Andy Burnham opens fire at Labour's 'current leadership' over the Welfare Bill

Relations between Andy Burnham and Harriet Harman must be disintegrating quickly. After the leadership favourite abstained during last night’s vote on the Welfare Bill, Burnham attempted to his logic on the World at One. Burnham said his mind hadn’t changed and he has always been in favour of a ‘reasoned amendment’ — but he was unhappy with how the vote went:

‘Let me be clear: this was still a compromise position and it wasn’t a strong enough position for me. But I as leader firstly would have opposed this bill outright last night and would do so if elected leader.

‘And number two though, I faced a choice: did I, having made the party move its position, did I then defy the compromise position, and I wasn’t prepared to split the party and make the job of opposition even harder.

‘I’m putting myself forward to lead the party, it doesn’t seem to be right to be therefore splitting it.’