Pressure grows on Starmer to step aside for Burnham – UK politics live

Ministers say PM faces being forced out by party if he does not act, with one calling his departure inevitable

• Cabinet loyalists tell Starmer he has the weekend to set out timetable for exit

• ‘Within 10 mins, he’d nicked it’: illustrator on his ubiquitous image of Burnham

Jess Phillips, who quit as safeguarding minister last month, said Andy Burnham has “proved his hypothesis” that he could beat Reform in a constituency where many expected Reform to do very well.

“He beat off Reform absolutely soundly in an area that absolutely should have been delivered to Reform and if anyone else had stood there, we would not be having this conversation now,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.