Ed Miliband hit by egg on campaign trail in London


Where was Boris?

If he'd done a Prescott then people might have a bit more respect for him.

The guy that got Prescott was standing pretty much right next to him at the time. Looks from the video that the one that got Milliband was a fair bit further away. I'd certainly have a lot more respect for him if he managed to leap over a couple of people and flying kick the guy.

My first thought was why would you bother to egg a no-mark like EB? Then I heard the guy responsible talk to the cameras... WMD - Words of Mass Deception, yeah I bet you've been saving that one up all year, genius.

The world has given up waiting for the seismic words that Ed Miliband will utter to rally the Labour Party and get the fighting fit for the next Election. If the Tories win in 2015, it will be this chump's fault.

He's a bloody caretaker. I wouldn't be surprised if Labour replace him before the next election.

The ConDems are laughing all the way to the bank, they can get away with (pretty much) anything and still be in with a shout at the polls, because Labour don't have a credible leader.

I think the next election will rest in the economy. If it does show a sustained recovery by election day, the Tories may well win. If not, they won't.

I agree, but there will probably be very little improvement by then. We still have not reached the highs of 2007 so the economy is still not recovering properly.

There's also the issue that the bits of the economy that are recovering are on the 'macro' side of things. Even if manufacturing or the balance of payments (or whatever) improves, the bare fact is people feel poorer than they were and with no sign of pay rises matching inflation at any point in the near future, that's unlikely to change much.

The vast majority of people don't vote based on macro-economic issues because they don't see them. They vote on personal issues. What may be a factor at the election is not whether people feel better off (because in all likelihood they won't) is whether they feel confident that either of the major parties may make them better off at some point in the future. So most likely it'll be the Tory line of 'they broke the economy in the first place, don't vote for them' against the Labour line of 'they help their friends but you're worse off'. With the Liberals saying 'none of it is our fault, honest'.

People don't just feel poorer, they are poorer, because inflation has had a five year free run, against a back drop of pay freezes and cuts. If the average increase was 2 to 3% a year, most people are 10-15% worse off.

The recent improvements in manufacturing are tiny and even manufacturing still has a very long way to go to reach the levels before the crash. I think Faisal Islam from Channel 4 showed a graph with the recent uptick in manufacturing as tiny compared to the fall before. I doubt that many will see a real improvement in their standard of living in their lives. In the US real median wages have been stagnant since 1974. That might happen here. So standards of living have been falling for many for years.

The vast majority will vote for who they think can make things better. If there is a problem with unemployment in an area and there are large numbers of "ethnics" then they might vote BNP or UKIP. The problem which both Labour and Conservative face is that they are following the same economic model which has not worked. Neither really deserve to win.

Who ever wins the public will get screwed over.


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A graffito I saw in St Albans in the mud 1990s read "it doesn't matter who you vote for - the government always wins".