Andy Burnham accused of failing to give a 'straight answer' after refusing to say if he was due to meet chairman of cheating Manchester City

Andy Burnham has refused to answer questions over whether he was due to meet the chairman of scandal-hit Manchester City last month.

The Prime Minister is coming under growing pressure to reveal the full extent of his connections with City’s billionaire bosses after his intervention in support of the club raised eyebrows.

Last week it was revealed that Mr Burnham had met City bosses at least six times as Mayor of Greater Manchester, despite previously claiming he had just one 'significant' meeting with them.

The PM insisted in the Commons last Wednesday that Man City’s owners had never raised the question of fraud charges against the football club with him.

Mr Burnham said at last week’s PMQ’s that he was 'happy for everything to be set out in full' regarding his dealings with the club. The Greater Manchester Combined Authority published details of two hospitality dinners with the City chairman at matches in 2017 and 2018.

But Mr Burnham was again questioned by Tory shadow solicitor general Jerome Mayhew at PMQs on Wednesday. He asked: ‘In September, did he have a meeting scheduled with Khaldoon Al Mubarak?’

The Prime Minister responded: ‘I answered the honourable gentleman last week, and I set it out very clearly in the statement that I made. It was all covered in that statement, and there is no more I need to add.’

Shadow sport minister Louie French told the Mail: ‘Once again Andy Burnham has failed to give a straight answer to a straight question.

‘Time and again the Prime Minister has been less than transparent about his dealings with Manchester City's owners and it raises the obvious question of what is he hiding?

‘Andy Burnham needs to come clean about this whole sorry affair and finally answer the question about any scheduled meetings in Downing Street with Man City’s owners.’

Last month Man City was found guilty of the vast majority of charges brought against the club for financial wrongdoing by the Premier League.

An independent commission ruled the club had disguised payments worth £900million through a series of ‘sham’ deals in a bid to mislead the football league.

Just days before the guilty verdicts were announced, City chairman Mr Al Mubarak met Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds in Downing Street to discuss Abu Dhabi’s investments in Britain.

A Downing Street spokesman said that Mr Burnham did not attend the meeting and had not met City’s owners since becoming Prime Minister in July.

However the Tories have called for the PM to clarify whether there had been a scheduled meeting with Mr Al Mubarak that had been due to take place in September.

Mr Burnham raised eyebrows after the guilty verdict when he said he would be ‘concerned’ to lose City’s billionaire owners as they had been a ‘huge partner in the building of modern Manchester’.

After his remarks sparked criticism, No10 was forced to clarify that the guilty verdict against City was ‘serious’ and that the club was not ‘above the rules’.

Manchester City has appealed against the guilty verdict and denies all wrongdoing.