If this was the start of Andy Burnham’s challenge for the leadership of the Labour party, it could barely have gone worse.
A remark in an interview about “getting beyond this thing of being in hock to the bond markets” sparked a storm of criticism this week from Labour colleagues and investors in the City.
Downing Street was not only angry at his manoeuvring for the Labour leadership on the eve of the party’s conference in Liverpool. UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and others also pointed to Burnham’s apparent disregard for spending prudence, three years to the week that Liz Truss torpedoed her own premiership with an uncosted “mini” Budget that sent bond markets into a tailspin and increased the cost of mortgages up and down the land.