Politics Andy burnham Kemi Badenoch

Andy Burnham’s ‘fact check’ after Kemi Badenoch said he was ‘a pair of eyelashes and a black T-shirt’ signals that love it or hate it, there’s a new comms style in town

Oonagh Keating. Updated June 25th, 2026

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Ahead of Wednesday’s PMQs, political pundits speculated that Kemi Badenoch might show a bit of grace towards the outgoing PM. Lol. What? They haven’t been paying attention. Of course she didn’t.

Here’s how she decided to play it, earning a rebuke from the Speaker.

Of course, the most likely next PM, Andy Burnham, was dismissed by Ms Badenoch before he’d had a chance to do anything. Here’s how she described him.

He took to Twitter with a fact check.

We should have gone to Specsavers, apparently, because we’d have been with Kemi Badenoch on the colour, but that’s a whole other issue. The Guardian’s Pippa Crerar had a fact of her own to share.

She’s not wrong. We neither can nor want to imagine Keir Starmer fluttering his eyelashes for a comeback.

Burnham’s quip didn’t go down well with everyone. It made a lot of people cringe themselves inside out, and just plain riled others. Here’s a sample.

Others enjoyed the very different approach – if occasionally somewhat reluctantly.

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