Burnham to become Labour leader today - and urged to make Miliband chancellor

Andy Burnham should make Ed Miliband chancellor when he becomes prime minister next week, Harriet Harman has said.

The Labour peer repeated an earlier call that the energy secretary should be moved into Number 11 amid reports the home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, is now the favourite to replace Rachel Reeves.

Burnham to become Labour leader - follow live

Speaking on Sky's Electoral Dysfunction podcast, Baroness Harman said Mr Miliband "knows the Treasury", having worked as an adviser to Gordon Brown when he was chancellor, and "could actually hit the ground running in the most important job".

But she insisted Mr Burnham - who becomes Labour leader today - must have "political breadth" in his cabinet to keep the Labour Party together and "regional reflection" in his top team.

"You can't have all your cabinet members from London or all your cabinet members be from the North West. He's got to have a gender balance. You can't have the old boys' network where women don't get a look in. But above all, he's got to have people who can get on and do the job for him," she said.

The former cabinet minister also warned those appointed not to head off on holiday over the summer and said they should be in "their departments and sweating it out [...] because they have got to hit the ground running".

"At the end of the day, when you're a cabinet minister, when you're prime minister, you've just got to be on the job the whole time. And I think if it looks like an energetic, purposeful, committed team who's dealing with all the problems the country's got, while all the rest of us go on holiday, I think that's how it should be," she said.

Harman: Burnham must root out sexual harassment

Baroness Harman said the incoming PM also needs a "drive" to stamp out sexual harassment and bullying in a similar way to how Sir Keir Starmer tackled antisemitism when he became leader.

Various female ministers and MPs have complained about misogynistic briefings and a so-called "boys club" operating inside Labour.

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Baroness Harman also called for a crackdown on misogyny and sexual harassment in Westminster.

She said that government and parliament "need to set an example of being a decent workplace".

"The women members of the Parliamentary Labour Party have over the years been driving forward the argument that there's got to be protection against sexual harassment for young women staffers, women researchers, and also indeed women MPs," she said.

"And [they are] trying to improve the system so that you tackle the impunity of those at the top to carry on like this."

Baroness Harman pointed to Sir Keir's drive to tackle antisemitism at all levels of the Labour Party and said: "I think what's been called for is a similar drive about how men in power treat women in the party."

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