Why Ed Miliband Should Resign Immediately

I write this as a long-term Labour supporter & voter, & as a friend of the Party who wants to see it succeed.

I would say to people who support Ed Miliband, don't confuse loyalty to the Party with loyalty to its current leader, they are not the same thing. Ed M was elected leader on 25th September, 2010, & this is quite long enough to get the measure of him in that role. He is useless. Many Labour supporters I speak to think he is rubbish. He is unable to galvanise his own core support: never mind reach out to trade unionists, disillusioned LibDems, the Occupy people, laid-off public sector workers, & other opponents of the Coalition who don't know where to go [thanks to @fauxpaschick for this thought.] There's a vast reservoir of anti-Coalition sentiment in the UK right now; Ed M is unable to tap it.

I grant you that the state of the Labour Party is not entirely Ed M's fault. The Party is still in shock, paralyzed after Tony Blair took it to places it never thought it would go, especially involvement in the invasion of Iraq. Too close a similarity to Tony Blair is a reason for suspicion of David Miliband within the Party. Another source of its paralysis is the trauma of the long economic boom of the Noughties turning to shit in their hands.

The Labour Party still doesn't know what it is or what it wants to do post-Blair & Brown, & Ed M & his team have so far been unable to help it with either of these questions.

At the moment, the Labour Party is treading the road of failure, led by pygmies. It remains to be seen whether it can pull itself together & get on a better road.

It doesn't matter whether in private life Ed M is a nice guy - a claim that was often advanced for Gordon Brown. It doesn't matter if his heart is in the right place - which, judging by his Conference speech during which he gave benefit claimants a thorough kicking, I doubt [for more on this, see my post of 1st October, 2011]. What matters is - is he an effective politician ? & the answer to that is - no. Ed M is a professional politician to his fingertips, but he is not an effective one.

In a democratic system, it doesn't matter how wonderful your ideas or personality are if you can't win a majority. Only if you get elected into power will you have a chance to implement your policies & maybe make a bit of difference to people's lives.

Ed M will never lead the Labour Party to getting a majority at a General Election. You may disagree with me about this. Time will tell which of us is right.

We should learn from the ruthlessness of the Tories with regard to their leaders & ditch Ed before it is too late & the next Election is lost.


Addendum: I had a text conversation with my friend Stu about this post. I said to him: "Labour I think are sleepwalking to defeat, & letting the Tories run riot in the meantime." To which Stu responded: "I think they can't really be bothered to take on running the country again. It's the only reason I can think of, why they're so lacklustre about it."

I realise that the system for deposing a current Labour leader & electing a new one is complex & difficult. But none of that was a problem when they were crowning Gordon Brown. Where there's a will, there's a way.