You advocate picking a fight with the unions entirely for the spin value?

Is that what we call populism? Or just spin over substance?

Secondly, Ed has to show he cannot be defined and shaped by his supporters and critics.

What Labour needs is, er – less principles?

@Joe Otten – I totally agree. Picking an unnecessary fight is what Blair would do, and once upon a time it would have worked. But the statesmanlike thing to do would be to point out calmly and clearly the value of the unions and affiliates and then get on with the serious business (and I don’t mean crafting narratives).

So do not listen to the Unions, pick a fight with them, and I’ll tell you what my Union was inches away from disaffiliation not to long ago, and the 4 million labour came begging for might well not be there the next time. And if a party does not listen to the people, it’s supporters then why not ring up Blair and ask him to come back.

God almight what next.

The Labour party was founded by the unions who wanted a political voice because the Tories and the Liberal party gave not one shit for the working man. So no change there then.

It’s the worst possible way for him to have won. Getting beyond the union vote is going to be horrendously difficult, regardless of how it was individuals voting and not a bloc. The tabloids are going to rip him to shreds.

I somewhat agree with the article.

Three key aims have to be the following.

1 – very quickly challenge and defeat the “red ed” label. The Union vote did win it for Ed but that need not be a weakness so long as he doesn’t lurch left now or play to vested interests now he’s won. (Some cheap argument with the unions might help, but it is more than that really.

2 – build a team that incorporates the other candidates (perhaps without Dianne who I fear would turn down any position worthy of her mandate). David in particular has a strong mandate, and Ed and Andy have clear support of their own. They have also all shown some good ideas and intelligence about their campaigns and their talents should be harnessed fully.

3 – Build an agenda and develop policy principles. This is more important than coming p with policies. It will ensure that responses to government policy and of course Labour’s own policy ideas, are coherant and directed at the priorities that matter. Without that populism is too easy, reactionary opposition is too easy, and as such credibility never develops.

Is that what we call populism? Or just spin over substance?

No – it’s called breaking free of having your opponents define you.

He isn’t Red Ed anyway. He was always quite centrist on many issues.

‘It’s called breaking free of having your opponents define you.’

If you have to play at fighting with people just for appearances, then you are still acting as if their definitions are valid. This is especially true today when there’s an army of bloggers ready to point out, even when the tabloids miss it, that someone is picking a fight for the sake of it.

Sunny

Have a clear narrative that supports a strong agenda and hammer that endlessly. Labour loses when it’s indecisive and aimless.

Surely one of the chief lessons of the New Labour deviation was that Labour is most offputting when it is obsessively and boringly repetitive.

Good choice #Labour. From LGBT Asylum News analysis of statements we thought @Ed_Miliband best 4leader 4 #LGBT asylum http://bit.ly/bce4Xl

C S Clark

Picking such a fight is not really the issue. It is more about being willing to face up to the fight when one innevitably arises.

And with some one as centre-left as Ed Miliband, disagreement with the unions is going to happen.

As for doing so making the definitions placed on him by opponents valid – recognising that they are harmful is not the same as recognising they are valid.

Wow, this is a depressing post and some depressing comments.

Picking a fight with the unions right now would be disastrous – they will be the main vehicle for explaining why the coalition’s plans for cuts is bad, and preventing it from becoming a fait accompli that renders it a non-issue at the next election. Not turning Labour to the left, after it’s inexorable drift to the right has taken it to its lowest vote share since 1918, would be insane.

And including the other candidates except Abbot would be ridiculously churlish. The Shadow Cabinet needs to be drawn from as broad a spectrum as possible – it would be excellent to see John McDonnel and Kelvin Hopkins (who has a better grasp of economics than anyone else in the PLP) in there, though sadly I don’t think either is running.

@6, The attack dogs of the tabloid press are not going to be ripping anyone to shreds if their owner has muzzled them.

Rupe’s downmarket troops at the Screws and Sun are about to disappear behind a paywall. Not a good move in an age where more and more folks get their news online.

You think that won’t make a difference? Then riddle me this: how come the Times and Sunday Times are being heavily advertised on TV right now? It’s not the paper that is being pushed in the adverts – it’s their website.

I suspect that the Murdochs and their representatives on earth are the ones making the far bigger mistake. As for the rest, there’s only so much mileage in repeating “Red Ed” and “in hock to the unions” before the public get bored with it.

Greg

1 – look up the constituencies Labour lost in 2010 – and those it lost the largest proportions of its majorities – compare to the ones where its vote went up – and learn the simple lesson that labour’s core voted labour in 2010 – and the problems was no one else did.

