Ed Miliband plays down family rift over leadership and urges Labour to ‘move on’

By Daniel Martin for the Daily Mail
Updated: 11:07 EST, 19 June 2011

Ed Miliband has admitted that he still cannot ‘look back and laugh’ with his brother David after he defeated him in last year’s Labour’s leadership contest.

Nine months after his narrow victory, Ed indicated that the scars are still so deep for the siblings to have a normal relationship with each other.

And he refused in an interview to comment on claims his mother was ‘in despair’ that her two sons had fallen out.

But he claimed the Miliband family had ‘moved on’ from last year’s fratricidal contest – and that everyone else should too. 

Last year, as he launched his campaign for the leadership, Ed told the Independent on Sunday that he and his brother would ‘look back at all of this and laugh’.

But, asked by the same paper whether they had now done so, he said: ‘I don’t think we’ve done that yet, but I think I what I would say is that both of us have moved on.’

Asked how he would characterised his relationship with his brother, he said: ‘I am not going to get into that. I’m just going to say that we’ve both moved on, so everybody else should too.

‘I don’t regret my decision to stand at all.’

Mr Miliband denied claims that his wife and his brother’s were on such poor terms they could not even talk to each other. 

‘Nonsense, nonsense, that’s nonsense. It’s nonsense. David and Louise were at our wedding a few weeks ago, and it was great that they were there and enjoyed themselves.’

However, he did not mention that David and his wife did not go to the evening party after the recent wedding between Ed and Justine.

And he refused to respond to rumours that their mother Marion Kozak was ‘in despair’ over the fall-out.

‘I’m not going to get into any conversations with her about it,’ said the tight-lipped leader.

A poll in the Independent on Sunday showed Mr Miliband's net personal rating has fallen from minus 14 in April to minus 27 now. Some 27 per cent believe David would make a better leader than Ed.

Last week, aides of Ed claimed he ‘admires’ Margaret Thatcher and is using her as an inspiration as he battles to become Prime Minister.

But a new book, Ed: The Milibands And The Making Of A Labour Leader, reveals he wrote of his ‘elation’ when she stepped down and held a 24-hour party to mark her downfall while an Oxford student.