, one built around setting out concrete plans to help ordinary voters. Insiders say the aim is to present a governing alternative rather than to weaponise Farage's latest embarrassment.
The strategy appears to be working for now, with Reform's poll numbers falling and Labour regaining some ground. But several Labour insiders warn that progress on small boat crossings and the wider migration debate is essential if Reform is to be kept in check in the long term. The danger, they say, is that Labour's own MPs could wreck the progress by reopening old wounds over immigration.
A large group of Labour backbenchers is threatening to rebel over government plans to toughen settlement rights for foreign workers. The policy would double the time it takes for most legal migrants to claim indefinite leave to remain, from five years to ten years, and it would apply to people already living in the UK. That last element, in particular, has provoked fury among MPs who say it is a betrayal of care workers, NHS staff and others who have built lives in Britain in good faith. As many as 100 MPs are thought to be pushing for a significant watering-down of the policy.
The rebellion is a direct challenge to Burnham and Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who are due to finalise the policy this autumn. They are weighing whether to offer a concession to avoid a damaging Commons defeat. But the pressure is intense because many of the rebels represent Red Wall constituencies that are vulnerable to Reform. They fear that a government which promises firm border controls while making it harder for existing legal migrants to settle will look both cruel and incoherent. Others, however, are urging the Prime Minister to hold his nerve. One MP said Burnham should not be distracted by the rebels.
Those close to Downing Street say the PM understands that people want to hear what the government is doing to solve problems, not simply to see it attacking the Opposition. At his first Prime Minister's Questions, Burnham went out of his way to lower the temperature, looking for common ground rather than confrontation. A No 10 source confirmed that the PM is deliberately attacking Reform less than his predecessor did. The source said: “The PM gets that people want to hear what your plan is. They don't want to just hear you slagging off the other side. So that's why he overwhelmingly spends his time explaining his diagnosis and how he's going to fix things.”
That approach has been welcomed by some Labour MPs who had grown impatient with the old strategy. One MP said: “He's ditched the moralising tone that Keir Starmer often adopted, which is a very good thing. Falling boat crossings are encouraging but that's all. It won't be neutralised as an issue until they are much lower. Burnham can reach the Reform-curious Labour voters in a way Starmer couldn't. But the proof will be in holding his nerve on things like ILR.”
Labour divided over immigration
The internal row over immigration is not new. It has rumbled on since the last election, but it has now reached a critical point. Earlier this year, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood set out plans to reform the immigration system, including tougher rules on indefinite leave to remain. The proposal is meant to ensure that only those who have made a long-term contribution to the UK economy can gain permanent residence. But the retrospective element has turned it into a lightning rod for Labour's left and centre-left, who argue that workers already contributing to the country should not be punished because of a change in government policy.
An early day motion from Labour MP Neil Duncan-Jordan, calling for all skilled workers currently in the UK to be exempt from the changes, has now attracted 43 signatories from across the party. The number is growing, and senior figures fear it could reach the high dozens when the policy is finally brought to the Commons. The rebels include MPs from safe seats as well as those in marginal constituencies, suggesting the opposition is not simply driven by electoral anxiety.
One Labour source on the rebel side argued that Burnham should reconsider the policy because Labour is more likely to win votes from people who have drifted to the Greens or the Liberal Democrats than from Reform supporters. The source said: “The evidence shows Labour is losing more votes to the centre and left than to the far right. Chasing Reform's voters while alienating our own base is a losing strategy. Starmer learned that lesson the hard way. Burnham has the opportunity to learn it the easy way by dumping this plan.”
The source also rejected the idea that the public were behind the tougher settlement rules. “I also reject the simplistic binary here. The public believe in fairness. You might want immigration to come down, but you would not dream of punishing the care worker looking after your parents, or the other workers keeping the country moving,” they said.
Those on the other side of the argument say the policy is essential if Labour is to neutralise immigration as an issue. They point to the fact that immigration was one of the most important factors in the 2024 election result, and that Reform's rise was driven largely by public anxiety about border control. The same MPs warn that a highly visible backbench rebellion would reinforce the narrative, already pushed by Reform and GB News, that Labour cannot be trusted on immigration. One MP put it bluntly: “The Reform/GB News mantra message that we are being invaded by a young and fighting-fit male army has cut through. We need the language to counter this. Small boat numbers have to reduce to zero before we are taken seriously again. I believe this can be achieved but it will take stronger measures. Rebelling on ILR will reinforce the belief that we are not in control of our borders.”
