Editorial: ​Tony Blair is right about problems within Labour but partly to blame for ills UK is dealing with today​​​​​​​

Faultlines in the Labour Party were evident yesterday when Andy Burnham challenged Tony Blair’s criticism of the present government.​

The former prime minister ex-Labour leader had said that his party is “playing with fire” over the UK’s future. In a 5,700-word essay, Sir Tony also urged Labour MPs to avoid a “personality contest”.

Mr Burnham, who is expected to try to wrest the Labour leadership from Sir Keir Starmer if he wins next month’s Makerfield by-election, criticised the essay for not mentioning inequality.

Sir Tony had called on the prime minister to rip up his Energy Secretary Ed Miliband’s net zero targets and reduce the welfare budget, which he said risks outpacing defence spending. He also criticised the triple lock, which lifts payments to pensioners by the highest rate of inflation, wage growth or 2.5pc each year. Sir Tony was right to highlight the pledge, which is costing the UK government an ever higher share of its overall budget.

Mr Burnham’s response underscores his left-leaning instincts – he does not see a problem in even higher levels of redistribution of wealth through tax and spend.

Sir Tony has been right too about the disaster of mass immigration. But so what if he is right if the Labour Party does not agree with him? Sir Tony got away with being a quite conservative leader of that supposedly socialist party but would not do so now.

In any event, he cannot escape censure for setting in motion the mass migration disaster or indeed spiralling government spending, which began in 2001, after his cautious first four years in Downing Street. Furthermore, he does not mention the huge risk to the UK caused by separatist feeling, fuelled by his zeal about devolution.

Sir Tony is right in most of his criticism but, for opposite reasons, few people on the left or right of the political spectrum want to hear him saying it.