The article reflects on Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s longstanding enthusiasm for the Smiths, highlighted by his guitar performance of Rusholme Ruffians in Kyiv. It argues that the band’s bleak yet lively portrayal of national decline, injustice and alienation makes the moment symbolically resonant amid Britain’s current political and social difficulties.

Burnham’s fandom is presented as credible: he saw the Smiths at Salford University in 1986 and named three Morrissey songs among his desert-island choices during the 2010 Labour leadership contest. The piece also notes his later reservations about the Smiths’ perceived cultural elitism, while placing both the band and Burnham’s attachment to them in the political and cultural atmosphere of the late 1990s and early 2000s.