{"id":647182,"date":"2026-06-19T13:07:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T13:07:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/647182\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T13:07:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T13:07:12","slug":"hugh-grant-steve-coogan-and-carol-vorderman-how-celebrities-threw-support-behind-andy-burnham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/647182\/","title":{"rendered":"Hugh Grant, Steve Coogan and Carol Vorderman: How celebrities threw support behind Andy Burnham"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Andy Burnham, who is widely mooted to be a prime ministerial hopeful<\/a>, has won a resounding victory in the Makerfield by-election \u2013 after a number of high-profile celebrities gave him their backing.<\/p>\n

Actors Hugh Grant<\/a> and Steve Coogan<\/a> were among the voices to champion Andy Burnham, who until recently had served as the mayor of Greater Manchester.<\/p>\n

Grant, known for roles in the films Notting Hill and Four Weddings and a Funeral, appeared at a campaign rally on Wednesday night held in Stubshaw Cross Club in Ashton-in-Makerfield.<\/p>\n

\"HughHugh Grant and Steve Coogan are backing Andy Burnham (Getty)<\/p>\n

Coogan, meanwhile, best known for his long-running comedy persona Alan Partridge, appeared alongside Andy Burnham in a campaign video earlier this week.<\/p>\n

In the clip, shared on social media last Saturday, the politician said he was \u201closing the poster war\u201d and had been told that other campaigners had celebrity endorsements. <\/p>\n

Coogan then appears in frame, joking: \u201cAndy wanted a slightly classier celebrity to endorse his campaign, but he had to put up with me instead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another celebrity to have voiced support for Burnham is former Countdown presenter Carol Vorderman, who said she was \u201cdragged\u201d into the discourse after comments made online by Reform\u2019s by-election candidate, Robert Kenyon, resurfaced. <\/p>\n

Earlier this month, Kenyon was found to have made historical derogatory remarks about women on social media<\/a> and had appeared to endorse a sexually graphic comment directed at Vorderman.<\/p>\n

\"VordermanVorderman at the Labour Party conference in 2025 (AFP\/Getty)<\/p>\n

Responding to Andy Burnham\u2019s win, Vorderman said in an Instagram video: \u201cI’m so happy… Burnham wins resoundingly by about 55% of the vote. Isn\u2019t that fantastic? <\/p>\n

\u201cCongratulations, Makerfield. As someone who came from the North \u2013 and I\u2019m not a South East bird, I\u2019ve lived in Bristol nearly 20 years now \u2013\u2029it\u2019s like, finally, we\u2019re gonna have someone who thinks about places outside the South East. And it\u2019s just gonna be marvellous, Andy Burnham for prime minister.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coronation Street actor and former Loose Women presenter Sally Lindsay also threw her support behind the politician, endorsing him in a video.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve supported Andy for years,\u201d said the Mancunian celebrity, ahead of the by-election. \u201cI think he\u2019s a very singular politician who really, really cares about the people he\u2019s working for. And I don\u2019t know many politicians that give part of their salary to what they passionately believe in, which is homelessness. I will support Andy till the end of time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Celebrity endorsements have been a fixture of political campaigns within the UK and in the US, where many of the biggest names in show business are seen to champion major political parties.<\/p>\n

In the run-up to the 2024 general election, celebrities including Elton John, Hugh Bonneville, Ed Sheeran, Lesley Manville and Fatboy Slim were among the many names to endorse the Labour Party.<\/p>\n

While Keir Starmer still has years left in his term as prime minister, speculation has mounted about a leadership challenge following Labour\u2019s disastrous result in the recent local elections. <\/p>\n

Former health secretary Wes Streeting is another potential candidate, although Andy Burnham\u2019s popularity among Labour voters now makes him the definitive favourite should a leadership contest take place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":647183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,96,11237,229,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-647182","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-horizontal","tag-politics","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/647183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}