Makerfield BBC by-election debate live: Burnham and Reform’s controversy-hit Kenyon to face off in first hustings

Andy Burnham says he would begin to transform the crumbling social care system this year if he became prime minister, including looking at inheritance tax and care charges to help fund it.

In an interview with The Guardian, the Greater Manchester mayor said: “It is urgent, the need to fix social care, and I personally would look at all of the kind of implications of that in relation to inheritance tax and care charges and everything. I wouldn’t flinch from it.”

In recent years he has talked about replacing inheritance tax with a progressive “care levy” to fund a national care service.

He accused Westminster of “flinching away” from tackling difficult policy problems, saying politicians must be willing to take on “the weight of the system” that stands in the way of radical change.

Burnham first tried to change the social care system when he was Labour’s health secretary in 2009, when he planned a levy on estates to pay for universal social care.

He suggested bringing forward the Casey review, which is due to draw up proposals for change from 2028. He said he would like it published by the end of this year, focusing on measures that could be implemented quickly.

Political editor David Maddox says Andy Burnham needs Blair’s winning formula but must simultaneously prove to a sceptical Labour Party that he has left the Blair days behind:

Labour has not learnt lessons from the Tories on “changing the leader at the top”, a minister has said, as he noted that “entitlement is not a qualification for leadership”.

The business secretary said: “I don’t think we’ve learnt the lessons of the Tory party in government, where every time there was a problem that was experienced with their government, there was only one solution, and that’s changing the leader at the top.

“There was never any acceptance in the Tory party at the time that the challenges that they had were related to a programme of government… and they always just felt that changing the person at the top would solve it.”

Mr Kyle expressed his “frustration” over his party’s failure to learn that lesson and criticised colleagues who “blame one person” and fail to “accept responsibility for our collective endeavour as a government”.

Labour’s Andy Burnham and Reform UK’s Robert Kenyon are due to face on another in a special edition of BBC Question Time ahead of the Makerfield by-election.

They will be joined by other candidates from the Conservatives, the Lib Dems and the Greens.

The show starts at 10.40pm on BBC One, just after the 10 o’clock news, and it will also be available to watch on BBC iPlayer, from 9pm.

You can listen to the episode live from 9pm on the BBC Sounds app, or follow the coverage on the BBC News website/app.