Summary of cabinet changes

Thanks to Election Maps for publishing a summary of Andy Burnham's cabinet changes in an easy-to-understand table.




















There were one or two good appointments. The replacement of Rachel Reeves by John Healy might just mean that the new PM is serious about funding defence properly and the appointment of Wes Streeting as defence secretary may confirm that.

Streeting is the Labour party's equivalent of Michael Gove - a politician who is hated by most of those on his own side and loathed by almost everyone else but is nevertheless one of the most competent people the party concerned has.

(If it is true, as has been rumoured, that Rachel Reeves was offered the post of defence secretary I can only assume this was a way of inducing her to walk. The thought of Reeves having to make the case to John Healy for defence spending is almost as funny as Nigel Farage having to fight for his political life against a comedian with a bin on his head, but for that very reason I can't see that she would ever have accepted the position.)

Those sacked include several of the most egregious walking disasters in the Starmer administration, but also two of the few people in it who I had any time for.

Burnham also managed the difficult feat of sacking one of the worst members of the Starmer government (Steve Reed) and replacing him with someone even less appropriate. (Angela Rayner as housing minister? Really? There might have been an argument for the role it had been rumoured she would get, sorting out social care.

I have to live in this country, so I want Burnham's government to succeed in Britain's interest. But overall I am not optimistic. The country faces many challenges which would be difficult whoever was in power. And as Kemi says, Sir Keir Starmer wasn't the main problem: the Labour party is the problem.

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