Rt Hon Ed Miliband

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio 4. For rights reasons the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:10

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.

Presenter0:34

My castaway this week is the Labour leader Ed Miliband. He's been in charge of his party for three years now and was the youngest leader they'd ever elected, although that fact got somewhat lost in the blizzard of drama that surrounded his coronation famously. He stood against his brother David. To say the younger brother's victory upset the political apple cart would be something of an understatement.

Presenter0:55

Politics is in his pores. His mother was a human rights campaigner, his father a renowned Marxist academic.

Presenter1:01

Both parents came from Jewish families who settled in Britain, having only just survived the Nazis. Looking through his C V clever, comprehensive schoolboy, degree in philosophy, politics and economics from Oxford, an intern for Tony Benn, Economics Lecturer at Harvard, Special Adviser to Gordon Brown, it's clear for him there's only ever been one abiding passion.

Presenter1:22

He says politics is not something I choose. It's not something I learned from books, even from my dad's books. It was something I was born into. And I think it's fair to say, Ed Miliband, that being leader of the opposition might be the hardest job in politics. What do you think the most difficult aspect of it is?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband1:40

First of all, I think there are many, many harder jobs in life. I think it's a privilege to be doing this job. The biggest privilege is.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband1:48

If it doesn't sound a bit like sort of Miss World, going around meeting people, talking to people, talking to people about their lives.

Presenter1:52

Little uh

Presenter1:55

And in terms of the difficult part of the job, which was what I asked you there, is it Prime Minister's questions? Is that something? I mean, plenty beforehand. I'll tell you what I think is the most difficult.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband2:02

I tell you what I think is the most difficult part actually, reflecting on it. I think it's the twenty-four-seven nature of the job. It's about the fact that I've got two small children, Daniel and Sam.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband2:13

And they're getting to the stage where they know if Dad's around or not.

Presenter2:16

You said I used that phrase about being born into politics. That was a phrase you yourself used in your conference speech of twenty ten. In that speech, you put your family front and centre. With hindsight, do you think that was a smart thing to do?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband2:30

Absolutely. Because you can't understand me without understanding where I come from. Now, you know, my dad had a particular political outlook. It's not the same as mine, but it's a big part of what inspired me. And and and in y anyway, in in modern politics, who you are, who your family is, it's always going to be relevant and and important to people. So I think it sort of comes with the territory.

Presenter2:55

In September of this year, you said, I think it was in a QA, that you were bringing back socialism. For you, what does that mean?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband3:03

uh democratic socialism, it's on our party card. For me it's about a society where there is fairness and justice and greater equality. That's what brought me into the Labour Party. We live in a capitalist society. My dad thought you could abolish capitalism. I don't. But I think it throws up fundamental injustices. And what motivates me as a politician is you see injustice and you seek to do something about it.

Presenter3:30

Now of course there are plenty places on television and radio where people can talk politics with you with a capital P. Today I hope we're going to find out a bit less about policy and a bit more about you. I'm sure you'll know that on desert island discs people are sometimes sceptical about politicians' choices. This list that we're about to hear, how many people have cast their eye over it and how much is it your list?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband3:50

It's it's it's absolutely my list. It's a list that is personal to me. Lots some people will not like some of the songs on the list and in a way that's as it should be, but uh this is the list I chose.

Presenter3:55

Well

Presenter4:01

I was told you did play the violin when you were a little boy. Are you quite a musical person?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband4:04

Absolutely terribly. It was a sort of screech city, really. So I'm afraid I I can't sound very musical.

Presenter4:10

Okay. Well, do tell me about your first choice this morning then, Ed Miliband. What are we gonna hear?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband4:14

My first choice is Enkozi Sikaleli Afrika, which was the song of the African National Congress and is now the South African national anthem. One of the formative experiences I had in my childhood was meeting a woman called Ruth First, and she was an extraordinarily charismatic woman. And a few months later, she was killed by a letter bomb sent by the South African secret police. And anybody having that experience as a child either runs a mile from politics or they think, gosh, this really, really matters.

Speaker 14:52

Yeah.

Presenter4:53

Come on, sire soon.

Speaker 24:54

Uh

Presenter4:55

Uh

Speaker 14:55

Yeah.

Speaker 24:55

Who made this heavy darling monster?

