Critics say the move, which will keep PC Harper’s killers in jail, leaves number of prison spaces ‘too close to the bone’

PC Andrew Harper’s killers will remain behind bars after a critical intervention by Andy Burnham, but the move has led to warnings that overcrowded prisons will be left “one major event away from disaster”.

Announcing a U-turn on the early release scheme after weeks of intense pressure, Burnham said he understood “how strongly people feel about this issue”.

Campaigners welcome plan to bring IPP sentences to a close but say the move is long overdue

Campaigners have hailed Andy Burnham’s pledge to bring an end to indefinite jail terms as “a day that thousands of families have spent years fighting for”.

The prime minister has said he will “end the injustice” of imprisonment for public protection (IPP) sentences during this parliament, meaning people will no longer be trapped indefinitely under a sentence abolished more than a decade ago.

Labour has promised a ‘fundamental rewiring’ of power. But some areas are years into their devolution journey while others scramble to get started

Apart from the joyous hyperactivity that comes with suddenly making it to No 10, there are good reasons why Andy Burnham seems to be a prime minister in a hurry. If he decides that his first term is going to run to its maximum length, he has three years, which is a maddening time-frame: too long for him to just tinker here and there, set out his long-term vision and then ask the electorate for permission to do more, but probably too short to start and finish many of his key projects. His chosen solution, it seems, is a mixture of the strategies he would use for each approach, which includes running at some issues at breakneck pace.

So it is with his specialist subject: devolution for England. The huge changes now afoot actually began under Keir Starmer, with the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act passed earlier this year. Areas that previously had two tiers of local government will see them replaced with new unitary councils. But the most historic move centres on regional mayors – what the government calls “strategic authorities” – and a shift that the Whitehall PR machine is hyping up as a “fundamental rewiring of the way our country works, surrendering power that for too long has been held in Westminster and Whitehall”. In principle, this is unquestionably worth celebrating. But it also gives rise to a whole range of increasingly urgent and awkward questions.

John Harris is a Guardian columnist

PM says anyone convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter, will be excluded from the scheme

PC Andrew Harper’s killers will remain behind bars after Andy Burnham announced changes to the early release scheme aimed at easing prison overcrowding, saying he understood “how strongly people feel about this issue”.

The prime minister said anyone convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter, would be excluded from the scheme, which would have made two of the officer’s killers eligible for early release. It comes after Burnham previously ordered a review of plans for the early release of thousands of killers, rapists and sex offenders from prison in September.

PM says anyone convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter, will be excluded from the scheme

PC Andrew Harper’s killers will remain behind bars after Andy Burnham announced changes to the early release scheme aimed at easing prison overcrowding, saying he understood “how strongly people feel about this issue”.

The prime minister said anyone convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter, would be excluded from the scheme, which would have made two of the officer’s killers eligible for early release. It comes after Burnham previously ordered a review of plans for the early release of thousands of killers, rapists and sex offenders from prison in September.

As economic circumstances worsen, the PM’s commitments have left him and the chancellor in a tight spot

When Andy Burnham made his first speech after returning as an MP, he promised that as prime minister he would oversee “the most significant change moment in our politics for 40 years”. His style, direction and communication has been a big shift from Keir Starmer’s approach, but as he heads into the autumn, the new prime minister faces some very similar problems.

With an early budget in late October, and worsening economic circumstances, Burnham has made promises and commitments that put him in a tight spot. Here are some of the constraints over the coming months that Burnham and the chancellor, John Healey, must contend with in their autumn budget.

The former UK prime minister is still shaping politics (even if he doesn’t want to interfere). He talks about keeping his temper, staying fit – and why he won’t pay £90 for a Scotland football shirt

It’s a Monday in August and as England burns in dystopian heat, Gordon Brown and I are in his office at the top of his house in North Queensferry, overlooking the moody waters of the Firth of Forth. It’s hard to recall the top of my own sauna-like house in London as we stand here in the cool, wearing wool suits and necessary socks, my coat slung over the back of a chair. “I was watching Raith Rovers – the local football team – on Saturday,” Brown says, “and it was really cold. There was a wind blowing in from the sea.” He asks if I’ve heard the famous joke – “Scotland’s only got two seasons: July and winter”– then chuckles. It’s one of his favourites. (I’ll hear him tell it three times today.)

That’s not to say Fife has been untouched by the multiple heatwaves. They had a few sunny days. One hit 24C – “a shock”, Brown says, July temperatures typically being 15-17C. He stood in his kitchen and considered the modest patch of grass at the back of the house. “I never imagined being out in the garden in the summer. I never imagined it because it’s either raining or too cold.” Once out, he found himself battling a “very dangerous” nest of wasps. One family member was stung, then there was the rigmarole of specialists in thick gloves and protective suits undertaking its removal. By the time that was done, the sun had gone in.

Exclusive: PM also warns his ministers against trying to influence vote when bill returns to Commons next month

Andy Burnham has told Labour MPs that he will not cast a vote when the assisted dying bill returns to the Commons next month, to avoid influencing the debate.

While supporters of the measure welcomed his move, No 10 officials said the prime minister had no wish to affect the process in either direction, and was just doing what he thought was best to allow MPs to reach their own collective view.

The UK prime minister clearly still adores the band. Perhaps he’s attracted to songs about sham justice and murderous meat factories, shot through with nihilism and exquisite despair

As an origin story, Andy Burnham: Smiths Fan has a lot going for it. It’s plainly authentic: he can name the time he saw them live (Salford University, Queen Is Dead tour, 1986). A cynical young man in a hurry might fake that now, but not back when he first said it, in 2013. Asked by Labour Uncut for his desert island tracks during his 2010 leadership bid, three of the eight were sung by Morrissey (two Smiths singles and one off Viva Hate), which is superfan territory.

That’s a softball exercise to endear yourself to Labour members; you have eight chances to hit every base, and to blow three lives on an artist who had already, by then, been dabbling in nationalism for 18 years (we’ll come back to this) was dicey and brave. You’ll recall that Burnham did not win that election. If you were an enemy state, amassing this hinterland for an asset, you’d have basically done a really good job.