An experiment for Albanese to watch: British PM’s bid to stem working-class drift

August 16, 2026 — 5:00am

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Recently anointed UK Labour Prime Minister Andy Burnham has launched a controlled experiment in social democratic resistance against the international rise of populism. Less than a month after leaping from mayor of Manchester to member for Makerfield to fulfil his destiny of saving Labour from extinction, he is cunningly pre-empting the policies of his main opponents. Burnham’s aim is clearly to regain the trust of Labour’s traditional base: the working class which has been drifting to the right – and when the right fails them, even righter.

First he declared dead the Blair-era plan to get a majority of young Britons to university. His predecessor, Keir Starmer, had already replaced Tony Blair’s target of 50 per cent attendance with an ambition for two-thirds of children to go to university or take on an apprenticeship. Shortly after his elevation, Burnham went further, pledging a “major shake-up” which will “value the hard hat every bit as much as the graduation cap”.

You might remember versions of this policy from the likes of the Australian Liberal Party. The Morrison government’s Jobs-ready Graduates Package increased the cost of non-vocational university degrees while discounting vocational courses delivered at university, such as nursing and teaching, in an (ultimately failed) attempt to encourage students to choose the latter. One Nation, historically the party of the sans-degrees, emphasises vocational pathways in its platform. US Republican President Donald Trump celebrates blue-collar America as the “backbone of our great nation”.

In Australia, the Albanese government is still powering ahead with the Whitlam-era goal of getting Australian children to university, as though........

© Brisbane Times