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Cartoon by E. Baron Cartoons
UK PM Andy Burnham Breaks Pledge On Tax & Appoints Net-Zero Zealot ‘Red Ed’ Miliband as Foreign Secretary
- A Radical Dispatch
1) Andy Burnham Coronated as UK PM
The UK’s Labour government has coronated new prime minister Andy Burnham to replace Keir Starmer, without calling a general election. This is possible due to Burnham winning an internal selection to become leader of the Labour party. The leader of the party with the most seats in parliament is automatically invited by the king to become Prime Minister.
Upon assuming the role, Burnham immediately reshuffled his cabinet. The changes made can be seen in the graphic below.
Nigel Farage, whom multiple surveys have consistently indicated would win in any fair election, has called for an immediate general election, stating that Burnham has no mandate to govern.
Click to play:
Nigel Farage: “You cannot make the biggest change in British politics in 40 years without a mandate from the British people and it will be only decent, right and proper to call a general election on that issue and to do it now.”
2) Ed Miliband as Foreign Secretary
Among the more surprising appointments by Burnham, and one that has specifically upset the Americans, is his choice of ‘Red Ed’ Miliband as Foreign Secretary.
This means that Ed Miliband is now in charge of our foreign Secret Intelligence Service SIS, colloquially known as Mi6.
Such as prospect has understandably worried the Americans.
The Times reports 21st July 2026:
Click to play:
Maajid Nawaz for WARRIOR CREED: "...Ed Miliband as Foreign Secretary. You can see the photo on your screens. That photo, by the way, I'll blow it up for you, is genuine. We can assure you we would not be publishing this photo of Ed Miliband attempting to eat a sandwich if it were not genuine. Everyone in the United Kingdom knows that is indeed a real photo.
The point here is that man, as you can see pictured on your screens now, is our new Foreign Secretary. Why the photo in particular is relevant is because of the...there's another one for you, it's because of the implication. As Lee Anderson MP states, which you can see now in the middle of your screens: 'Ed Miliband is now in charge of (our secret intelligence service, colloquially known as) MI6. Let that sink in.'
This man is in charge of Britain's intelligence, Foreign Intelligence Service. And that is a problem. It is a problem because the photo itself, though of course comedic and tongue-in-cheek, what it depicts is an image of a man that lacks control of his faculties, in a more nuanced sense.
And that is as exemplified by the concerns that the Americans have raised, which is on your screens now. It's not just us picking on him from over a photo, all right? Though, the photo is relevant. It's - to the actual point - where diplomacy comes in.
The Americans have have made a serious point. The Times reports 21st July 2026, 'Ed Miliband has been appointed as Foreign Secretary. The US administration has already let it be known that it has significant reservations about Miliband.'
Now, what those reservations may well be, probably include the fact that Ed Miliband was known as Red Ed, born to a devout Marxist father...Ed Miliband is similarly of that view. He was known as Red Ed when in government. The Americans are probably concerned that we've just appointed Red Ed as the head of our Foreign Intelligence Service."
One suspects that Miliband lacks the testicular fortitude required to make important decisions on crucial geostrategic matters of state.
Click to play:
Jeremy Paxman: “People think you’re just not tough enough!”
Miliband: “Well I, let me tell you. Right? Let me tell you. OK. [audience laughter]”
Paxman: “Go on.”
Miliband: “Let, let me tell you. Am I tough enouss, tough enough? Hell yes I’m tough enough.”
This concern is not without substance. As former prime minister Boris Johnson - who has many of his own faults - reminded the nation, as former Labour leader Ed Miliband’s indecision and lack of spine unnecessarily prolonged Syria’s horrific civil war.
The Telegraph reports 20th July 2026:
“…His share of responsibility for one of the most calamitous foreign policy blunders in recent times is a terrible warning of what kind of a foreign secretary he will turn out to be.
Britain’s allies – particularly America and the Gulf states – will probably be dismayed by his promotion…They will remember what happened in August 2013, when the blood-soaked dictator of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, inflicted hideous deaths on at least 1,400 civilians, including hundreds of women and children, using sarin nerve gas.
Miliband, then leader of the Labour opposition, did more than anyone else to prevent Britain from responding to this atrocity in the only effective way, which was by taking military action.
Once Britain had abdicated, America did the same. Whereupon Assad proceeded to gas his people over and over again, burning out the lungs of women and children, until his chemical massacres were finally stopped five years later by the military method that Miliband had always opposed…
…After Assad’s atrocity, David Cameron, then prime minister, proposed enforcing the international prohibition on chemical weapons by joining America and France in destroying as much of Syria’s stockpile as possible. After equivocating for a few days, Miliband decided to oppose the necessary motion in the Commons. His speech on August 29, 2013, was a masterpiece of moral evasion and vacuity.
