Uk politics

As Ed Miliband prepares to present a carefully crafted image of ‘Ed the human’ to the Labour conference this afternoon, polling out today suggests the nation still does not see him as a future Prime Minister. In a ComRes poll for the Independent, just 22 per cent of voters said they agree that Ed Miliband has what it takes to be Prime Minister, compared to 33 per cent for David Cameron: On the economy, Balls and Miliband continue to rank below the public’s view of Cameron and Osborne. The poll found that 24 per cent of voters trust the Labour team to make the right decisions about the economy, compared

At the very end of a rather long and wonkish fringe about Labour’s policy review last night, Angela Eagle started describing what she called an ‘electronic town square’. She’d already told the audience about Star Trek salutes, so this town square, which sounded rather like Labour’s answer to Trumpton, was quite in keeping with the slightly quirky discussion. But the electronic town square is even more interesting than Star Trek because it’s an example of how the party is trying to update the way it creates policy and engages with its members and members of the public. Sadly, you won’t find Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, or Grub in

Ed Miliband wants voters to see a little bit more of the man he is this conference, and his speech today is expected to be very personal, giving even more vivid glimpses into the Labour leader’s life. He will draw on his own upbringing in the speech, pointing to his parents’ experience as Jewish refugees and the education he received at a London comprehensive. Although this is being billed as the most personal speech Miliband will give, it’s not as though he hasn’t delivered speeches before about his identity. In his first speech as Labour leader in 2010, for instance, he told the hall that he wanted ‘to tell you

Iain McNicol’s speech to his party’s conference this afternoon picked up on one of Ed Miliband’s big themes from this morning’s Marr interview: the idea that Labour is an anti-politics political party. The party’s general secretary praised the work of Labour members on various social campaigns, and then added: ‘Politics is fractured and needs mending. Earlier we stood in silence to remember those of our friends who have passed away this year including the fantastic Philip Gould. I remember him once saying politics was like a vital football match being played out between the reds and the blues. But as the players fight for every ball, strain for every goal,

On BBC1 Sunday Politics just now, Harriet Harman rowed back from what she told me for this week’s magazine: that Labour would not match Tory spending plans at the next election. The change in position is significant as it shows how Labour—and Ed Balls, in particular—want to keep this option open ahead of 2015. In 1997, Gordon Brown’s commitment to keep to Tory spending plans for two years largely succeeded in reassuring people that Labour could be trusted with the economy. Balls, who was one of the architects of this policy, is said to be interested in doing the same in 2015. The thinking is that it would take the

Ed Miliband’s main aim for this year’s Labour conference is to show people what makes him ‘tick’, bringing across his personality to voters. He was rather wooden when he appeared on the Andrew Marr Show this morning, and made it clear that this getting-to-know-you conference won’t be about a personality change, but emphasising his own true character traits. He was keen to suggest that he possesses nerves of steel in standing up to the trade unions, who the Sunday Times reports are trying to flush out remaining bastions of support for Tony Blair within Labour. He said: ‘You can’t say at one and the same time that Len McCluskey is