Andy Burnham calls for ‘collective spirit in politics’ during Glastonbury festival appearance

Andy Burnham has called for ‘collective spirit in politics’ while appearing at Glastonbury festival.

The Mayor of Greater Manchester received an ovation from the crowd while taking part in a panel discussion in the Left Field tent on Saturday.

Calling for a ‘rewiring’ of the British political system, Burnham said: “Britain needs to gets rid of the old ways, get around a table and agree a programme for political change, a collaborative spirit. Then we’ll have a progressive government at the next general election.”

He went on to say: “Good, safe housing should be a general rule in this country. Social care should be provided on NHS terms. And we need to renationalise rail and buses.”

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Burnham then went on to discuss the UK’s “silent mental health crisis - brought about by the nature of life now where people are worrying themselves to sleep”.

He finished by saying: “As our crises have got bigger, our politics has got smaller. If our political system was a computer, we’d have taken steps to stop it being hacked. We need to make power flow differently throughout the land.”

It comes after Burnham recently spoke about the rail strikes, saying that Labour should not "fall into the trap" of criticising them.

The 52-year-old said it was "entirely their right" for RMT members to walk out, while also accusing the conservatives of ‘demonising’ workers.

Speaking on the BBC's PM programme, he said: "I will never be the kind of politician that criticises anybody for fighting for their income, for their family, to pay the rent.

"It’s entirely their right in difficult times to do that."

Commenting on the Tories, he added: "There’s a thought in my mind that they actually want these strikes, like they wanted the controversy about the Rwanda plane,” he said.

"I don’t think Labour politicians should fall into the trap of criticising workers that are fighting for their incomes in the middle of a cost of living crisis.”