Meet the new leader: Ed Miliband could be the first Jewish prime minister since Disraeli

Published on Wednesday 29 September 2010 23:42

The first Jewish prime minister since Disraeli he could be but the man nurtured in a Marxist household insists religion is not important to him

HE doesn't do God and was too busy to register as the father of his young son. He drives a Ford Focus, but aspires to get the keys to a Prius. For escapism, he likes nothing more than hanging out with the ladies from Wisteria Lane but for idealism he'll ditch the box set of Desperate Housewives in favour of The West Wing.

So just how normal is Ed Miliband? Well, that depends, as a child could YOU complete the Rubik's Cube in one minute 20 seconds ... using only one hand?

Yesterday "Red Ed" to use the new soubriquet adopted by critics annoyed that his nomination as the Labour Party's new leader was secured only through the support of Britain's three biggest unions, attempted to move beyond the party's conference and engage with the country he hopes one day to run. This involved a light grilling on Daybreak, ITV's new breakfast show, where the interrogation was not on the economy, but matrimony and Mr Miliband's refusal, so far, to wed his partner of five years, Justine Thornton, a former child actress who now works as an environmental barrister. As critics of New Labour would argue, the importance of marriage took a tumble on their watch and despite Gordon Brown's encouragement that a ring on Ms Thornton's finger would assist his political fortunes, Ed Miliband was always happy to insist such public gestures were unnecessary in today's society. Until yesterday, that is, when he announced that he would be getting

married "eventually" but refused the show's generous offer to propose on air. "I don't think it would exactly bring out my romantic side to propose on Daybreak, but thanks for the offer anyway," he said.

He insisted, however, that voters were "pretty relaxed" over whether or not politicians were married and said: "Stable families come in different forms. We happen not to be married. We will get married eventually, but I think it is really important to say that different people provide stability to their kids – which is the thing that really matter – and to themselves in different ways."

The fact that he and Justine were not married resulted in his name being absent from his son, Daniel's birth certificate, for when Justine went along to register the birth she discovered that, as they were not married, she couldn't automatically register Ed's name as the father. He had to do so in person. "She came back and said: 'You will never believe it, I can't register you. You have got to go along to the council offices and make sure you do it.' I am really embarrassed I haven't. We have a second one on the way and I'm going to make sure I do two for the price of one."

The relaxed, jovial manner Ed Miliband was able to project is why he was previously known as the "ambassador from the Plant F***" during the civil war between 'Brownites' and 'Blairites'. Although a 'Brownite' he was able build bridges with Tony Blair's team for the simple reason that he was one of the few who didn't arrogantly tell them as an automatic response to "F*** off". As he said: "I was the one who tried to bridge some of the nonsense that there was." Friends joke about the time he argued with a member of the audience on BBC1's Question Time and the woman later asked him to got out with her. This ability to build consensus and calm troubled waters stems, say friends, from his role as the younger brother in a fiercely argumentative family. The son of the Marxist Professor, Ralph Miliband, and his academic wife, Marion Kozak, who both escaped the Holocaust, Ed, with his older brother, David, listened and joined in debates with figures such as Tony Benn and Joe Slovo, head of the ANC's military wing. (Ed would later go on to work briefly for Benn as an intern: "very helpful" he noted in his diaries.) Yet as a child, political debate would take a back seat to his passion for the soap Dallas, and as a teenager he reviewed films and plays on LBC Radio's Young London programme. Even today his interest in television extends to classic cartoons such as Top Cat, The Flintstones and Scooby Doo.

As a student at an ordinary North London Comprehensive, he was a self-confessed "maths geek" – later it was his speed at mental calculations that caught Gordon Brown's attention. (In later years Brown made such a habit of calling him up at all hours that Miliband took the opportunity when the Chancellor was out of the room to grab his mobile and delete his own phone numbers.) At Oxford University, where he attended the same college as David had four years previously and studied the same subjects, Politics, Philosophy and Economics, Ed discovered his passion for the practical aspect of politics during a rent dispute. "I wasn't particularly bookish; what really got me going was student activism, and mobilising people."

After graduating he worked briefly as a television journalist, before being taken on by Harriet Harman, then a shadow minister, as a speech writer and researcher. According to Charlie Whelan, Gordon Brown's former spin doctor, Brown then "burgled him off Harriet." In 2003, he spent a year's sabbatical at Harvard University, which took him out of the country during the invasion of Iraq. His fondest cities are New York and Boston "because at various times I lived with my dad in both of them." A former colleague of Ralph Miliband said that of the two brothers, Ed has "more of his dad in him than David". Upon his return to Britain he was rewarded with a safe Labour seat and quickly joined the cabinet. He was, according to some, a ditherer, but after he announced his leadership bid, he said that put paid to any such notion as it was evidence that he could take the difficult decisions. During the expenses scandal he was described by newspapers as one of the "saints" for claiming one of the lowest amounts.Friends say Ed Miliband could be a relationship counsellor if he was not a politician. As one said: "Ed is a brilliant communicator and is seen as very friendly guy. He's the younger brother who has had to work harder socially and play the peacemaker. He combines brains with charm and political acumen." The emotional intelligence Ed is said to possess, in contrast to his stiffer, more cerebral brother, was cunningly deployed as a skewer during an edition of Question Time, a few weeks ago, where Ed told his brother that he loved him in front of millions of viewers, all of whom then noted how David visibly squirmed in his seat.

He admits the most expensive items in his wardrobe are his suits and he does intend to educate his children at the local school.

"That's why my parents did. I think everyone benefits from comprehensive education: people who go private are missing out."

On the question of faith, after a devout Christian who converted to Catholicism after leaving office, and a son of the Manse, Ed Miliband is returning the leadership of the Labour Party to the quiet atheism of Neil Kinnock. While The Jewish Chronicle claims Mr Miliband is the first member of their faith to lead the Labour Party and others members of the Jewish community are anxious to see the first Jewish Prime Minister in Number 10 since Benjamin Disraeli left office in 1880, Ed Miliband is strictly secular, admitting yesterday: "I don't believe in God personally but I have a great respect for those people who do," A position he shares with Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, whom he now looks forward to removing, along with the Tories, from office.