Since Robert Walpole in the 1720s the UK has had 59 prime ministers.

That process has accelerated in the past decade, with Andy Burnham the seventh PM in the past ten years. That points to the harsh nature of politics, the political blood-letting that resulted from the divisions of Brexit and public frustration that despite promises things are worse rather than better.

There are external reasons from Covid to war in Ukraine and the Middle East to explain why this is happening – but the result is that the UK is now being seen in Europe and beyond as politically unstable and difficult to govern. Andy Burnham engineered himself into the post, persuading an MP to stand down and create a by-election so he could return to Westminster from being the elected mayor of Manchester. For now, his party sees him as someone capable of turning around its disastrous plunge in popularity since a landslide election victory just two years ago.

That hope remains to be tested. He has to decide whether his strategy will be to take on Reform or the Greens. Neither will be easy. With Reform a much tougher target than the Greens. For now he is seeking to say things that will attract positive comments.

But this is akin to playing Bridge and taking all the easy tricks. Any keen card player knows it is vital to have a long term strategy rather than simply picking off the low hanging fruit. He is promising 'change', but cynics know all political leaders deliver that. The bigger question is whether it is change for the better or worse. In reality he can only deliver positive change, as he sees it, by getting the economy growing. Nothing he has said to date has suggested he has any realistic plans to make growth happen. A problem with Burnham is that he is a people pleaser; he likes to be liked and so says what he thinks people want to hear.

The problem is delivery and we have seen prime examples. Scrapping VAT on domestic electricity bills in England was to be funded from a budget line he said existed, but which does not.

A hint at easing the unfairness of personal tax allowances ravaged by inflation, bringing state pensioners into the tax net, but then he said this will not happen. Burnham has come to power when there is no parliamentary scrutiny and he has yet to be properly challenged by an unsympathetic journalist on his policies and plans to pay for them. As for agriculture we have an entirely urban prime minister. His appointment of Angela Eagle at DEFRA is a kick for touch with a safe, experienced and competent pair of hands. She too is entirely urban in her background and politics and it is hard to envisage much imagination or farmer focus coming from DEFRA.

Burnham has hinted that inheritance tax rules around farming may need to be looked at, but this was long before he took on the reality of being a prime minister with big plans and no money.

This is a policy change about which farmers should be sceptical. While I would love to be proved wrong, logic and politics are against change. His decentralisation instincts are promising, but duplicating Downing Street in Manchester is not going to transform left-behind rural communities. Nor do his instincts point to any radical review of the institutions here and their potential for stalemate politics. Many in his party crave a wealth tax based around land or property.

If that was applied to agricultural land it would make the inheritance tax disaster look like the proverbial Sunday school picnic. Burnham has suggested he will pursue the Starmer policies of closer ties with the EU, but within the manifesto commitment of no customs union or single market.

Politically the EU is more wary of Burnham than of Keir Starmer. All in all it is time now to see through the political spin. Burnham deserves a chance to prove he can do better, but not at the cost of repeating failed past policies based around tax, borrow and spend. Managing an ailing global economy and defending a country is very different to running Manchester, which he constantly harps back to for policy inspiration. That is akin to believing the skills to deliver a beautiful suburban garden can transfer success into running a vast farming estate.