Latest story here 👇 inews.co.uk/news/politics/bu…

Exclusive: Andy Burnham interview on how he will seek to revive the northern leg of HS2 using Crossrail style funding to ease the burden on the Treasury. He also talks about bringing utilities back under public ownership and wanting the biggest council house building programme of the “post-war period.” The pitch doubles as fiscal discipline. He argues that if you rein in the unregulated rents that inflate the housing benefit bill, you can then give the country “a grip on its costs”. To those who say he is careless in his approach to the bond markets, he retorts that “the reverse is true”. He claims that his plan for a ten-year investment plan to “bring down the revenue budget” is precisely “something that the bond markets might appreciate”.

New: Morgan McSweeney is back advising the Prime Minister – four months after he resigned over his role in the Mandelson scandal. The former No 10 chief of staff is advising Sir Keir Starmer in his moment of greatest peril, multiple government and Whitehall sources told The i Paper. McSweeney is helping the Prime Minister and has “never really gone away”, one minister said. “He has been on the end of the phone 24/7,” one source said. “He has been wargaming a leadership contest and believes Keir still has a chance if there are three or more [challengers] in the contest. He has been working out how the votes could go. It’s mad.” Exclusive with Richard Vaughn

With so much focus on Andy Burnham’s position on Brexit in the wake of Wes Streeting’s calls to rejoin the EU, I am reposting my story from Saturday, which revealed that he had agreed with his MP supporters in the Red Wall not to “go big on Europe”. liveapp.inews.co.uk/category…

EXCLUSIVE: First serving Cabinet minister endorses Andy Burnham’s bid to return to Parliament. In an interview with me for BBC Radio 4’s Week in Westminster, Bridget Phillipson said she has “certainly no intention to stand in the way of Andy being a candidate” in the Makerfield by-election. The education secretary described Burnham as a “strong candidate” - but also declined to rule herself out of running for prime minister in the future Full interview to be broadcast tomorrow at 11am when she also talks about imminent government equality guidance on single sex spaces. Other guests include @IainDale @ayeshahazarika @sarahjolney1 @matthew_elliott @claire_ainsley @rcolvile Write up in @theipaper 👇 liveapp.inews.co.uk/category…

NEW: Downing Street and Buckingham Palace have discussed how to prevent the leadership crisis currently engulfing Keir Starmer overshadowing the King’s Speech on Wednesday. W/@janemerrick23

After nearly nine years at The Sunday Times and 12 years on Sunday newspapers, I’m hugely excited by the challenge of a daily - and, yes, getting my weekends back. I can’t wait to get started!