The Guardian view on Ed Miliband’s big speech

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/23/guardian-view-ed-miliband-speech

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He likened the address to a “job interview”, and in the early passages of Ed Miliband’s speech in Manchester yesterday the interview nerves were apparent. Endless encounters with a Gary or a Josephine in the park were called upon to prove that the prime ministerial candidate was personable; happy, hollow slogans about “a better future for you and your family” were trotted out to proclaim universal appeal. Fortunately, some way into the speech, the Labour leader shifted modes, from job application to plan of work, which lifted the mood in the hall, and did something for his own standing too.

There was no unifying theme of the sort Mr Miliband has suffered in set-piece speeches before, from predatory capitalism to one-nation Labour. Instead, there was a diagnosis of what has gone wrong with the economy and politics too. Britain’s failure to reward the toil and tackle the troubles of so many of its citizens left many voters convinced, Mr Miliband said, that Westminster could do nothing for them. This was the root cause not only of separatism in Scotland but of English alienation too. The all-important question is, of course, what he could actually do about any of this by replacing the coalition’s “you’re on your own” governance with his own philosophy, “togetherness”.

The Labour leader has shown a weakness for abstract talk, but yesterday he got pretty specific. His six-point plan set out measurable ambitions – on low pay, green jobs and home-building, among other things – that his prospective administration can be held to. Some of the individual goals are dubious – it would, for example, be better to focus on affordable housing in the round, including for renters, rather than prioritising home ownership. But the list as a whole – if achieved – might go a long way to restoring optimism in worn-down communities, and even faith in politics.

Mr Miliband wants progress to be judged over a 10-year horizon, a “jam tomorrow” timetable which will invite derision from some, but which looks shrewd in the light of what Ed Balls had to say about post-election austerity on Monday. Indeed, the big squeeze in hospitals and social care departments will intensify before it eases. Welcome but modest new levies on houses worth over £2m and tobacco producers will only provide relief at the margins. Although it has many proposals to smooth the cruellest edges of capitalism – such as abusive zero-hours contracts and blacklisting employers – Labour has still not developed anything that could be called a comprehensive alternative to the British way of doing business. That leaves many of its social ambitions looking dependent on scarce public funds, and its political prospects open to the old “tax bombshell” assault, in the marginal seats especially.

Some Labour MPs fret about that; but, reiterating his faith in active government, Mr Miliband signalled preparedness to stand his left-of-centre ground. He made an impassioned plea for Britain’s place in Europe, and offered a ruthless analysis of how David Cameron’s obsession with the UK Independence party came at the cost of isolating the United Kingdom itself. Reminding the hall of how Cameronian compassion had given way to the bedroom tax, and of how hugged huskies had yielded to “green crap”, Mr Miliband hit home with an audience which was never going to take much persuading. The far trickier test remains persuading the country of his own stocks of the character thing. The Labour leader’s list of the powerful whom he has stood up against – including Rupert Murdoch, energy giants and the Daily Mail – is not a bad place to start. Fundamentally, however, Mr Miliband used yesterday to try to move away from personality politics. What he is selling is less himself than a Labour government.