Interesting to read Tony Blair’s comments in the Sun today with his advice for Ed Miliband on New Labour and the need to stick to the centre ground.
Ed Miliband, of course, grandly and quickly declared New Labour dead after he won the leadership race, saying that “the era of New Labour has passed. A new generation has taken over”. Blair’s response to that?
“The concept can’t possibly be over because the concept isn’t time related. It is about the Labour party constantly being at the cutting edge, being a modernising party – always being full of creative ideas and isn’t pinned in its ideological past. That is always the choice for the Labour party. It is the choice for progressive parties.”
On the time Ed Miliband has taken to set out policy Blair doesn’t have a problem with, but he rightly says it is down to what he does with it:
“Ed Miliband has sensibly given himself the space to develop policy. The question is now what he puts into that space.”
Then there is the question of the next election. Of course it is four years away and a lot could happen between now and then, but what he says chimes with Labour’s recent performance in the local and Scottish elections.
“I am happy to give him my full support. I always will do for the leader of the Labour party, and I think he should be given a chance to set out his agenda. But in my view Labour will win if it fights from the centre.”
