Press Office

Aired: Sunday, 13 May, 2007 10:00
Sunday Live with Adam Boulton

 

Boulton:          You are minister for the third sector which I suppose is volunteerism society doing what it can.  Would that include presumably the News of the World, J.K. Rowling and footballers putting up a very big reward to find Maddy?

 

Miliband:        Well, obviously it’s a very sad story that we’ve got and people have come forward very generously and said we will give these rewards in the hope that somebody will come forward and let’s all hope that someone comes forward.

 

Boulton:          Gordon Brown has too talked about volunteerism so has Tony Blair, so has David Cameron so it must be a warm issue but does it actually mean anything in practice?

 

Miliband:        I think it does mean something.  I think in a way it is part of Gordon’s recognition, which you saw in his leadership statement, that yes government and the state play an important role in funding lots of the activities that take place in our community but what’s also incredibly important is that we have individual initiative and allow people’s talents to flourish.  If you take Sure Start for example, one of the governments big innovations, yes it’s about government funding but it is also about parents on the ground being able to shape how the service works.  I think there is a recognition that it can’t be about central control, it must be about people being able to exercise local initiative and Sure Start is one example. 

 

Boulton:          So would Prime Minister Gordon Brown do anything different from Tony Blair in this area or would he just build on the policy?

 

Miliband:        I think in a way the challenges are different.  One of the things that strikes me as a minister as you say for the third sector which includes social enterprise – businesses founded for a social purpose like Jamie Oliver’s "Fifteen" restaurant.  There’s a huge anxiousness and enthusiasm for that kind of business, yes making a living but also putting something back into society, really fulfilling social purposes.  One of the things I want to look at in my job, and I hope Gordon will do this if he becomes Prime Minister, is how we can see more of these social businesses, social enterprises flourishing.  

 

Boulton:          Not a very cheery poll for Gordon Brown in the Sunday Times today; the gap, David Cameron’s lead, expands from 4% to 10% with Gordon Brown as leader, on Blair compared to Brown people say Blair is more likeable, only 31% like Gordon Brown, just as honest as Blair, Blair is more principled and Blair is a better representative for Britain.  It’s going to be an uphill struggle isn’t it?

 

Miliband:        It’s early days.  I think there is a big challenge for Gordon and for the government.  For Gordon it is being about to move out of being Finance Minister which he has been for ten years, lots of boring statistics that you have to talk about, BSBR and all that -

 

Boulton:          - Important statistics -

 

Miliband:        - Boring but important as I am sure he’d be the first to say, but to get to a different place and talk about different issues and that’s what we have started to see in the last couple of days.  I’d say about any poll that is taken at the moment that it is very early days in Gordon’s campaign, he has got six or seven weeks to campaign, then he’s got -

 

Boulton:          - But can he reinvent himself?  People are pretty familiar with him aren’t they?

 

Miliband:        I don’t think it is about reinventing himself, I think it is about showing a side of himself that people have never seen.  As I have said, they have seen him talking about those core economic issues which are very important to people but not what a Prime Minister tends to talk about.  A Prime Minister tends to talk about a whole range of other issues, that is his challenge and I think he is actually meeting that challenge quite well talking today about affordable housing, for example.

 

Boulton:          Noticeably he has been touring marginal constituencies round London, in Kent, in the South East.  He does have a problem in that kind of middle England type of area doesn’t he, I mean, because of the Scottishness apart from anything else?

 

Miliband:        I wouldn’t say he has got a problem -

 

Boulton:          - Isn’t that really what is feeding into a poll like this?

 

Miliband:        I think for the whole country there is an opportunity for Gordon to set out who he is and what he believes in.  I happen to think that people will quite like the blend that he offers of experience, you know your mortgage is safe with him as Chancellor and hopefully as Prime Minister but also he has got values, I mean, what is his core value?  I would say it is to have a country where everyone can try and fulfill their potential and make the most of themselves and what’s that really about?  It’s about using the power of government to help people, to enable people to make the most out of themselves but also to unleash people’s individual initiative.

 

Boulton:          Now, this evening he is debating with the left with the two candidates who are hoping to get enough nominations – Michael Meacher and John McDonnell.  Frankly, would you hope that that would be the last debate he has with them, not because he doesn’t want a contest but because defining the leadership election in terms of Gordon Brown versus that minority of the Labour Party is probably not the most constructive way of using his time, is it?

 

Miliband:        Funnily enough not really.  I think it is really good he is doing the debate today.  I hope he gets a chance to talk to them, to debate with others over the coming weeks and months.  Look, I think it is very important for him, we have just been talking about his need to get out there and talk to the country about who he is and what believes in.  I think any opportunity to engage on the issues which this debate tonight offers – it’s good that he is taking it up and it’s a real opportunity for him. 

