At 5.15pm on Monday, the most powerful woman in Britain strode up its most famous street. Louise Haigh was, quite literally, walking up Downing Street to a new destiny that just months ago seemed impossible for her.
Yet if Keir Starmer’s previous Labour regime underestimated her, Andy Burnham’s new regime is, arguably, there because of her.
Nobody underestimates Haigh now. Hers is a tale of redemption.
Haigh (known socially as Lou) helped to mastermind Burnham’s path to power. He rewarded her on Monday with the posts of chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster (running the cabinet office) and, crucially, first secretary of state. Burnham didn’t name a deputy prime minister. In practice, as first secretary, his deputy is Haigh.
Although in the spotlight on Monday, she has done the Downing Street power walk before. Haigh was first appointed to government in July 2024 as Starmer’s transport secretary, at 36 the youngest woman ever in the UK cabinet.
Then, the gregarious Haigh seemed to play up a little for the cameras. With her bright clothes and the bright red rockabilly hairstyle she had then, the 2024 pictures were later used against her by her political enemies as evidence that her face didn’t fit in a government serious about power. Five months later she was forced out in a bizarre row.
This week, a different version walked up Downing Street for her second coming. The flamboyant hairstyle was gone. She wore a stylish grey trouser suit and a stare as steely as anything traditionally made in her hometown of Sheffield.
Who is this woman who, along with Burnham, drove Labour through that rarest of political things - a bloodless coup?
Haigh has two big Irish links. The first is her paternal grandmother, Peggy O’Shea, who hailed from Mitchelstown in Cork. The second is her partner, the Foyle MP and former SDLP leader Colum Eastwood – they’ve been together for a couple of years.
She knew Keir was leading us to disaster. She also knew Andy could stop it and, so, she became the catalyst for what happened
— Haigh colleague
Haigh, an avowed left-winger, is chided by her critics as the product of a privileged private school education – normally anathema to Labour types. Yet her friends insist she comes from a relatively ordinary north of England background.
An interview with education sector online publication Schoolsweek from 2015, the year she became an MP, sheds further light. In it, Haigh said family issues meant her mother chose to take her out of state school and put her in private school.
Haigh also revealed that she had been badly bullied at school. Often, the bullied grow up to become the determined.
After studying politics she worked for several Labour MPs, including Lisa Nandy, whom Burnham this week reappointed as culture secretary. Admirers say she stood out as a talented organiser, and she was elected MP for Sheffield Heeley aged 28.
In the years before, Haigh had worked in union politics and in London as a public policy officer for the insurer Aviva, while also volunteering as a police special constable.
It was during this time that the bizarre events unfolded which later led to her political defenestration in 2024.
[ Burnham administration criticised over first big policy announcementOpens in new window ]
In 2013 while at Aviva, Haigh was mugged on a night out. She reported to police that her work phone was in her stolen bag. It wasn’t (she says she mistakenly believed it was) but she was prosecuted for fraud by misrepresentation. Haigh pleaded guilty on the advice, she says, of her solicitor.
It seemed a minor matter and the conviction is classed as spent. She told Starmer about it when he later appointed her to his shadow cabinet – at first in the Northern Ireland brief, where Irish officials liked her enthusiasm for a role some in British politics disdain.
Her conviction wasn’t publicly known, however, until a few months into her first cabinet job in 2024. Starmer’s then-political Svengali, Morgan McSweeney (born in the same county as Haigh’s granny), called her up and effectively sacked her. The row got nasty, Haigh was said to be devastated, and her career lay in ruins.
There was sympathy for her among some in Labour, who felt Starmer’s camp had harshly abandoned one of Labour’s most talented young MPs. She has always had admirers across the party from left to right – Rachel Reeves is said to be a friend.
Haigh plotted a comeback. She already knew Burnham well – she had worked on his 2015 leadership campaign, despite nominating Jeremy Corbyn. Friends say Burnham was kind to her and supportive when she was ousted from Starmer’s government.
He had already failed with two leadership attempts and he had also had not managed to be selected earlier this year for the Gorton & Denton seat in Manchester. Then Burnham joined forces with Haigh, who by then led the Tribune group of left-leaning Labour MPs.
Burnham had the public profile, the popularity and the platform to become prime minister, while Haigh had the organisational skills and the clout across the Labour parliamentary party. She helped to oversee the coup in Labour that ousted Starmer and together they crafted the policy programme for Burnham to replace him.
“After what happened to her two years ago, a lot of people would have crawled into a hole and never crawled out of it,” said one of her colleagues.
“But she bent the situation to her will. She knew Keir was leading us to disaster. She also knew Andy could stop it and, so, she became the catalyst for what happened.”
Now Haigh is back at the top table of Westminster politics as enforcer for the UK’s new leader, Burnham. Her friends say she is fun to be around and may yet find time to raise a glass to celebrate it all. And also, one assumes, her birthday. Haigh turns 39 today.
