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- Read Miliband’s “change” article – Tuesday (29th July)
- The Guardian on Miliband & today’s Radio coverage (31st July)
- Telegraph: Brown aides denounce Miliband (31st July)
- Times: Miliband stokes the fires: Cancelled India trip & “farewell speech” to staff
- Daily Mail: Miliband quits trip to India as Foreign Secretary (31st July)
BREAKING NEWS: POLL: Only one individual threatens Brown as leader. Who? Miliband? Guess again.
Comment at end
1st August, 2008
DO YOU REMEMBER HOW THEY LAUGHED AT THIS?
David Miliband, BBC Question time, 8th February 2007, before Blair left office
Miliband: “People can hoot …” in response to derision from some in the audience when Blair’s efforts in Northern Ireland were mentioned.
NOTE: A propos today’s BBC audiences: If you have ever doubted the state of denial which flows through the blood of many British TV & Radio audiences these days, take a look at the whole video here
THE MILIBANDWAGON
It’s all happening so quickly there’s little time to catch your breath.
Labour backbench MPs Geraldine Smith and Bob Marshall-Andrews have both called for Miliband to be sacked. What a surprise! These two, neither of whom were ever on board the Blair boat, and found it hard to suppress their great joy in his departure, are standing by Brown. And that, despite the deep disappointments that the present PM has landed the Left with.
Geraldine Smith said Mr Miliband was “trying to stir up trouble” and should get on with his job, adding that if he was sacked he would return to being a “nonentity” on the backbenches.
Bob Marshall-Andrews accused Mr Miliband of “pretty contemptible politics” and said his behaviour had been “duplicitous”.
LAUGH … OR YOU’LL CRY
Admit it … it’s hard to know whether to laugh or cry. Well, it’s hard for some of us. After David Miliband’s breaking of the silence, is the Breaking of the Party imminent?
It’s easy to run out of superlatives today .. especially for those who disapprove.
Disgraceful, duplicitous, contemptible. immature, disloyal, self-serving, crappy …
The disappointed – no, shocked and horrified in Brown’s Labour are at an absolute loss as to what to do.
And even frustrated Blairites can’t be full of too much optimism now that Mr Miliband’s head has appeared above the parapet. In these days of black humour we can imagine it being shot off by friendly fire.
I hate to say “I told you so”, but it was clear to the disinterested political watcher that New Labour was held together by the leadership of Blair. It was held together because for some time, it was difficult to argue that the man who got it right and won them three elections in a row was dispensable.
In the end, though, no-one is indispensable. Blair went, Brown stepped in … and now what?
Allies of the Foreign Secretary poured scorn on Downing Street over attacks from close allies of the Prime Minister which described Mr Miliband as ‘immature’, ‘disloyal’, ’self-serving’ and ‘crappy’.
Last night Ivan Lewis said Mr Brown should stop being timid and show stronger leadership if he wanted to remain Labour leader. Asked if ministers were loyal to the Premier, the junior health minister said: “We now face the ultimate test. We have a decision to make - because people don’t vote for divided parties.”
Sources played down a report that Mr Brown was prepared to “anoint” the Foreign Secretary his successor and make him Chancellor in September. Equally, they denied briefing that the minister could be sacked.
Downing Street suspects that other Cabinet ministers – including Mr Miliband’s brother Ed and International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander – knew of his plan to set out a personal manifesto for taking on the Tories.
The beleaguered Prime Minister, on holiday in Suffolk, received no warning of the extraordinary newspaper article in which Mr Miliband warned that ‘times demand a radical new change’ for Labour.
It has been universally interpreted as the opening salvo in a campaign for Mr Brown’s job.
Many Labour MPs believe Mr Miliband is trying to steal a march on potential rivals, such as Jack Straw or Harriet Harman, if the PM is ousted in an autumn coup.
The Foreign Secretary, 43, said he had decided to set out his plans because of the sense of ‘fatalism’ sweeping the party after its crushing defeat in last week’s Glasgow East by-election.
Asked if he was planning a leadership bid, Mr Miliband said he was ‘not campaigning for anything other than a successful Labour Government’.
To the suggestion that it would be ‘mad’ for Labour to change leaders again, Mr Miliband said cryptically: ‘The Labour Party never does mad things.’
He added: ‘The truth is we had a very bad result in the Glasgow by-election.
‘I was frustrated by the sense of fatalism that had imbued in parts of the media and the Labour Party.
‘Gordon will lead us forward and the rest of us have a contribution to make.’
Mr Miliband told a press conference with the Italian foreign minister, which turned into a media circus, that Mr Brown was a ‘good leader with good values’.
But pressed to rule out standing for the leadership, Mr Miliband said there was no point in doing so.
He had done that before, he said, when under pressure to stand after Tony Blair stepped down, and no one had believed him.
And several times he suggested that under Mr Brown, Labour had failed to articulate a clear vision or demonstrate that it could provide the ‘change’ voters wanted.
