Labour 'asleep' since election defeat claims Mandelson

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Labour has "gone to sleep" since its election defeat and is shirking tough decisions about its future purpose and direction, Lord Mandelson has said.

The ex-business secretary told the BBC the party was guilty of "awful complacency" and hoping a "new face at the top" would make it electable.

He contrasted the current situation with the party's "stupendous" renewal which led to its 1945 election victory.

Four candidates are vying to become the party's new leader in September.

Shadow ministers Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper, Liz Kendall and veteran left-wing activist Jeremy Corbyn have been taking part in a series of hustings around the UK.

The party is also reviewing its election performance to find out why it failed to make headway in England and why it was comprehensively rejected by voters in Scotland, where it lost all but one of its seats.

Lord Mandelson was a key figure in the New Labour era which saw the party win three successive election victories under Tony Blair and was also a key figure in Gordon Brown's crushing election defeat in 2010.

He was critical of former leader Ed Miliband, arguing that he took the party in the wrong direction and abandoned the centre ground on issues such as tax, spending and welfare.

Now the Labour peer has turned his fire on those hoping to succeed Ed Miliband as leader, suggesting they are struggling to address the fundamental questions needed if Labour is to regain power.

'Spectacular defeat'

In an interview with BBC's Newsnight marking the 70th anniversary of Labour's 1945 election victory under Clement Attlee, he said the party had failed to come to terms with the "spectacular defeat" it suffered two months ago.

"You have to think with each successive era, particularly after the spectacular defeat we've just had, what new, what different, what improved is required to enable us to win next time," he said.

"And until and unless the Labour Party faces up to that, as they did stupendously in 1945 and again subsequently, until we do that, we won't win."

Lord Mandelson, whose grandfather Herbert Morrison was a leading figure in the Attlee government between 1945 and 1951, suggested Labour had retreated from the difficult thinking needed to rehabilitate its fortunes.

"Everyone said in the first 24 or 48 hours after our defeat this year, 'oh my God we've really got to think radically and overhaul and realise where we went wrong'," he added.

"Since then the Labour Party seems to have gone back to sleep somewhat.

"You know, that sort of awful complacency, that sort of desire not to make difficult choices, or take difficult decisions that might be inconvenient for the Labour Party or create some tension or division, no, 'let's leave that alone, let's hope that a new face at the top will simply get us back to where we want to be'. It won't. It won't."

Lord Mandelson is one of a number of leading Blairites to have criticised the party in recent weeks.

The leadership contenders have all distanced themselves from aspects of Labour's 2015 manifesto but warned that the answer is not to return to the policies of the mid and late 1990s, saying the country has changed and faces different challenges.

To mark Labour's 1945 victory, Newsnight will also be speaking to Labour politicians present at the time and since, including Lord Healey, Lord Carrington and Lord Hutchinson, on its legacy and what the party can learn from it.

You can see the film tonight on Newsnight at 22.30 BST on BBC2.