Labour thus has to appeal to the centre again for the first time in years.

2 – McDonnel? Seriously? You have to be kidding me. If he were among the best the party had available I’d be dispondent at the lack of prospects for getting the tories (of both colours) out in 2015.

Tim: You seem to be dismissing the fact that those papers still sell close to 3 million copies remarkably lightly. I know the “dead tree press” is so quaint and archaic when you can tweet to your zillions of followers in an instant, but more people are likely to pick up a copy of the Sun which is lying around to flick through it than have ever visited their dismal websites.

This might require some making some very clear centrist noises (maybe even picking a minor fight with the unions).

Perhaps he could unambiguously reaffirm his commitment to the policy of reducing the deficit (including significant departmental spending cuts) that was a major plank of the manifesto he wrote for the May election? Perhaps he would also indicate just how his cuts would differ from those of the Coalition? That would certainly show he was no union stooge and was fit to be taken seriously as a politician.

At the moment, news stories from the Sun, Telegraph and Mail don’t mention that “Ed won thanks to the unions”, although it is already appearing in Conservative comment pieces. The BBC mention Ed’s union lead in the body of their story and Nick Robinson discusses it in conjunction with Ed’s appeal to second and third preferences. The Guardian mentions the union lead in the strapline to their main story…

1 – look up the constituencies Labour lost in 2010 – and those it lost the largest proportions of its majorities – compare to the ones where its vote went up – and learn the simple lesson that labour’s core voted labour in 2010 – and the problems was no one else did.

Look at the fall in turnout since 1997, look at that fall was distributed, and learn the simple lesson that Labour’s core vote stayed at home in 2001, 2005 and 2010. Labour needs to get its core vote, to actually go and vote. David Miliband was not capable of doing that, and if Ed Miliband rehashes Blairite tactics, he won’t be either.

And I think a strong case can be made for John McDonnell’s abilities, particularly on local government organisation (it was he who set up the operational procedures of the Greater London Authority, for instance).

Greg

Thing is – I’d love it if that was true. I’d love to believe 2010 was a story of lost coe support. I’d love some one who claims it to be able to convince me it were true. Because it sure as hell beats the alternative which is that labour has to attract more centrist voters.

But sadly no one can convince me of that. Because of facts.

You see I HAVE looked up the figures and constituencies.

I suggest others do the same. Just as it would be nice to think global warming wasn’t true and we could carry on painfree and regardless – we have to accept that the opposite is true.

I’ve looked at the figures and constituencies as well, and it is very obvious that 2010 was not some kind of aberration but a continuation of a pattern in loss of support since 1997. Labour lost 5 million traditional Labour votes between 1992 and 2001 – it did not win those votes back in 2010, and lost another 5 million votes on top of that.

@6

I disagree – the worst possible way for someone to have won was achieved by Brown with his coronation…
~

Also, didn’t 2nd prefs have more of an impact than the union members votes? From what I can tell, at least… especially Ed Balls’ supporters. Deffo shadow chancellor, there.
Don’t think Ed Miliband should play into Tory territory of union-bating – instead he should be making the case for the important role that the unions will play in stopping or curbing the worst of these upcoming cuts.

Let me put it this way: If everyone who voted in 2010 votes the exact same way in 2015, but the 5 million traditional Labour voters who stopped voting over a decade ago could be convinced to turn out and vote Labour too, Labour would win a landslide.

Is the New Labour strategy of either passively or actively ignoring that constituent, really beneficial in any way?

@Margin4eror #12 – If Sunny had said that Dear Leader should make absolutely sure he doesn’t roll over on the next fight he has with some unions then I wouldn’t have disagreed. But he didn’t.

Recognising what could be harmful is one thing. Acting on that recognition in a fearful way is what gives the bully power.

Hate to point-out the bleeding obvious, but all of those individual union voters are also voters in local/general elections. Many union members did not vote for Labour in the last election because of what Blair did to the LP.
@15
You do not know who didn’t vote for labour who might have done with a different leader and different policies. I llive in the Labour heartlands where their vote diminished and that was mainly because of taking support for granted, which you, in a round about way, are suggesting. The LP should concentrate on attempting to win back the support of the left and maintain their core vote. This wishy-washy call for centrist approval is a loser, and Ed M. would be a fool to listen to that advice, particularly now we all now where the libdems stand.

“The Conservatives have already declared, ‘This is the result we wanted’ – is if there was any chance they would have said otherwise. ‘Oh no, we didn’t get the right result, we’re going to lose the next election!‘”

Except that plenty of Tories were openly hoping for an Ed win – the “Red Ed” meme was being prepared before the results.

