Ed Miliband’s frontline political career began in betrayal, leapfrogging his older, more talented and more electable brother David to seize the Labour leadership in 2010. That act split the party down the middle.
He then led Labour to a catastrophic defeat in 2015.
It wasn’t just a loss but a landslide that handed Tory leader David Cameron an unexpected majority and left the left demoralised.
That failure opened the door to Brexit, a moment that broke the hearts of millions of Labour-voting Remainers.
Ed didn’t just lose an election, he cost the left their beloved EU.
Now, having finally returned to office, he’s causing chaos all over again.
His obsessive net zero agenda is tearing holes in Labour unity and deepening divides within the movement. It also involves plastering the countryside with wind turbines built using Chinese slave labour.
Tony Blair is the latest big Labour beast to take aim, warning that Miliband’s climate approach is built on “inconvenient facts” voters are beginning to see through.
He said Miliband’s approach is “doomed to fail” as voters are “being asked to make sacrifices for virtually no impact.”
He’s not wrong.
Miliband is loathed on the right but increasingly, the fury is coming from his own side.
Shuttering North Sea oil and gas production will cost the UK billions in lost tax revenues and leave us more dependent on foreign energy.
His green vision will saddle British households with soaring bills while making little difference to global emissions, as China and India continue to burn coal with impunity.
Unions are furious. Unite’s Sharon Graham has publicly attacked his strategy.
GMB boss Gary Smith has branded the refusal to issue new oil and gas licences “madness”.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves reportedly sees Miliband as a serious obstacle to her economic plans and opposes his move to block Heathrow expansion.
Reform’s Nigel Farage is having a field day by blasting net zero lunacy. So is Tory leader Kemi Badenoch.
Labour PM Keir Starmer? Not so much.
Starmer has been forced to defend his beleaguered Energy Secretary. Just days ago, he insisted net zero is part of the “DNA” of his government.
That’s not conviction but crisis management.
Yet Ed Miliband’s grip on the party remains strong.
If Starmer were toppled tomorrow, Miliband would be a serious contender to replace him.
But his appeal doesn’t stretch far beyond the well-heeled, liberal middle classes. The kind who love green utopias as long as they don’t interfere with their long-haul holidays.
Working-class Labour voters, the same people who backed Brexit and now eye Farage, don’t see him as a visionary.
They see him as a liability. So do many Labour backbenchers.
Miliband’s green dogma is costing Labour votes. He’s probably doing more for Farage than he will ever do for Starmer.
It isn’t the first time he’s sunk the party and it won’t be the last.
Now a top Labour donor has demanded that Starmer sacks “bonkers” Ed Miliband. Yet opposition parties will be hoping Starmer will keep him in post.
The longer Miliband is there, the more he will hurt Labour. Unfortunately, he’s damaging the country too.