Ed Miliband - On Borrowed Time?

You know, I really feel sorry for Nick Clegg. He's spent the best part of the past year acting as a teflon coating for David Cameron, and since Thursday's elections, he's doing exactly the same thing for Ed Miliband. Because it is only the fact that the Liberal Democrats did so badly on Thursday that hides the fact that it was also a very difficult and disappointing set of results for the Labour leader.

Let's look at the best result for Miliband Minor - the fact that the Labour party have gained seats and, indeed, overall control of some councils. As things stand (Saturday at ten to two, fact fans) Labour have gained 800 seats and 26 councils. Yet the vast majority of those gains have been at the expense of the Liberal Democrats, and taking votes from them at the moment really is like taking candy from a baby. But what should be worrying Miliband - what should really be worrying him - is the result for the Tories. Over the past year, they have been heading up a coalition pursuing, for many, deeply unpopular and divisive policies. In fact, hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets to protest against those policies. The results at their first electoral test in government? 81 new councillors, and 4 new councils. Far from struggling to hold onto their territory, they have actually gained ground since taking power. Ultimately, Miliband Minor needs to be able to take on the Tories properly if he wants to be installed at Number 10. There's no evidence here that he will be able to do it. In fact, the council results suggest all he has managed to do is win some seats that the Labour party should never have lost in the first place from a massively unpopular third party.

And the council results are the best for him of the day.

Because in Wales, Labour have made some gains, but still seem unable to take control outright. And Wales - Labour's heartland, again where they should never have lost popularity at all - is a crucial sign of the well-being of the party in general. These election results suggest that they health of that party is damaged at the very least. But that's nothing compared to what happened North of the Border in Scotland.

There, the Labour party appear to have handed overall control of the Scottish parliament to the SNP on a silver platter. And this is Scotland, for fuck's sake, where the last Labour Prime Minister was born. If they can't win here, then they are going to struggle to make any headway whatsoever in far more hostile parts of the UK. Furthermore, what is particularly damaging to Miliband Minor is that he campaigned in Scotland, and he's been rewarded with a big fat "fuck you" from the Scottish voters.

He also campaigned for AV, and guess what happened there? Oh, the movement was defeated conclusively at the polls. Miliband Minor seems to have inherited that inverted Midas Touch of his former boss - everything he touches turns to shit. In fact, this t-shirt (via Guido) seems very harsh but also extremely apt:

With results like these, I'd be surprised if Ed Miliband is still leading the Labour party come the next election. In fact, his best bet to lead Labour into that election would be if the coalition collapsed right now. Of course, he could do something extraordinary to turn his fortunes around, but he gives no indications that he is willing to do so, or even that he feels he needs to do so. He's just waiting for the electoral pendulum to swing back to Labour and install him as PM. These results show that just isn't happening.

In fact, we could use this as a litmus test of how serious the Labour party is about winning the next election: they will show they are serious when they get a credible leader, capable of communicating and coming up with some sort of genuinely different, and popular, policies. In other words, when they get a leader other than Ed Miliband.