Ed Miliband,the man who only 8 months ago was a close advisor to his spend, spend, spend, spent,predecessor when announcing a two year review of Labour Party policy yesterday declared that it should be "The Peoples' Party".
Could this be a little unwise? Things with "Peoples'" in their title, whether Peoples' Princesses or Peoples' Democratic Republics tend not to have very happy records. In the case of the latter they also usually mean the reverse of what they say.Labour has a particular problem with the title as it really doesn't mean all of the People anyway. Just some of them. It heartily dislikes vast swathes of the electorate especially the non Labour better off including anyone in the 50% tax bracket,- ie the aspirants once they have made it,- Tories in any shape or form but with Etonians first up for the guillotine,expatriates,those who enjoy country sports and large numbers of others who escape urban state dependency. These they see as not People.The New Labour project was all about leading the party away from all these hangups from the past, but Ed with his references to the need to put New Labour behind and about socialism not being a dirty word, appears through the fog to be be encouraging a slide back to the comfort zones of the past.He must know the maths of where that leads but the heart is leading the head.
Is Ed a People anyway? With an actively political family background,a father who like Browns' looms large amongst his influencers and post university career only in politics it's a fair question.Fratricide is rather unusual too.
