Andy Burnham just gave away how hopeless he'll be - we'll be begging Starmer to return

Just how on earth did we arrive at this point?

A serial loser deemed not good enough to lead his party, not once but twice, stages a coup d'état to overthrow a democratically elected prime minister, sticks two fingers up to the people he is about to rule over, and avoids scrutiny like the plague.

No, this is not a military intervention in some African banana republic, but Britain in 2026.

Embarrassing dad Andy Burnham - consigned to the Labour scrapheap in 2017 and sent to the provinces after bringing up the rear in two leadership contests - will be crowned king and become the UK’s seventh prime minister in the past 10 years.

That he does so without a whiff of examination, or opposition, says all you need to know about Labour.

Its reservoir of talent is bone dry. There is a hosepipe ban on skill. The barrel has been scraped.

This lightweight, self-appointed prime minister - the Messiah without a mandate - has given his views on the pressing issues, er, insisting he puts milk in a mug first because “I just have a feeling that it softens the teabag a bit and makes it stronger”, despite the laws of physics suggesting it would cool down water and therefore slow down the brewing process.

And Yorkshire puddings with Christmas dinner? Well “it should not be done”. This is the level to which we have plunged, folks.

Britain might be in the grip of a political and societal crisis but Burnham - less hauled off the substitutes bench, more dug up from the scrapheap - has refused to reveal anything of note. Not on defence, not on the ballooning and unsustainable welfare bill, not on house-building, not on the NHS (and he used to run the thing), not on much.

So the inevitably (nasty) surprises that lay ahead will be foisted upon a public that has not had the opportunity to challenge him, or been afforded the courtesy of a debate.

Labour is treating Britain with utter contempt. The rigged process that saw him overpromoted to PM was called a "leadership contest" - despite there being one name in the hat.

That the public he serves is totally in the dark and he has revealed no details of his plan is something that would shame the Kremlin and make Kim Jong Un, the Supreme Leader of North Korea, blush.

No wonder so many people are peeved and completely disillusioned with the donkeys who lead us.

Rather like Labour’s general election victory in 2024 being the result of the chaos of the Tories and the preceding 14 years, so it is true that Burnham’s unchallenged route to Number 10 is the upshot of Sir Keir Starmer’s calamitous time in charge.

Burnham’s only utterances so far have been to deride 40 years of what he describes as “neo-liberalism” - a dig at Margaret Thatcher’s success in neutering the unions and opening up Britain to the freedoms of a market economy, a path to growth and wealth followed by New Labour.

We all know where this ends.

We might know little about Burnham and his plans but, actually, we know a great deal.

His is a clarion call to the Labour Left and the snarling backbenchers to whom he is now beholden and whose eyes are swivelling at the prospect of more spending and more borrowing.

He doesn’t have the answers, and nor does Labour, which has an unblemished and unrivalled record when it comes to blowing taxpayers’ money.

Burnham’s tonic for Britain is a programme of renationalisation, arming the unions with more power, and rewarding the idle and indolent. It is the very worst type of socialism.

Labour - out of options left, right, and centre - might have guzzled the Kool-Aid but the country has not.

Soon-to-be ex-Chancellor Rachel Reeves hammered families and businesses into oblivion to the tune of £66bn of tax grabs in two budgets. The welfare bill is currently £333bn a year and rising.

Our defence and security is a global laughing stock, the roads are broken, the NHS is stuck in neutral, and the public held to ransom by a slothful public sector whose default answer is always no.

Taxpayers can take no more which is why cocky Burnham, who has refused to be challenged on his lurch to the Left, will soon find out the answer when, as he said, they are asked to “give a little bit more”.

We know what Labour wants - higher welfare spending and higher taxes to pay for it.

Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden revealed what we all know when a recent WhatsApp message was leaked.

He said: “Every meeting I have is 'who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others'.”

The truth is Burnham is too scared to lay it out in front of the public.

Why? Because it's a stitch up.

He's acting like the MP for Moscow, not the honourable member for Makerfield.