'Facts are chiels that winna ding'
Less than a year after he pipped his older brother David to the winning post - Ed Miliband's leadership of the Labour party is in trouble.
Today's papers are full of negative stories about Ed's failure to articulate clearly what Labour - under Miliband the Younger - stands for - as disaffected elements within the party question whether they made the correct choice.
Even the trade unions - who effectivley handed Ed Miliband the crown - feel emboldened and able to throw their weight around.
In today's Independent on Sunday, Dave Prentis - boss of Unison, Britain's biggest public sector union - attacks the Labour leader for allegedly 'failing to stand up for the NHS'.
Now Dave Prentis is a nice enough chap, but he's hardly a giant figure in Unison - never mind the wider labour movement.
Yet he feels able to lecture the Labour leader - who can no longer count on Unison's support apparently - because he (Ed) still has "a lot to get right" and should abandon the strategy of only issuing "reasonable statements" on the NHS.
Now this is code language, union speak for - 'get your finger out and do what we want you to do, otherwise we'll pull the plug - on Labour finances'.
But this is what you get when you sup with the devil - and Ed is Labour leader today thanks to the trade unions.
Because the trade union section is the only part of Labour's Byzantine, undemocratic electoral college - which allowed Miliband the Younger to squeak the narrowest of wins.
Since older brother David won the majority support in the other two sections - consisting of individual party members and Labour MPs.
So the conduct of that ballot is coming back to haunt Labour - and there's no easy way to heal the all too obvious divisions within the party - which, of course, go back to Gordon Brown's long campaign to undermine and eventually unseat Tony Blair.
The heart of the problem is the undemocratic way that Labour elects its leaders - One Member One Vote (OMOV) would have produced a different result - which is a fact that Labour can't run away from.
Today's papers are full of negative stories about Ed's failure to articulate clearly what Labour - under Miliband the Younger - stands for - as disaffected elements within the party question whether they made the correct choice.
Even the trade unions - who effectivley handed Ed Miliband the crown - feel emboldened and able to throw their weight around.
In today's Independent on Sunday, Dave Prentis - boss of Unison, Britain's biggest public sector union - attacks the Labour leader for allegedly 'failing to stand up for the NHS'.
Now Dave Prentis is a nice enough chap, but he's hardly a giant figure in Unison - never mind the wider labour movement.
Yet he feels able to lecture the Labour leader - who can no longer count on Unison's support apparently - because he (Ed) still has "a lot to get right" and should abandon the strategy of only issuing "reasonable statements" on the NHS.
Now this is code language, union speak for - 'get your finger out and do what we want you to do, otherwise we'll pull the plug - on Labour finances'.
But this is what you get when you sup with the devil - and Ed is Labour leader today thanks to the trade unions.
Because the trade union section is the only part of Labour's Byzantine, undemocratic electoral college - which allowed Miliband the Younger to squeak the narrowest of wins.
Since older brother David won the majority support in the other two sections - consisting of individual party members and Labour MPs.
So the conduct of that ballot is coming back to haunt Labour - and there's no easy way to heal the all too obvious divisions within the party - which, of course, go back to Gordon Brown's long campaign to undermine and eventually unseat Tony Blair.
The heart of the problem is the undemocratic way that Labour elects its leaders - One Member One Vote (OMOV) would have produced a different result - which is a fact that Labour can't run away from.