“I’ve looked at the figures and constituencies as well, and it is very obvious that 2010 was not some kind of aberration but a continuation of a pattern in loss of support since 1997″

The Tories were telling themselves the same thing after 1997 – “our voters from 1992 stayed at home, if we appeal to the core we can win them back!”. Then 2001 happened…

What will be interesting is how Ed M reacts if the Unions go on strike.

Gregg @ 22

2010 was not some kind of aberration but a continuation of a pattern in loss of support since 1997.

It may not be Labour’s policy positions that’s been losing the party votes but a shrinkage in the pools from which Labour recruits its support.

Union membership is down. The working-class has shrunk as the middle-class has expanded. Mass immigration is petering out to nothing. Social liberals who once found the Tories too obnoxiously homophobic or racist don’t anymore, ‘cos they aren’t. The NHS finds itself better funded by the Coalition than by Labour. Even the ranks of the unemployed are predicted to shrink.

Like the Daily Express, Labour is becoming a ghost brand. And like the Daily Express it can continue to shriek its customary platitudes ever more stridently. But it won’t do any good.

According to a Populus poll last year 31% of Unite members vote Tory.

Yet they got to vote for the Labour leader.

Given the way the union votes fell and the narrowness of the result, it could be it was the Tories what wonnit for Ed!

@29 – There are two possibilities when it comes to trade unionists who support other parties, voting in the leadership. They might vote for who they think is the worst candidate, as a spoiler strategy. Or, they might vote for the candidate they like the most, and that candidate’s victory may potentially increase the liklihood of them switching to Labour come the general election.

It depends on whether you think the average voter is as tribally partisan as… well, bloggers and blog-commentors.

“Is that what we call populism? Or just spin over substance?”

It’s worked for him so far.

I would rather fight the brown shirts, and the lily livered Lie Dems and lose, than win with more New Labour, Murdoch sucking shit.

Go down swinging rather than worrying what uncle Rupert will say. The general feeling in the MSM is that this is good news for the tories, (which off course they would have said whatever the result) so the expectations are very low.

28 – who exactly reads the Daily Expres these days?

I remember my history tutor telling me years ago that it was the male version of the Daily Mail.

[33] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spvvAdAN5bA

Christ, Flowerpower is right but a world or UK controlled by Thatcherite creeps like him and jay surely isn’t the future.

Congratulations to Ed Miliband. Although I think Harriet Harman and her Shadow Cabinet have done sterling work these last few months in opposing the coalition’s programme, now that we have a new leader we can truly start working our way back to government.

It’s been great to have a leadership contest this time – to be honest, I think the MPs ripped us off in 2007 by denying us an election (16 years without choosing your own leader is a loooooooooong time).

@32 Sally: “I would rather fight the brown shirts…”

I’ll make you an offer, Sally. I’ll give £50 to Oxfam if you can provide a mainstream media quote (academic publisher, broadsheet press, think tank publication) that names a current LibDem, Conservative or right wing Labour Party MP who controls a brown shirt street army akin to the SA.

Rules:
1. Mainstream media means exactly that. The source needs to be a reliable. respectable reference rather than 9/11 troofers or the like.
2. If I lose, my donation will be made via an escrow who we both respect (eg Sunny, Dave Osler etc).
3. Offer ends at the end of October 2010.

“Secondly, Ed has to show he cannot be defined and shaped by his supporters and critics.

This might require some making some very clear centrist noises (maybe even picking a minor fight with the unions). ”

I cant believe you wrote that. Are you really Malcolm Tucker?

The Project is OVER Sunny, over.

But can Labour with Ed’s leadership win the seats in the south of England that the party needs to win to form a government?
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7b5aa2a4-c744-11df-aeb1-00144feab49a.html

Perhaps it’s as well that Doncaster council is no longer Labour controlled or they would be really junketing tonight:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/40990.stm

First elected Labour in 16 years…and the thread dies out so early in the evening?

I’d have expected the discussion on LC to have gone on half the night.

Is it happening somewhere else online, that I’ve missed?

Patrick Hennessy, the political editor of the Torygraph, is reporting that: “Ed Miliband made an immediate appeal to the ‘mainstream’ voters of Middle Britain after winning the Labour leadership with a dramatic and narrow victory over his older brother, David.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/labour/8025448/Ed-Miliband-my-pledge-to-the-squeezed-middle-class.html

All of which shows that Ed Miliband has good sense enough to recognise the constituency that Labour has to win over to come out of a general election with sufficient Labour MPs elected to form a government. Mind you, I’m unsure what his constituency Labour Party in Doncaster will make of that pledge.