Mr Miliband, the most senior Blairite in the Cabinet, added: ‘Can Gordon lead us into the next election and win? Yes. I’m absolutely confident about that.’
MPs close to Mr Brown noted with fury that he was careful not to say the Premier would or should lead the party into the election.
A close ally of the Prime Minister said: ‘He had the opportunity to close this down and he failed to take it. His behaviour can only be described as disloyal and self-serving.
‘David Miliband should shut up and so should everybody else.
‘The Labour Party needs to demonstrate some spine and backbone and discipline.’
Another MP close to Mr Brown said: ‘I am afraid his ego has clouded his judgment.’
Mr Brown, who has been rocked by a string of political blunders and the economic downturn, is thought to be preparing to reshuffle his Government in an attempt to boost Labour’s fortunes.
But he appears to be in too weak a position to risk sacking Mr Miliband.
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith laughed off suggestions Labour could be about to replace Mr Brown with someone ‘young and hip’.
‘I don’t think that’s what we want at a time when people are worried about the economy,’ she said.
Keeping quiet: Health Secretary Alan Johnson has refused to comment on calls for him to stand as Mr Miliband's running mate
Health Secretary Alan Johnson – touted as Mr Miliband’s possible deputy prime minister on a ‘dream ticket’ refused to answer questions on the matter.
Chief Secretary to the Treasury Yvette Cooper came to Mr Brown’s defence, rejecting claims that half the Cabinet wants him to quit.
David Cameron was also an unlikely ally. The Tory leader warned he would call for an immediate General Election if the Prime Minister was forced to stand down.
That is precisely the argument No 10 has used to bring rebels into line.
With Labour’s fortunes at rock bottom, scores of backbenchers could lose their seats in an election now, but would be safe for another two years under Mr Brown.
Mr Cameron told the Western Morning News: ‘All I do know is if he does go we really cannot have a third prime minister in two years, the second who has not been elected.
‘If he did go and someone else took over there should be an election, in my view, straight away.
‘Not after a period of months, but straight away and let people choose who should run the country.’
OTHER ARTICLES ON LABOUR’S LEADERSHIP CRISIS
REGICIDE? (Economist) – AGAIN
(COLLECTIVE) SUICIDE? – Welsh First Minister
CIVIL WAR – Government ministers ask one another: “Which side are you on, and you, and you …? And me?”
BRING BACK TONY BLAIR – ‘PLEASE DON’T’ says the Telegraph’s Iain Martin – If ever Labour needed a GOOD reason to do so, this is it!
Miliband video – Question Time, 8th February, 2007
When Miliband says that Blair, having worked for ten years towards the peace process in Northern Ireland, should be permitted before retirement to finish the job, he is derided by the ignorant in the audience. Excuse the use of that word, but if these people did not know and/or were unwilling to accept that without Blair the peace settlement would likely never have happened AT ALL, “ignorant”, “blindfolded”, “biased” are the only words appropriate.
And now have they all apologised to Mr Blair? And to him over the recent SFO/BAE/Saudi House of Lords decision. You bet. They haven’t! And such as these have the vote!
Question Time page on this programme, 8th February, 2007
or watch the entire programme here
Miliband’s similarities to Blair – Forget the policies, THIS is what counts:
A self-deprecating sense of humour.
Taking calls from listeners for an hour on Radio 2, Mr Miliband told one she was ‘very nice’ after she told him he was the sort of person we need as Prime Minister’. Mr Miliband responded, “I promise you, this is not my mum.”
Fancy a fiver on Miliband – latest odds here
I might put a tenner on Blair – following THIS news
But the YouGov poll also contains some cold comfort for the Prime Minister, showing that that none of the Labour figures currently considered possible replacements would significantly improve the party’s standing.
With Mr Miliband as leader, Labour scores 24 per cent against 47 per cent for the Conservatives. Under Jack Straw, the Justice Secretary, the figures are 24-45.
Were Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary, to take over, Labour would fall to 17 per cent, in third place behind the Liberal Democrats on 18 per cent and the Conservatives on 50 per cent.
In fact, the only Labour figure who could significantly narrow the gap with the Tories is the man the party forced out of office last year: Tony Blair.
Yet even with Mr Blair as leader, Labour would trail the Conservatives by 32 per cent to 41 per cent.
What!? Only 9% to catch up Mr Cameron’s Tories?
Easy stuff for some.
By the way, I’ve just finished e-mail chatting with an American friend, also a Blair fan. I was just thinking about how Mr Brown must be feeling right now on his wet, dreary English holiday, while Mr Blair basks in sunny Malaysia. I thought of this:
But mainly on the just because the unjust steals the just’s umbrella!
So if some unjust fella has pinched Mr Brown’s brolly and passed it to you, Mr Blair, to use as a parasol on holiday, you need to give it back.
It’s raining cats and dogs on your old friend here!
And YOU don’t need it. The sun is shining on you today.
Ah well, perhaps there is a God after all!
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