 

Boulton:          Sure but what I am saying is he has got six weeks now.  Frankly the choices are either that he stands effectively as the Prime Minister in waiting or he goes through this Labour leadership challenge and we can only see two people out there who could possibly challenge him. In terms of the debate within the party would it be better or worse if there is a left wing challenge?

 

Miliband:        I personally welcome a contest actually.  I think it would be good if there was a contest.  What you can’t do in these circumstances is say as some people have done, look Gordon Brown should start throwing some of his nominations to John McDonnell and Michael Meacher to make sure there is a contest, I don’t think that would be sensible but I think it would be good if there was a contest.  I think whatever happens whether there is a single candidate or more than one candidate Gordon needs to use the next six or seven weeks to get out there and be talking to the country and I know he is determined to do that.  For example there will be hustings organized by the Labour Party, you know, places where the candidates go, even if there is only one candidate he will still be at those hustings and I think that is important.

 

Boulton:          Now, this announcement today of eco-friendly housing, trying to build, I think, five cities of 20,000 each so 100,000 new places.  That again is a development of a policy that Yvette Cooper already told us about.

 

Miliband:        Sure, sure, well he she hadn’t really.  I think she announced a year a go one of these places where this sort of initiative might be taken, she said a few weeks a go that we were thinking about these issues.  This is a much firmer announcement, it is saying there will be five eco-towns, it is saying that broadly speaking there will be 20,000 houses in each of them, I think there is going to be interest from lots of local authorities in this.  What’s the purpose of this?  It’s saying affordable housing was not the biggest challenge ten years a go, for example as far as local authority housing was concerned the challenge was decency and we have taken a million kids out of sub-standard housing.  The challenge now across the country, and this unites middle England the so-called traditional Labour areas, I see it in my area of Doncaster, is building the housing that people need whether it is rented or owned.

 

Boulton:          So this will be affordable housing?

 

Miliband:        Yes, it will be affordable -

 

Boulton:          - How can you enforce that?

 

Miliband:        Well, it’s about the planning regulations, it’s about encouraging local authorities to come forward, lots of the details are going to be set out later -

 

Boulton:          - Will these be houses that are owned by the state effectively or council houses, or they be private houses?

 

Miliband:        As I understand it, and obviously it will be for Yvette and Gordon to talk in more detail about it, it is going to be mixed use housing.  These are about towns that have mixed communities, we know some communities where you have some ownership and some rented is the better way to go.  The objective is trying to get more houses built in his country which I think everyone recognizes is a huge need out there.

 

Boulton:          The other proposal is more parliamentary restraint, if you like, on the executive.  That is a code way of saying Tony Blair has been too presidential isn’t it?

 

Miliband:        No, I think it is a way of saying that the government as a whole needs to do more to take parliament seriously.  Let me just give you an example, when I was a back bencher and I asked to speak on the budget debate and I spoke on the last day and a Tory MP said to me that a few years a go I would never have got the chance to speak in this slot on the last day of the budget debate because parliament was so much more important.  Now, that has got to be a bad thing and we have got to find ways where we make parliament, the centre of our democracy, more important.  Partly it is about giving it more power but also let me just say about more statements in parliament and less announcements on the Today programme.

 

Boulton:          I understand that but one of the ideas again is that important public appointments would be approved presumably by select committees.  Is there going to be an end to whipping select committees, in other words letting parliament decide who sits on their select committees rather than the party leaderships because that’s one of the reasons why they’re notably weaker than their American counterparts?

 

Miliband:        That’s obviously something that we will have to look at but I have to say when you think about the kind of reports the select committees are coming out with about the government over the last few years you wouldn’t say most of them seemed like, sort of, ‘Patsies’ -

 

Boulton:          - But if you are giving them teeth that would be the real way to free them up wouldn’t it?

 

Miliband:        There’s always going to be an issue about who gets to sit on the select committees.  I think that the truth is about a lot of these public appointments which we are talking about, for example some of the regulators have been mentioned, regulators of some of the privatized industries, I don’t think it is necessarily about who gets on the committees, it is about taking it seriously and making sure the person is fit for the job, it’s really sort of putting them through their paces.  

 

Boulton:          And finally, I’ll give you that Gordon Brown is going to be the next leader of the Labour Party, you don’t have to say it, I know it is a contest -

 

Miliband:        - Take nothing for granted -

 

Boulton:          - Yes, alright.  Is he going to win the next general election in his own right?

 

Miliband:        Yes, I am confident he can.  It is a big, big challenge and I think it is a challenge the Labour Party should not underestimate.  We have a huge job to renew the trust with the British people, that’s starting now with Gordon going out there and listening and learning but we have got a long way to go.