Burnham to scrap digital ID as he prepares to become PM

Andy Burnham’s first major policy pledge will be to scrap the government-issued digital ID plan for all British adults as he moves into Downing Street on Monday, a sign that his team is treating cost of living pressures as the test of his new premiership.

Burnham is due to replace Sir Keir Starmer after a meeting with King Charles III, following a run in which the vast majority of Labour MPs nominated him to take over. He returned to Parliament through the Makerfield by-election last month after previously serving as mayor of Greater Manchester.

Lucy Powell, Labour’s deputy leader, set out the line Burnham is now expected to walk: he will stand by Labour’s 2024 election manifesto but govern in a more forceful way. Speaking on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, Powell said Burnham would be “bolder and more ambitious” and that his leadership would be about “clearing the decks” of distractions from the cost of living and the economy.

That framing matters because it suggests the first room for manoeuvre will come not through an open break with manifesto language, but through how narrowly Burnham chooses to read it. Scrapping digital ID is being presented by his team as a “reset of priorities”, with Powell saying it would let him keep a “laser focus” on the cost of living. Burnham’s office has also linked the decision to the “daily priorities” facing people across the country.

The move gives Burnham an early opportunity to stretch Labour’s programme without formally abandoning it. A promise to stay loyal to the manifesto leaves space to downgrade projects that are not seen as central to household bills, wages and growth, even if those plans were previously part of the government’s wider reform agenda.

Kemi Badenoch has already moved to frame Burnham as a danger to discipline rather than a reset. The Conservative leader branded him a “people pleaser”, warned that his plans were “airy fairy” and accused him of not knowing “what the country’s priorities are”. Her attack lands at the point where Burnham is trying to define himself against Starmer’s administration while still claiming continuity with Labour’s election pledges.

The digital ID reversal is likely to be the first test of how far that balancing act can go. If Burnham can drop one headline plan on the grounds of focus and priority, the next pressure points will be whichever other manifesto commitments he decides can wait.