Ed won as predicted by Guido Fawkes (described in an earlier post as an unintelligent source by Sunny; who cares…his website is the best with scoops,breaking news and as proven again a great deal of accuracy) and now as it sayeth in Proverbs “He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind”.

Yes, I think that applies to Ed…he shall inherit the wind.

In other words, not only has he cynically seduced the Unions to usurp the better claims of his brother over the wishes of the members and Labour MPs he now has to unite a party that was hardly inspired by his leaden victory speech. He looked surprised at the result, like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming car.He might be bright but has the charisma of a dead sheep.

Cameron and Clegg I suspect can hardly believe their luck at the stupidity of Labour now destined to be out of power for at least 10 years now we have the Unions’ stooge as Leader.

It’s worth pointing out that if the votes of affiliates, Labour members and MPs had equal weight, Ed would have won on first preferences in the first round:

http://www2.labour.org.uk/votes-by-round

He got far more votes than David; it’s just that many of them carried relatively little weight, thanks to the odd voting system. That’s how I’d spin it, I think.

@43 119,000 of those are not members of the labour party. That is a problem.

Secondly, only 9.1% of the unions ie affiliates voted – so the cabal of the union bosses did.

So stop peddling these half truths. Ed Miliband won – and he won under the rules and that is fine but saying he won among the membership is a lie.

I do not think the party elected the right leader and I definitely do not like the way this affiliate business goes however, those are the rules and Ed Miliband should be congratulated and move on.

But one of the brightest and best of the labour party’s domestic politics career is effectively over thanks to the Brown cabal including charlie whelan. Union bosses won it for ed.

But that’s life – lets move on.

David Miliband won in every marginal and target seat – and Ed Miliband won three big unions who actively campaigned for him even while handling the election.

And now the leader has changed his tune completely. That is straight out the cameron play book. so the principled guy who defended labour’s record in office, made an argument about growth and wrote three election winning manifestos was rejected by the union cabal and we have to rejoice.

Sorry – its time to move on but let us not try to pretend that Ed Miliband won because of his appeal to ordinary members or the country but because of the Union cabal.

I hope Ed Miliband does well as leader of the party and launches an investigation as to why many new labour members did not get their ballot papers also this whole voting system.

What rubbish he won more votes then David from ordinary people, get over it, you wanted David to win because he is the nearest to Blair, get over it mate.

The Union cabal as you call it are ordinary members people most working class, I voted for the GMB I actually voted Abbott, Ed, Balls, Burnham, David.

David was last on his past voting record.

I am over it and Ed Miliband is the leader and I am not disputing it. While I am disappointed I have no problems accepting the result.

But the union members are not members of the labour party – if you want to talk about politics learn how to read election results. Look at the breakdown how the votes came in. Just because you are member of Policy Exchange does not mean you get a vote in the Conservative party election – so why should membership in Fabian Society or Compass allow you to vote for the Labour party leader.

Only 8.75% of the union membership voted. And that would most likely be people like Charlie Whelan rather than a bank worker who can’t really be bothered about labour party elections.

I think to make the country’s politics more democratic, the unions should be forced to get approval from its membership whether they wish to support the Labour party.

I know few members of unions who regularly and consistently vote for Tories, Lib Dems and even Greens. Why shouldn’t their levies go to those parties?

In addition, a lot of new members did not get their ballot paper even though they registered as party members with enough time left. What do you say to that?

I am not disputing Ed Miliband’s win – I am just calling it the way it is true – ie Unions delivered for Ed Miliband especially union bosses,

@ 47

Only 8.75% of the union membership voted.

Good heavens! I hadn’t realized that. So, far from winning the overwhelming support of “ordinary, working people”, Ed is representative only of that small clique of politically motivated activists and wreckers. That’s even worse.

Gregg

You calling them “traditional labour voters” doesn’t make it true. I’m sorry. I want it to be true. But it isn’t. Wishful thinking can’t really replace facts.

And here’s the facts.

All over the poor and deprived parts of once industrial inner city London not only retained Labour MPs en masse, but they returned them with bigger majorities than before, and in many cases with higher turn outs. Indeed with local elections at the same time, Labour returned more councillors in those boroughs than in past local elections and in places like Newham and Barking and Dagenham kicked out marginal working class parties like the CPA and BNP respectively.