Shift away from Starmer's approach
The seeds of Burnham's new approach were planted a year ago at Labour's annual conference. Keir Starmer, then leader of the party, used his conference speech to launch a dramatic attack on Reform, describing its narrative as racist and immoral. It was a deliberate attempt to draw a clear moral dividing line between Labour and Farage's party. But not everyone in Labour was convinced. Among the doubters was the man who would soon become prime minister.
Those close to Burnham when he was Mayor of Greater Manchester argued that Starmer risked falling into a trap set by Farage. The comparison they drew was with Hillary Clinton's description of some Donald Trump supporters in 2016 as a “basket of deplorables”. That attack was seized upon by Trump and used to argue that the entire political establishment held his supporters in contempt. Burnham's concern was that Labour could make exactly the same mistake: alienating voters who were considering Reform rather than persuading them, and in doing so hardening support for Farage rather than weakening it.
That is why Burnham has adopted a more conciliatory tone since entering Downing Street. He has avoided colourful insults and instead tried to sound like someone who understands why people might have drifted towards Reform. He has acknowledged that concerns about immigration are legitimate, even while insisting that most of the answers do not lie in the far-right playbook. His team believe this is a more effective way of winning over the “Reform-curious” voter than calling them racists or deplorables.
The Prime Minister's media strategy has also changed. He spends less time reacting to Farage's provocations and more time promoting government action on the cost of living, energy prices, housing and public services. No 10 sources describe it as a “plan-first” operation. The aim is to make Reform seem like a party of protest, while Labour is presented as the party of government. The hope is that voters who flirted with Reform in 2024 will come back to Labour once they see the party taking their concerns seriously.
'Small boat numbers have to fall to zero'
The biggest challenge remains the Channel crossing crisis. On paper, the government has good news to tell. In the three months of June, July and August, a total of 6,949 people crossed the Channel in small boats, the lowest number for that period since 2019. The fall has been driven at least in part by measures put in place by Starmer and continued by Burnham, including stronger co-operation with French authorities and a tougher stance on illegal working. This has given Burnham an opportunity to argue that his approach is delivering.
Yet many Labour MPs say the public does not believe the statistics. The sense of crisis built up over several years is not easily reversed. One MP said: “The issue with small boats is that people don't believe it [the falling numbers].” Another added: “There's a real sense of disbelief. A lot of people just simply don't trust official statistics. So for Reform's base, I don't think that it matters as much.”
This lack of trust is a broader problem for the Government. Repeated failures to deport people, delays in the asylum system and a backlog of more than 100,000 cases have made it hard for ministers to claim they have control. Even when the statistics show an improvement, voters remember the headlines about record numbers of arrivals, overcrowded hotels and the cost of processing claims. The result, according to polling by More in Common and others, is that many voters on the right are deeply sceptical about any government claim that migration is coming down.
Louis O'Geran of the think-tank More in Common said Labour was in a marginally better position on immigration because of the recent figures. “If the issue is seen to be slowly getting under control, that's going to be something that Reform are going to have to really shout to talk over,” he said. But he cautioned that the improvement was fragile and could easily be undone by another visible incident, such as a large crossing on a single day or a story about a migrant crime.
For Burnham, the question is whether he can hold his party together while also holding his nerve on policy. The left of the party wants him to soften the ILR plan. The right wants him to go further and faster on border control. The centre, where Burnham has always positioned himself, argues that the best response to Reform is a credible but humane plan that brings down numbers without demonising migrants.
His allies say that is precisely what he is trying to do. They point to the fall in Channel crossings as evidence that firm but fair policies can work. They also argue that the public will eventually recognise the difference between Labour's approach and Reform's. But the rebellion over ILR is a reminder that governing is harder than opposition. Burnham may have learned the lessons of Starmer's mistakes, but he now faces his own test: showing that Labour can be trusted on migration without tearing itself apart in the process.
The old maxim about not interrupting your opponent may have served Burnham well in the short term. Farage has spent the past week fending off questions about his aides, their resignations and the allegations made in the Channel 4 investigation, and Reform's poll numbers have slipped. But the Prime Minister knows that political fortune is fleeting. If Labour MPs continue to fight over immigration in public, the damage could outweigh any benefit that came from Farage's troubles. The nightmare, as one Labour adviser put it, is not the Reform leader but the Labour party itself.
Source: The i Paper News