FlashFeed

Full text

LONDON — A majority of adults in the U.K. believe Andy Burnham should call an election to win his own mandate to govern if he takes over from Keir Starmer as prime minister.

The POLITICO Poll by Public First found 51 percent of respondents say Burnham, who became an MP just last week, “should call and try to win an election to give his government legitimacy.” Only 34 percent believe he would lead a legitimate administration without a new general election.

The results sharpen a key question in the debate over the transition of power in the U.K., with Burnham all but certain to replace Starmer, who has already set a timetable for his resignation, in No. 10 Downing Street later this month.

Burnham is already facing demands from opposition politicians to call an election and let the country decide, on the basis that he was not even a candidate for parliament at the last general election, which Starmer’s Labour Party won by a landslide two years ago.

“Even if the public is tired of elections, our poll shows they would rather not see someone become the prime minister without going through one,” said Seb Wride, head of polling at Public First. “As with the Conservatives before them, the public responds badly to the idea that leaders of the country are decided in rooms they are not in.”

Burnham was mayor of Greater Manchester until last month when he won a special by-election to represent the parliamentary seat of Makerfield, in northwestern England, enabling him to put himself forward as a candidate to replace Starmer as Labour leader and PM.

With no other credible rivals likely to stand against him, Burnham seems set for a frictionless takeover, inheriting a huge army of more than 400 Labour MPs in the House of Commons and a massive working majority of 165. That would give him extensive powers to change the country, despite only having won the backing of fewer than 25,000 voters in Makerfield.

Burnham’s allies have dismissed calls for an election. He also said in a speech on Monday that his radical plans for reforming Britain were “consistent with” Labour’s 2024 manifesto, a broad hint that he does not believe another election is necessary.

Voters, it seems, are not convinced.

The Public First poll found 57 percent of respondents think a general election should be held to choose the next government, while 32 per cent said the current Labour government should “see out their term.” Just over half — 51 percent — said the country needed an election to sort out who is in charge.

Men, people aged 65 and over, and respondents in the East of England were the most likely to say “Andy Burnham should call and try to win a general election to give his government legitimacy.”

Among respondents who said they would rather see an election to choose the next government, 42 percent said the public should “always” be responsible for picking a new PM.

Outgoing British Prime Minister Keir Starmer stands beneath display of UAV drones as he delivers a speech in Berkshire, west of London, on the Defence Investment Plan on June 30, 2026. | Stefan Rousseau/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

“For Burnham, there is a risk that even before it exists his leadership is being challenged on its legitimacy,” said Wride. “The public has largely already assumed he will be Prime Minister. They do not see this as a contest, and it is likely the accusations that Burnham’s ideas are ‘untested’ will therefore land more heavily.”

The top reason given for not wanting an election was that it would be “too disruptive or costly,” supported by 37 percent of respondents, while 12 percent said they were “bored of voting in elections.”

The coronation

When it comes to the Labour leadership election, only 21 percent thought it would be “a genuine contest with a real chance for different candidates” while 64 percent said “the outcome is all but guaranteed.”

When asked who was most likely to become the next prime minister, 59 percent of respondents named Burnham, with only 2 percent naming former defense minister Al Carns.

Burnham won an endorsement of sorts for replacing Starmer, with 44 percent saying he has a stronger right to govern than Starmer because he “better reflects what the public wants now.” Some 25 percent said Starmer had a stronger right to lead the country because “he won the last general election.”

Labour has been lagging behind Nigel Farage’s Reform UK for more than a year in the headline polls. Recent analysis suggests Burnham would cut Reform’s lead if, as expected, he takes over the Labour leadership, but would still struggle to hang onto Labour’s Commons majority, even in the best-case scenarios.

When it comes to political support, respondents to the latest poll who plan to vote for Reform were the most likely to say Burnham needs to call an election to gain legitimacy: 75 percent of current Reform voters backed this approach.

Among Conservative voters, the proportion saying Burnham should call an election was 63 percent, while even one in three Labour supporters (34 percent), whose party stands to lose scores of MPs on current polling, think Burnham should seek a new mandate.

“Calling an election is undeniably a risk,” Wride said. “Even if we assume that Labour might get a small bounce from changing leader, Burnham has a difficult task ahead to enact popular changes while avoiding the criticism that he has no public mandate for those changes. Election polls remain fractured, and the result is far from predictable.”