But in case you think London is an exception to the rule – look at Rochdale. (Working class and again, deprived)

It was held by Lib Dem Paul Rowen. Yet in 2010 Labour, despite terrible national performance, kicked out an incumbant from a party that had a much improved national performance. Again, this would suggest that Labour’s heartlands came out in 2010.

Meanwhile the constituencies lost most convincingly by labour were those relatively wealthy places that had come across to Labour in the 90s but that left Labour as it allienated centre-ground middle income voters.

I would love this not to be the right narative. But I’d also love climate change not to be true. It is. We have to accept it and learn.

Flowerpower

Surely that’s true of all party leaders elected not by the people but by their party’s activists. (Or wreckers, if you like)

Shamit

You are right that the unions won it for ed. And by it was largely the activist part of the unions rather than members as a whole.

And that leaves ed with the task of casting off the “red ed” tag that he has quite ludicrously been given. He will cast it off because, frankly, he’s about as red as a Spurs home shirt. He’s very centre ground and the unions will realise that and feel a little put out about it soon enough.

He does though, still have to prove he can appeal to a wider public than the activist classes – especially as the wider membership vote went to David, suggesting perhaps that he struggled to win round many of those who pay their membership but do little else. (That is the largest part of every party membership)

I see little reason why he can’t do that. There is nothing about his views that would hinder him in that.

Margin4error @ 50

Sure it’s true that in regular parties the leader is elected by the members. But Ed M has been out and about in medialand saying he’s his own man and claiming a wider popular mandate by pointing to the “ordinary working people” (and not the Union executives via bloc vote) who swung it for him. Seems they’re not so ordinary or even at all representative, but a tiny politically engaged minority.

- Charlie Whelan has told the Guardian’s Jonathan Freedland how it was him and 4 union leaders who fixed it for Ed Miliband.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/2010/sep/26/labourconference-labour

Flowerpower

Union executive via a bloc vote?

Margin4error
You will have to stop taking the bait from tories, do you seriously think that Cameron and Clegg and the rest of their motley supporters are going to say they are worried about Ed M and the LP?
Before we talk of winning back core voters (I know you disagree with my view) the condems have done more for the LP than any appeal to a particular class. Students, for example, were identified as core supporters of libdems, do you really believe that it is the case now?
Now I’m going to turn your own advice back on yourself, all factions of the LP need to get behind the new leader. You never know, I might even start voting for the LP again.

steveb

The tories (of both colours) won’t admit to being worried about Labour. And I certainly don’t think they fear Ed any less than they fear David. I just like the “bloc vote” attack being used so many years after it stopped meaning anything.

I also agree that Labour are in a good position to recover quickly because the last dregs of the “dem” bit of the liberal party is being spat out – and so can be won back round to a labour party that gets itself straightened out.

And I agree Labour people all need to get behind their leader. Indeed all of the left has to do so as he’s the only chance any of us have of getting rid of a right wing government.

But getting behind him doesn’t mean failing to analyse the task in hand, which is what I tend to want to do.

“Ed won as predicted by Guido Fawkes”

Bollocks.

That you Guido?

Here’s some really surprising hot news:

Ed Miliband has offered his brother, David, the post of shadow chancellor, in a move which could set up a bruising early dispute at the top of the party over Labour’s approach to tackling the deficit.

David Miliband has insisted that Labour should stick to its original policy of halving the deficit in four years, a position that will be repeated on Monday by Alistair Darling in a farewell speech as shadow chancellor. . .
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ac0067ac-c9a8-11df-b3d6-00144feab49a.html

Did anyone see that coming?

57

I saw it coming. The only position Ed could offer David was Chancellor. He has a massive mandate from MPs and the party membership and is an extremely experienced minister.

Frankly, any other post would have been a snub.

The difficulty is for David who knows if he says no that will be seen as a snub or a sulk. But if he says yes he knows that means years of the press talking in terms of tensions between them and whether any of his comments on policy are really what his Brother agrees with, or whether they are him flexing his mandate.

Ed Miliband seems quite smart to me. Of course he has to distance himself from Blair/Brown. However, basic arithmetic will tell him he has to win the centre. Labour can’t win appealing only to their core vote and neither can the Tories. Ideological purity is a great way to inspire the activists and pile up huge majorities in places where you would have won anyway. Ultimately you lose the election. There are not enough poor voters for Labour to win by just getting them out to vote. There are really just a few million voters who decide the UK election and Ed Miliband will realise within that few million he needs to win a fair amount of voters on higher salaries. That arithmetic pushes UK politics to the centre.