…the Commons agreed with Miliband: thanks to a revolt by equally irresponsible Conservative and Lib Dem MPs, nothing was done.
Assad was soon gassing his people all over again...Donald Trump, then in his first term as president, struck back with cruise missiles that destroyed a fifth of Syria’s air force in one night.
A year later, Assad targeted Douma, a rebel-held area of Damascus, gassing hundreds, of whom almost 50 were killed. This time, Trump retaliated in concert with France and Britain. All three countries launched air and missile strikes against Syrian chemical weapon facilities – and they were completely successful.
… Sure enough, a senior Trump administration official told The Telegraph after Miliband’s appointment that the new foreign secretary risked being a ‘point of friction’ in the Anglo-American relationship.”
This is something that many of us will not quickly forget. We remember that precise moment when PM Cameron’s motion to join the US-led coalition against Assad was voted down in parliament.
Click to play:
“Do not forget Syria. Keep in mind it was this same Ed Miliband who as leader of the Labour Party voted alongside the Tories and others to delay our action against Assad in Syria, which delayed the resolution of that conflict for roughly five years with multiple thousands of deaths in the meanwhile. It was a tragic decision made under Cameron. Parliament, if you recall, rejected the attempted action in Syria. And it led to horrific consequences. Of course, eventually it required Trump’s first term to come along to resolve the situation in Syria. We did eventually join the American coalition and managed to push back against Assad. The eventual result was Assad was overthrown by the Syrian people. Ed Miliband, as was confirmed even by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who has many of his own faults, but on this point of Syria he posted out an article that was in The Telegraph, reminding people of this, that Ed Miliband was among the faction that voted down our attempted joining of that coalition early to defend the Syrian people against the tyrant Assad. Now that Assad has been overthrown and the new government of Syria led by Prime Minister Ahmad al-Shara is making progress in stabilising that country but, as well, in its own diplomatic recognition around the world. That criticism, the particular criticism of Ed Miliband being on the wrong side of the Syria debate resonates now a lot more. And it wouldn’t have been relevant if not for Andy Burnham, having resurrected that man in a post-liberated Syria context as somebody who was on the wrong side of the Syria civil war. And now he’s in charge of our country’s foreign policy. And we now have relations with the new Syria government, who will know and remember Ed Miliband’s position against them in supporting their tyrant Assad when he was quelling the popular Syrian uprising.”
3) Broken Pledge on VAT & Digital ID
As well as appointing certain undesirables to high office, new prime minister Andy Burnham has already broken a key tax pledge made on his opening day at 10 Downing Street.
Burnham announced that he would scrap Starmer’s plans for digital ID, a decision that reflected a Labour u-turn designed to fend off the populist revolt.
Burnham promised to use the savings made by scrapping digital ID to go on to make tax cuts in Value Added Tax (VAT). This was yet another policy appropriation by Burnham designed to fend off the populist revolt. But so far, so good.
So confident was Burnham in this plan that he had been briefing his team to make sure that they regularly announced how each shiny new policy pledge would be funded, exactly as he had done with this one concerning VAT.
The Times reports 21st July 2026:
And the tax cut in VAT rates was being touted by his new Chancellor John Healey as bringing “hope”.
The Times reports 21st July 2026:
Corporate media were doting over this announcement with their usual lack of due diligence. Sky News broadcaster Sophie Ridge was among those who appeared to take Burnham’s announcement at face value instead of scrutinising it.
But all of this quickly started to unravel after former Labour minister Darren Jones decided to publicly remind Burnham via social media that the digital ID scheme had not been funded. This meant that scrapping it would not provide the savings needed to cut VAT.
The Times reports 21st July 2026:
Such a development caused fury inside Burnham’s new government.
Leaving the new prime minister looking like he was completely out of his depth.
Cartoon by Ben Jennings.
Reform’s Robert Jenrick then went on to provide a detailed breakdown of how his party would not only be able to go further than Burnham’s tax cut, but also explained how this would be funded, by scrapping Net Zero.
Credit where credit is due. We agree with what Jenrick has said above.
4) But Is Digital ID Really Being Scrapped?
Beyond Burnham’s VAT funding debacle, there remain questions around whether digital ID is really being scrapped, or whether this announcement was a smokescreen to scrap the name but keep the infrastructure that brings it about.
Guido reports 21st July 2026:
The problem is that an entire digital ID infrastructure does appear to already be in place.
The UK government’s One Login system provides a unified point of entry for citizens to access all relevant government information required.
The issue is not this system in itself, no doubt many much needed efficiencies can be made. Instead, the issue centres around who the backend control for these incredibly powerful government software systems is eventually handed to, especially when one major private company that is already involved in such backend access to departmental government data, namely Peter Thiel’s Palantir, makes no secret of its ambition in this regard.
As such, we at Radical Media go further than the Guido political blog did above. Many people may not know this, but the UK has already…
