University workers have more faith in new UK prime minister Andy Burnham than in his predecessor Keir Starmer, while the majority believe education secretary Bridget Phillipson is “performing badly”, according to a poll.
The former Manchester mayor is set to become prime minister on 20 July and is expected to appoint a new Cabinet, including likely shaking up the team in charge of education as universities continue to face financial challenges, resulting in mass layoffs.
New polling of about 7,000 University and College Union (UCU) members found that more than four in 10 (42 per cent) are more likely to support the Labour Party with Burnham as prime minister.
The figures suggest members had lost faith in Starmer, with under a third (29 per cent) saying they would have voted for the former prime minister if an election had been held in the past few weeks, despite almost half (45 per cent) of respondents having voted for the party in the 2024 general election.
While university staff may feel relatively positive about the new prime minister, Burnham is widely expected to prioritise supporting alternative options to university for young people, rather than saving the higher education sector.
In a speech in June, he pledged to end the “days of a school system configured entirely around the university route”.
Burnham’s Cabinet changes are expected to be wide-ranging after Starmer attempted to introduce some continuity into departments following years of upheaval. Bridget Phillipson and Jacqui Smith have overseen higher education for two years but are now seen as at risk of being moved on and replaced by figures closer to Burnham.
The poll, carried out at the end of June, found that 64 per cent of respondents believed education secretary Bridget Phillipson was “performing badly”.
UCU general secretary Jo Grady said the data suggest Burnham “has the potential to revive Labour”.
“Labour did so badly in May’s [local council] elections because it haemorrhaged voters to the Greens,” she said.
The polling found almost twice as many respondents thought the Green Party (29 per cent) better reflected their views on education than Labour (15 per cent).
“Our members, working in colleges and universities across the UK, are representative of the coalition of voters Burnham needs to build,” Grady continued.
“Labour’s current strategy of moving to the right on immigration, including attacking higher education by restricting international staff and student recruitment in a bid to attract Reform voters, failed dramatically in May. Burnham must now take a more progressive stance if he wants to build a coalition of voters that will enable him to win a general election.”
While Burnham has yet to announce his policy plans, there are doubts about how progressive he will be compared with the previous administration.
Burnham is reportedly considering appointing current home secretary Shabana Mahmood as chancellor.
During her time at the Home Office, Mahmood oversaw increasingly restrictive visa policies related to universities, including implementing a “visa brake” for international students from four countries and the introduction of stricter compliance rules that have made it riskier to recruit overseas students.
‘Higher education is one of the few sectors in which the UK remains a world leader and, when supported properly, has cascading economic benefits, both regionally and nationally,” Grady said. “The incoming prime minister must lift the economically harmful visa restrictions and invest in universities.”
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