Hi, I'm Anouche, and in this special episode of the New Statesman Podcast, I hosted a

mayoral mashup with Andy Burnham and Sidiq Khan, recorded live at the New Statesman's

fringe event at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool.

I wanted you to have a listen to their conversation because there is a bit of a north-south divide

going on between the two. Here it is. Welcome to this very special event. It's a mayoral

mashup. We are in conversation with Andy Burnham and Sidiq Khan. At the New Statesman,

we have generously provided a safe space to bridge the north-south divide at last.

Now, I'm Anouche Kelly, and I'm Britain editor of the New Statesman, and before we start

I'll just explain how it will work. We will have some questions at the end, probably

a little bit shorter than we were planning, but probably about 15 minutes at the end,

so that you can make sure you ask the mayors what you'd like.

And now I'd like to introduce my two interviewees, London mayor, Sidiq Khan, and mayor of Greater

Manchester, Andy Burnham.

Well, there they are. Both have been elected and re-elected as mayors of their respective

cities, and when they were Labour MPs, they served as government ministers and in the

shadow cabinet too. They've both been up against a Conservative government when fighting

for their cities, and there have been some disagreements with the Labour leadership

along the way too. Thanks so much for joining us, both of you.

First of all, I wondered if you could tell me, what is the rivalry between you two?

I mentioned the north-south divide, fill me in a bit.

Well, there was that time we played at Anfield last year, do you remember?

Did you know it's he went first?

...