Miliband Emerges as UK Power Broker a Decade After Election Rout

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Nevertheless, in an interview with the BBC in 2021, he remarked that he was still “recovering” from his tenure as leader.

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Miliband’s run for office was characterized by a public perception of him as an awkward figure who was unable to perform every day tasks normally. A photo of him eating a bacon sandwich with a contorted expression on his face even has its own Wikipedia page. 

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Satirists compared him unfavorably to Wallace — the likable but clueless and hair-brained inventor from the Oscar-winning Wallace and Gromit animations. And he was much mocked for commissioning a large tablet engraved with Labour’s six election pledges. It was promptly dubbed the EdStone, and also earned its own Wikipedia page. 

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In later years, he was asked his biggest regret on the the How to Fail podcast, replying that he wished he’d been “bolder and more ambitious as Labour leader.” He’s since written the book Go Big.

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“The future for Labour, the best future is to go big: that’s the argument of the book,” he told a Channel 4 podcast. “And it’s the lesson I’ve learned from my time as leader.”

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Miliband is the son of Ralph Miliband, a Marxist intellectual who fled Belgium for Britain to escape the Nazis in 1940, and Marion Kozak, a human rights campaigner and Polish Jew who survived the holocaust after being sheltered by Catholics. Ed studied at Oxford University and then the London School of Economics, before becoming a TV journalist. He worked for Brown at the Treasury from 1997 to 2002 before going on a sabbatical to the U.S. to teach economics at Harvard.

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He entered Parliament in 2005, after being elected in Doncaster North, a seat he still represents. He joined the cabinet in 2007, became energy secretary the following year and drafted Labour’s manifesto for the 2010 election. His attacks on Tony Blair’s policies, including the Iraq War, helped him win the backing of six labor unions and led the Daily Mail newspaper to dub him “Red Ed.”

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Miliband’s harder edge was on display in the wake of Labour’s loss in the 2010 vote, when he famously defeated his older brother, David, in the ensuing Labour leadership contest that was widely seen as the elder sibling’s battle to lose. Three years later, he said the relationship was still “healing,” telling BBC radio: “It has been incredibly tough; really, really tough. I didn’t take this decision lightly. I knew it would have an impact on my family and on him.”

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That fraternal fight was weaponized by the Tories, who during the 2015 election campaign repeatedly accused Ed of stabbing his brother in the back. 

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That ruthless side may be coming to the fore once again as leadership contenders circle a prime minister in Starmer wounded by months of missteps, damaging U-turns and last week’s catastrophic local election results in which Labour lost control of the Welsh Senedd for the first time, and shed three in every five seats they were defending in English councils. 

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In his speech to Labour’s annual conference in October, Miliband ranged far beyond his energy brief, criticizing growing American political influence and taking a swipe at Elon Musk, telling the billionaire to “get the hell out of our politics.” He’s nevertheless on multiple occasions said he’s not interested in the leadership again.

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“I’ve had the, if you like, the inoculation technique against wanting to be Leader of the Labour Party because I was the Leader of the Labour Party, and that was a very successful inoculation,” Miliband told BBC radio in November.

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—With assistance from Jessica Shankleman.

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