JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
A peaceful transfer of power presided over by the monarch. It's supposed to happen in the United Kingdom every five years or so, but it has been happening much more frequently. Today, Andy Burnham became the seventh British prime minister in a decade, succeeding Keir Starmer, who was ousted by his own Labour Party. Let's go now to NPR's Lauren Frayer. She's at our bureau in London. Hi there.
LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: Hi, Juana.
SUMMERS: So, Lauren, walk us through the transfer of power that happened today.
FRAYER: Yeah, it's a now very familiar scene. A wooden lectern gets dragged out in front of 10 Downing Street. The outgoing leader stands in front of their staff and gives a farewell address.
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KEIR STARMER: It has been the privilege of my life to serve you and this great country as prime minister.
FRAYER: That was, of course, Keir Starmer before he headed off to Buckingham Palace to tender his resignation to King Charles. He said he's leaving with, quote, "good grace and a smile." Behind him applauding were many of the same lawmakers who turned on him and backed Andy Burnham to return to national politics and rescue the ruling Labour Party, which has been hemorrhaging support to populists both on the right and the left.
SUMMERS: And tell us a bit about Burnham. I mean, I don't think most of us have heard of him until recently.
FRAYER: Yeah. I mean, his name has long been familiar domestically in U.K. politics. He served in the governments of Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. But it was really in local politics as the mayor of Greater Manchester, England, in northern England, that he won fame domestically. He helped Manchester become one of the fastest-growing economies in the U.K. He also had a side gig as a DJ in Manchester's indie music scene. He does these snazzy social media videos that have been compared to New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani's. And polls show voters like him. They find him charismatic, which is why Labour swapped him in amid Starmer's lackluster approval ratings.
SUMMERS: And what do we know about his plans? What does he plan to do differently from Starmer?
FRAYER: So he and Starmer are from the same center-left Labour Party. They have roughly the same politics. This afternoon, Burnham fired Starmer's Cabinet, but then rehired some of them back in different positions. Former Energy Minister Ed Miliband will be the foreign secretary. Former Defense Minister John Healey - a fellow northerner, incidentally - has been named chancellor, which is kind of like Treasury secretary, probably the most important job.
SUMMERS: OK, listening to you list those names off - same party, same faces, different jobs - what's different?
FRAYER: Yeah. So in his first speech as prime minister, Burnham acknowledged that the U.K. has had this sort of revolving door of prime ministers, mostly Conservatives, until Starmer. Burnham pledged to be a, quote, "circuit breaker" to that.
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PRIME MINISTER ANDY BURNHAM: I know people at home are fed up with politics. I hear you. And I want to be honest with you. We have not been good enough. And we need to be better.
FRAYER: He said his whole generation of politicians - he's 56 years old - needs to, quote, "raise their game." And he also said he's going to devolve power to municipal and regional authorities away from the capital, London.
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BURNHAM: We will take power out of here and carry it into every postcode in the land so that they can do more - and in doing more, build a new economy.
FRAYER: To that end, he's opening a branch of Downing Street up north in Manchester, and that's unprecedented.
SUMMERS: Lauren, Burnham clearly has experience in domestic politics, but what about on the global stage?
FRAYER: Yeah. So one of the first phone calls Burnham had today after taking office was with President Trump. He also spoke with President Zelenskyy of Ukraine. And in a phone call with the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, he also mentioned Ukraine. He said he's got a, quote, "ironclad" commitment to Ukraine. So that is an indication of at least one of his priorities in foreign policy.
SUMMERS: NPR's Lauren Frayer in London, thanks so much.
FRAYER: You're welcome.
(SOUNDBITE OF POST MALONE SONG, "CHEMICAL") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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