This evening I had the interesting pleasure of listening to Ed Miliband’s inaugural speech to the Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute (SPERI).
I had not rated Ed Miliband particularly. He seemed dull. He didn’t make me feel anger, annoyance, inspired, optimistic – I just felt a general sense of apathy. Sure, he said some things that were good, but it was always felt like it was on a bandwagon (Ed. – Don’t worry, I’m not defecting). However, his speech was interesting. I would recommend reading it.
Ed painted the picture of where we had come from post the Great Depression.Talking about the rebalance of the settlement after a major politco-economical event. Ed believes we are this sort of turning point again and I won’t disagree with that.
The three conditions for change are as follows: the breakdown of consent for the current settlement; ideas which can form the basis of the new settlement; a political coalition to make it happen.
All in all, right (but a tad obvious?). Ed detoured into a mini political history lecture, but then returned to the modern day. According to Ed, there are now three challenges we must face: squeezed income; working people taking on more risk; intergenerational regression.
A strong sense of responsibility is something Ed is very passionate about.
Ed eventually is an intellectual. An interesting political thinker, sure. I am, however, not convinced he is a leader. The challenges he lays out, he didn’t lay out complete solutions for them. That’s fair enough. Labour are still going through their policy review, but bankers’ bonus tax & reforming welfare are only partial solutions to generating fairness in society.
I also find his complaining about energy companies very insincere. This is someone who was Energy Secretary for 3 years; it sounds like he didn’t do anything.
In questions, he was attacked mainly from the left. I don’t remember there being any ‘right wing’ questions. However, he made some interesting remarks, including support for International Aid & “We are a far too centralised society”.
#1 by Jen on February 9, 2012 - 9:29 pm
To be fair, there are not too many ‘right wing’ people in Sheffield to ask such a question.
It was an ‘intellectual’ speech not a substantive policy speech but that was what was required for this occasion. If Ed had answered the challenges he set out, he may as well have finished the speech by saying, “there you go – no need to set up a research centre now!”
Personally, I think the ideas are interesting – and if the next election is framed as a choice between a Conservative Back to the Future free Market capitalism or a Labour Road to a New Jerusalem of reformed capitalism, it will be interesting to see how the Lib Dems position themselves.
#2 by Lord Lindley (@LordLindley) on February 10, 2012 - 12:01 pm
You can’t get much more left-wing than Sheffield/South Yorkshire. They still go on about the miners strikes & what a hero Scargill was. Absolutely red to the core. A very safe haven for Beeker to make a speech.