Ed miliband

I was at a funeral on Friday and so late catching-up with the latest entertainment provided by UKIP. But, gosh, thank heavens for Godfrey Bloom. Not just because he and his ilk have injected some welcome craziness into British politics - the circus always needs new clowns - but because by doing so they have reminded us of the stakes involved. Bloom - last heard decrying aid squandered on feckless Bongo Bongo Land - one-upped himself with his talk of sluts who fail to clean their kitchens properly. Sure, there was something refreshing about hearing Nigel Farage admit all this amounted to a disaster for UKIP but the bigger point is that it should concentrate Tory minds. Far too many Tories seem to think UKIP might be rascals but rascals-with-their-heart-in-the-right-place.

What’s Ed Miliband about? In a word: socialism. You can think this a good or a bad thing, but there ought to be no doubt about where he stands. At a Q&A in the Labour conference last night, he was challenged by an activist: When will you bring back socialism?' 'That’s what we are doing, sir' Miliband replied, quick as a flash. 'That's what we are doing. It says on our party card: democratic socialism'. It was being filmed, and your baristas at Coffee House have tracked down the clip as an exclusive. This little exchange will perhaps tell you more about Ed Miliband and his agenda than much of the over-wrought character-spinning stunts you can expect to see this week. It was no slip of the tongue.

This is not the backdrop that Ed Miliband would have wanted for Labour conference. Labour’s poll lead has—according to YouGov—vanished, Damian McBride is dominating the news agenda and there’s talk of splits and division in this inner circle. But, as I say in the cover this week, you can’t write Ed Miliband off yet. He has three huge, structural advantages in his favour. The boundaries favour Labour: Type Thursday’s YouGov poll, the best for the Tories in 18 months, into UK Polling Report’s seat calculator, and it tells you that Labour would be three short of a majority on these numbers. It is a reminder that if the parties are level pegging, Labour is winning.

Trouble is, I suppose, there’s so much space to fill these days, in the papers and on cyberspace, on your TV screens and on the wireless. And not filled with the same old stuff, but filled with something different. And so if you’re a columnist the pressure’s really on: what the hell is there that’s new to say? What attitude can I strike that would be different from what Aaronovitch had to say yesterday, but also different to what Heffer’s saying today? That’s the only explanation I can come to for three articles within a week saying what a bloody genius Ed Miliband is.

Ed Miliband might have to tone down the attacks on Old Etonians after weeks of speculation were ended today with an announcement from Labour that they have hired Paddy Hennessy, the now ex-Political Editor of the Sunday Telegraph, to spin for them. The hire is is likely to trigger renewed scrutiny of the backgrounds of the Miliband and those closest to him. As this month's Spectator Life will reveal, Ed is surrounded by some incredibly wealthy champagne socialists. Find out just how many and who on Thursday.

The next election is going to be close. Very close, according to new polling from YouGov. When asked which government they would prefer after the next election, 41 per cent said a Conservative government led by David Cameron compared to 40 per cent for a Labour government led Ed Miliband. This does not mean Miliband is gaining momentum. In July, Labour had a 13 point lead in YouGov polls. Today, it has more than halved to just six points. The Times puts this down (£) to the Labour leader himself. The polling suggests he’s seen as weak, out of his depth and weird. When asked for three words to describe the Labour leader, the top choices are: Not that Cameron comes off much better.

Tough times for Ed Miliband. He looked pretty glum at the start of PMQs. Was he wishing that Syria had developed in a different direction? A few weeks of statesmanlike ‘unity and consensus’ – while Assad got his wrists slapped by a volley of Tomahawks – might have suited him better. Instead he was forced onto the domestic agenda. And it’s turning into quicksand. All his best accusations have been sucked into the mire. He can no longer mention the following: flat-lining, Plan B, the double dip, the bedroom tax, the benefit cap, cutting too fast and too deep. As for his trustiest platitude – ‘a recession made in Downing Street’ – that now sounds as quaint as ‘dial-up’ or ‘Suffragette’. Is anything left?

When Ed Miliband peaks, he really knows how to do it. His speech at last autumn's Labour conference was magnificent. Given the pressure on him to convince the unions to back his reforms to their links to the Labour party, you'd expect he'd have picked today's address to the Trades Union Congress conference to deliver another blinder. Sadly today was not a peak in the range of Miliband speeches. Sure, he produced a vaguely funny joke about a chap called 'Red Ed' who was in fact the Conservative Prime Minister Edward Stanley. Miliband told the conference that Stanley was 'the man who first legislated to allow trade unions in this country'. But it felt as though he was scaling a hill as he told this story without ever managing to reach the top.

David Cameron’s statement to the Commons on the G20 wasn’t as lyrical as his response to Russia’s ‘small island jibe’. But it was a reminder of the needle that now exists between Cameron and Miliband. In previous times, these statements—which are far less tense affairs than PMQs—have seen a bit of badinage between the two front benches. But that has now gone. The statement was dominated by Syria, which Cameron called the ‘refugee crisis of our time’. When Cameron talks about his defeat in the Commons on Syria, he speaks very quickly, with no pauses between the words. It’s as if he wants to get talking about it over as quickly as possible.