In a Daily Mail column, former Conservative culture secretary Nadine Dorries draws on her own experience of government to predict that Andy Burnham, having just become Prime Minister, will struggle to survive in the role beyond May. She argues that the sheer scale and speed of decisions facing a new PM, combined with Burnham's lack of prior top-level experience, will quickly overwhelm him, echoing what she witnessed when Boris Johnson entered Number 10.

Dorries describes the disorienting first days of a premiership: intense security briefings with intelligence chiefs, signing the "letters of last resort" for Britain's nuclear submarine commanders, and back-to-back briefings every 15 minutes as officials bring the new leader up to speed. She suggests Burnham will lose control over his own time, diary and even his wardrobe, with civil servants now dictating his schedule and dress for formal duties, while ambitious MPs, union leaders and other figures bombard him with demands and congratulations.