Burnham’s missing advisers spell trouble for UK investors

Andy Burnham’s absent advisers are a warning sign for UK investors, affirms the CEO of one of the world’s largest independent financial advisory organisations.

 
Nigel Green of deVere Group’s comments come as a month into Andy Burnham’s premiership, the economic team he was supposed to bring with him is, seemingly, nowhere to be seen, it has been reported.

Lord Jim O’Neill, former Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane, and ex-Office for Budget Responsibility chair Richard Hughes were all reportedly advising Burnham before he took power.

The deVere CEO says: “None have taken a formal role. An Autumn Budget date has already been set.

“A government cannot promise financial credibility on the back of three respected economists and then fail to bring a single one of them through the door.

“Investors were told this. They believed it. Right now, it simply does not appear true.”

O’Neill’s absence is reportedly tied to something specific. The former Goldman Sachs executive is said to be holding back specifically over Burnham’s refusal to rule out a wealth tax, and over his own desire to keep control of his business interests and shareholdings in financial groups.

“I doubt this is not indecision. It’s a direct response to a policy question Burnham has had every opportunity to answer and has chosen not to. This silence is not accidental, and it’s not free,” comments Nigel Green.

Labour backbenchers who backed Burnham’s leadership, including figures who publicly signed a letter pushing the idea, are calling for a 2% annual tax on assets above £10m, a policy they claim could raise tens of billions of pounds.

More moderate voices within the party, some tied to the rival leadership camp around Wes Streeting, want a narrower approach: equalising capital gains tax with income tax, with allowances protecting genuine investment.

Andy Haldane himself has warned publicly against treating any wealth tax as what he called a cash cow.

“This is not a minor policy disagreement tucked away in a select committee,” explains the deVere CEO.

“It’s a live fracture inside the governing party, playing out in public, a month before a Budget, with the very economists who might have helped resolve it sitting on the sidelines instead.”

Nigel Green argues the practical consequence for investors is immediate, not theoretical.

“Markets don’t wait for clarity before pricing risk,” he says. “They price the absence of it.

“Every week Burnham goes without ruling a wealth tax in or out, international investors holding UK equities, gilts, or business assets are forced to assume the worst case by default, because that is the only rational response to genuine silence from Downing Street.”

The retention of Neil Amin-Smith, previously an adviser to Rachel Reeves, does little to change that calculation.

“Keeping one adviser with Treasury experience is not a substitute for the specific credibility O’Neill, Haldane, and Hughes were meant to provide.

“Burnham’s own allies built his economic reputation around their proximity before the leadership contest. This reputation cannot survive on a single holdover appointment once the people it was built on decline to show up.”

He is blunt about what happens if the standoff continues.

Nigel Green concludes that the coming weeks, running into the Autumn Budget, represent a genuine test.

“Burnham has a narrow window to settle this before markets settle it for him,” he says.

“Stop leaving investors to guess.

“Every day this drags on without resolution makes it harder for anyone serious to treat this government’s economic credibility as more than a promise still waiting to be kept