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British Prime Minister Andy Burnham has bowed to mounting pressure to disclose details of his dealings with Manchester City’s Abu Dhabi owners following the club’s guilty verdict over serious breaches of Premier League financial regulations involving more than £830 million.
Burnham, who previously served as Mayor of Greater Manchester, came under scrutiny after expressing concern that City’s owners could sell the club following the damning findings of an independent commission.
The controversy deepened after Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch demanded that the prime minister publicly disclose details of his meetings with senior Manchester City officials.
Speaking on The Rest Is Politics podcast on Saturday, Burnham agreed to release the information, insisting that he had nothing to hide about his previous dealings with the club.
“I’ve been asked by the leader of the opposition to publish details of my meetings, which I’m happy to do and I’m going to,” he said.
“I will quite clearly put out there everything that I have done working with them in my previous role as Mayor of Greater Manchester.”
Burnham, who served as mayor from 2017 until earlier in 2026, maintained that his interactions with the club’s officials were not recent.
He disclosed that he had held only one significant meeting with them in 2021.
The prime minister has faced criticism over his initial response to the financial scandal, particularly his statement that he would be “really concerned” if Manchester City’s owners decided to sell the club.
His remarks raised questions about his relationship with the club’s owners and whether their investments in Greater Manchester had influenced his public position.
However, Burnham rejected suggestions that he had attempted to downplay the seriousness of the findings against Manchester City.
“I don’t think I misspoke,” he insisted.
“What I would say is my mind hadn’t been on all of the issues. My mind had been on Labour Party conference and I was doing interviews in relation to it.”
He argued that the club’s financial misconduct should be considered separately from the economic investments made by its owners in Greater Manchester.
“The football issues are different from the investment issues. People will try and conflate those two things, but they shouldn’t, in my view,” he said.
Burnham nevertheless acknowledged the gravity of the verdict.
“The football issues, the findings of the independent commission are serious, as I said in the interview,” he added.
The controversy followed a ruling by an independent commission which found Manchester City guilty of multiple breaches of Premier League financial regulations between 2009 and 2018.
The commission established that the club arranged sham commercial contracts to secretly channel more than £830 million into its football operations.
Its report also concluded that several important witnesses associated with the club gave false or misleading evidence during the proceedings.
According to the findings, “a number of important club witnesses gave false evidence in key respects and that some knowingly gave untrue and dishonest evidence”.
Manchester City have strongly denied wrongdoing and lodged an appeal against the verdict.
A separate independent appeal board is expected to review the case, while the Premier League has yet to announce sanctions against the club.
The proceedings followed a 42-day hearing in 2024 and were conducted independently of the Premier League’s executive body.
Meanwhile, some Premier League clubs have reportedly expressed concern about possible political interference in the appeal process, particularly given Burnham’s previous relationship with the club’s owners.
His dealings with Abu Dhabi investors during his tenure as mayor have also attracted attention because of their involvement in economic development projects across Greater Manchester.
Despite the controversy surrounding the club, Manchester City returned to Premier League action on Sunday with a 3-0 victory over Liverpool at Anfield.
Burnham’s promise to publish details of his meetings is expected to bring further scrutiny to his past engagements with the club and its owners as Manchester City continues its legal battle to overturn the financial misconduct verdict.
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