Ed Miliband has accomplished much over the past two years. The battle to win a majority in 2015 will open a new phase in his leadership, writes Steve Van Riel For the last two years, wherever Ed Miliband has chosen to focus his political energy he has had a great deal of success. Nick Clegg’s …

Today’s GDP figures offer a glimmer of light for the economy, up 0.3 per cent following the previous quarter’s contraction, thus avoiding a triple dip and raising hopes of good times ahead. Though still small, the better than expected rise has allowed George Osborne to claim the data is ‘an encouraging sign the economy is …

George Osborne was despicable and wrong to link the case of the killing of the Philpott children to the benefits system. Many others have rightly condemned him for this. He was wrong in what he said – and he was wrong in what he failed to say. If he wanted to comment on the case, …

Of all the members of the shadow cabinet, Jim Murphy may be emerging as one of the most interesting. Regarded, unfairly, as a Blairite pur sang, Murphy has adapted to the leadership of Ed Miliband with a mixture of impeccable loyalty and a streak of independent thinking: willing to accept cuts to his department, firm …

The Labour party is currently conducting a policy review. There are 10 priority topics including A British Investment Bank: Making it a reality. The consultation closes on February 28 and more information can be found here. The Green Investment Bank is well on the way to becoming a reality. It is entering the final stages …

Growth is like sex: everyone is in favour of it, but no one is entirely sure how you go about getting any. And while George Osborne might be like someone who buys a copy of Neil Strauss’ misogynistic self-help book The Game – he doesn’t have a plan, and he’s a bit of a jerk …

The Labour party, rightly, is obsessed with public services. Scratch the surface of any party member, and you’ll get a deluge of views about the health service, education system, libraries, railways and the local council. This is partly a reflection of the prism through which modern socialism sees the public sector: as a method of …

‘Markets understand the need for more public investment in infrastructure.’  No, this is not a quotation from John Maynard Keynes. Neither is it a quotation from Paul Krugman. Remarkably, it is a quotation from an editorial in The Times on 26 January 2013. This is significant. The Times, which has been fairly positive towards the …

Today’s PMQs was not one to light up the fires of political passions. But it did focus on one important and divisive issue: social housing. The government’s so-called ‘bedroom tax’ is set to charge those living in social housing around £60 per month for bedrooms unused for more than 13 weeks at a time. Like …

The Tories’ ‘40:40’ strategy indicates a Conservative majority in 2015 is difficult but possible, writes Hopi Sen DURING Conservative party conference last year, the prime minister’s political secretary, Stephen Gilbert, took the unusual step of privately briefing delegates on the party’s ‘40:40’ strategy to win a majority in 2015. Gilbert’s message was that the Tories …