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On Friday 31 July, Andy Burnham made history, even if he did so in his trademark style. He triggered a process that points in a genuinely radical direction. Yet its destination remains unmapped and uncertain, leaving potential supporters broadly sympathetic yet sceptical.
He was speaking in Sheffield. The occasion was the launch of his far-reaching, seven-page Cabinet Statement that proposes to decentralise power across England. It promises legislation that will empower regional mayors to raise their own income as well as having a share of tax revenues as a right. Its ambition is to “fundamentally re-wire the way our country works”. The Prime Minister acknowledged that the Cabinet paper points towards “a new constitutional settlement” and “will increase the case for … a written constitution”, and “a new clear set of principles about how this country should be run.”
In saying this Burnham unlocked the safety-catch on the fundamental feature of British rule: that the totality of its arrangements remains uncodified and informal. A feature that ensures our government belongs to those who govern us and not to the people as citizens.
It’s important to say that Burnham did not pull the trigger. But until that July day, no British prime minister when in office has ever endorsed the possibility of a “written constitution” in a positive fashion – a fact which makes this a watershed moment.
Indeed, from what I can work out, no prime minister when in office ever used the phrase ‘written constitution’ until 1989, when Margaret Thather was obliged to respond to a letter sent to her from the constitutional and electoral reform campaign group Charter 88. Its lead signature was Lady Ewart Biggs. I should admit that I drafted it.

Having been on Reform UK’s target list as a winnable seat, Andy Burnham’s new constituency is a microcosm of Brexit Britain and the failed legacies of Thatcher and Blair. Peter Jukes and Hardeep Matharu paid a visit ahead of its seminal by-election
Peter Jukes and Hardeep Matharu
Our request: “Basic rights to be entrenched in law; accountable and open government; electoral reform; regional power and a written constitution.”
Thatcher replied that, “The government consider that our present constitutional arrangements continue to serve us well…” with her unmistakable sense of a Royal ‘we’. She added: “the government does not feel that a written constitution in itself changes or guarantees anything: Everything depends on how constitutional guarantees, whether written or unwritten, are interpreted and applied in daily life.” An important observation I will return to.
Prime Minister Burnham faces a barrel-full of major issues: economic, diplomatic, military, environmental and social. Why should he add to these by unleashing the historic process of a written constitution? What is the problem to which it is the answer?
The problem has three parts: First, how do we decentralise the British state to release and empower regional judgment and creativity? Or, to put it negatively, how do we stop what is now the husk of an Empire State throttling our democracy in the all-too-familiar way it is programmed to do? Second, how do we protect and enhance our rights and freedom as citizens? Or, to put it negatively, how do we reverse the attacks on, for example, our right to protest, to privacy on the internet, and to vote? Third, and crucially, how do we restore popular consent to how we are governed?
All constitutions, whether written or not, contain the rules for changing the rules. In so doing they establish three things:
1. Relations of power between different part of society: who can do what to whom
2. The liberty and rights of citizens
3. What kind of society the country aspires to be
The British state is undergoing a breakdown on all three fronts. Burnham seems most concerned about the first. Many activists care most abo…