In Conversation With... Andy Burnham, New Town Theatre, Edinburgh Festival Fringe

 The interviewer was Neil Findlay, a Labour MSP until last year and seen as being on the left of the party.  The interviewee was Andy Burnham, now Mayor of Manchester but a Labour leadership contender not so long ago, and also seen as being on the left.  So this was always going to be more cosy chat than probing questioning.

Burnham's a good speaker, fluent and amusing, but always making his point.  He had valid criticisms of the current Scottish Government, especially over their mania for centralisation.  His plea for more cross party dialogue and cooperation, but excluding the tories, makes sense in our partisan times.  It was good to hear someone telling the truth about the disasters of the eighties and how we are now reaping the problems sewn back then by short termist populism.  And he outlined some of the excellent initiatives taking place in Manchester, particularly around homelessness.  His genuine hatred of the current breed of ukip-soundalike tories is something we need to see more of. If the Labour Party was a bit more in his image I might even consider them a viable alternative for my vote.  But it's not.

And sometimes what's not said is as important as what is.  Burnham has a dubious past voting record, such as favouring the Iraq War, and not voting to properly regulate fracking.  In questions from the audience he tried to glaze over Labour's refusal to contemplate negotiating with the EU to at least return to the single market, saying that those arguments were over - seeming happy to effectively disenfranchise the growing majority that favour reversing the 2016 disaster.

And there were hints of yet another southern politician who thinks he knows better what Scotland wants than the people who live her.  Funnily enough almost all of the audience members who asked questions came from down south - including the man weho welcomed Burnham to Edinburgh, having just said he was up here from Herts!  What strange times we live in.

I liked Burnham as a speaker, he has a lot of sound ideas in his social policies, and he would be a far better labour Leader than Starmer.  But he still feels out of touch with people in this country.