NOTE: Public First surveyed 2,013 UK adults online, between June 26 and June 29.

Full text

Creative Assembly's recent What's Next livestream dropped a few bombshells about the upcoming 9.0 update and the Lords of the End Times DLC. It's good news for anyone who loves vampires and Chaos, and for anyone who has ever found themselves underwhelmed by the conclusion to an Immortal Empires campaign.

First things first, it was mentioned that the long-awaited siege rework will be part of the 9.1 patch, and so wasn't part of this latest discussion. Neither was any info about Neferata, who is currently being worked on. And patch 8.1 is still coming too, which we'll hear more about next week.

What was included was the reveal of new endgames themed around the End Times. Where previously an Immortal Empires campaign could build to an endgame crisis, these "do not satisfy what we wanted them to do" according to associate design director Sean Macdonald. Each one basically just spawned extra armies. Now, most of those crises are being shifted to the midgame where they'll serve to power-up factions, with End Times events as the dramatic conclusion to a campaign.

There are three of them in the works. One is an altered version of the existing Vermintide crisis, one is based on Nagash (a legendary lord who will be part of the Lords of the End Times DLC), and the one CA focused on during the livestream features Archaon, the best boy of Chaos. Whichever one you get will be introduced with a cinematic and a note explaining the campaign mechanics.

Archaon, for instance, has a huge ward save that makes him basically undefeatable until you weaken him by taking out his lieutenants. While you're doing that, he can devastate provinces after razing enough regions in them, meaning even if you take them back you won't be able to rebuild there until he's defeated. Archaon's also able to confederate with any other Chaos faction, not just the Warriors of Chaos he could previously. To help you fight back, once Archaon's invasion begins other forces will be more likely to ally against him, making for a climactic dust-up.

If you're playing a campaign as Archaon, you'll have the option of continuing as you were or becoming the endgame crisis yourself, gaining the ability to devastate provinces, each of which increases how powerful you are, and eventually leads to your victory.

On that subject, victory conditions are due for a rework in update 9.0 as well. Each legendary lord will get their own unique victory conditions, a checklist of objectives that might include ranking up thematically appropriate units, confederating with specific friendlies, constructing their most famous landmarks, and so on.

The Vampire Counts rework is good news for me, an undead player from way back, and anyone else who has been holding off on a replay until the bloodsuckers got some love. They've been basically untouched since The Grim and the Grave DLC came out 10 years ago, which is wild given how significantly some of the other factions have been freshened up in the meantime.

The rework includes changes to how recruitment works, so Raise Dead will let you replace lost troops based on how many people died in a battle, each corpse in a province becoming a potential unit for you. Vampires, meanwhile, will be more powerful but more difficult to find. You'll have to discover a lair in a settlement and then either capture it or send an agent there, after which you'll be able to customize the vampire you get, spending resources to choose their bloodline and so on. Also, Vlad and Isabella von Carstein can both become legendary lords if you play a campaign where one starts as a hero. Which is nice.

(Image credit: Games Workshop) For a finale, CA revealed another legendary lord coming with the Lord of the End Times DLC. In addition to Nagash and Boris Todbringer (and Neferata, who will presumably be the traditional "free-LC" released alongside the expansion), the Glottkin are joining the Warriors of Chaos. The brothers Glot are a trio of heavily mutated siblings marked by Nurgle, with the monstrous Ghurk so large he serves as a mount for his brothers Otto and Ethrac. Though a part of the Warriors of Chaos faction, the Glottkin will have access to Nurgle's daemons, as well as new units like the Putrid Blightkings, Basilisk, and Chaos Siege Giant.

That leaves one more Lord of the End Times still to be announced. I'm pretty sure it's going to be Thanquol, the Skaven Grey Seer infamous for failing upwards after being defeated every time he shows up in a Gotrek and Felix book, and going through rat-ogre sidekicks at a rate of knots. If it's not Thanquol, someone's going to have to check in on the guy who's been ratposting for over 200 days in anticipation.

Best Warhammer games : Fantasy epics

Best Warhammer 40K games : The complete ranking

Best Warhammer TTRPGs : Across all three settings

Best Warhammer 40K books : Grimdark novels