Speaker 15:17

I see you look as you

Speaker 15:19

Oh, seems a song.

Speaker 15:26

That's who's

Presenter5:29

Uh

Speaker 15:29

It's a

Presenter5:29

Yeah.

Speaker 15:29

Uh

Presenter5:29

Uh Uh Uh

Presenter5:37

That was Nkozi Sicaleri Jafrica from the original soundtrack of the film Cry Freedom, arranged and conducted by George Fenton. I want you to cast your mind back to the late afternoon of the second of May in 1997 then. You'll remember it. Clearly, Labour had just won a landslide election victory. Gordon Brown enters the Treasury, the first Labour Chancellor in many years. You are one of just four advisers who is walking by his side as he goes through the doors of the Treasury. You're only twenty-seven years old.

Presenter6:04

That must have been an exhilarating moment for you.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband6:07

Yes, incredibly exciting, because I'd grown up under Conservative rule. I guess I was nine when the Conservatives uh won the election in nineteen seventy nine. And it was a s h there was a huge sense of change and a huge sense of expectation and anticipation, perhaps too much so.

Presenter6:25

So there you were then back in 97 and the years that followed, right at the heart of this government, and therefore right at the heart.

Presenter6:32

Of this dysfunctional relationship between Blair and Brown. Something what you're talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Blair and Brown, the camp's fighting it out. You're in the Brown camp. Increasingly, indeed, just opened my paper this morning, and there it was. The dysfunctional relationship that is apparently at the heart of your Labour shadow front bench between you and Ed Balls. People are saying you don't get on, you're antagonistic, it's fraught, you disagree on how policy should be represented, you're criticising the way he's doing it. What do you say?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband6:34

Can't think what you're talking about.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband6:58

Reflecting on then, there was a dysfunctionality.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband7:05

I think it was called the T B G B's.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband7:08

And you said I was in the Brown camp and obviously I worked for Gordon Brown.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband7:13

I sort of tried to be somebody, and I think I was somebody by common consent, who could sort of reach across.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband7:19

To people across the party. But as for now, look, Ed Bulls and I have seen that movie and we're not going back to it. You know, honestly.

Presenter7:27

Mr. President, it was the union vote, of course, that made the big difference between you and David when you won that leadership election. You won it with just 1.3% of the vote. There continues to be a very murky situation that's rumbling on in Falkirk right now. We're not going to get into the money shy of that, but I do want to talk to you about your links with the unions and the idea that you are in some way beholden to them because they got you in office, that actually, you know, as you were accused of at the dispatch box at Prime Minister's questions this week, of being weak and unable to stand up to union leaders, in particular Len McCluskey, to what extent do you feel you're compromised by your relationship, your close relationship with the unions?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband8:07

I don't feel that, and it's important to remember that it was the votes of individual trade union members.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband8:13

That were part of me winning the election.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband8:15

working men and women. I'm proud to have them affiliated to the Labour Party. And I'm embarked on a massive reform of the Labour Party. I think we can be a much bigger party, but only if we find a way of having an individual relationship with those men and women. Now, there are lots of people who are worried about this change. This is a big reform of my party.

Presenter8:35

This is a

Presenter8:37

Now time is not on our site, but I do want to ask you particularly about Falkirk, because there's a lot of people that say the best thing for you to do open inquiry, flush it all out in the open, why are you not having an open inquiry on Falkirk?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband8:47

Well we've done an inquiry. An open inquiry. And what's really important to say this, Kirsty. We've taken the strongest action in that constituency and we're determined to uphold the good name of the Labour Party. Because whenever a party has an inquiry into specific things that happen in a constituency, people do confidential interviews. The person around whom there was controversy is not going to be the candidate. There was a joining up scheme which we've closed down. None of the members who were joined up are going to be able to vote. We've had a police inquiry. So I honestly say to you, we've acted really thoroughly to uphold the integrity of the party. And as I say, we're now embarked on this major reform of our party precisely to learn lessons and change that relationship.

Presenter8:49

An opening policy.

Presenter8:58

But why should that need to be secret?

Presenter9:33

Second piece of music, Edmilliband. What is it? What are we gonna hear?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband9:35

The second piece of music is Jerusalem. It's obviously about England's green and pleasant land, and um.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband9:41

Being the son of refugees, you you mentioned that in the introduction.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband9:45

M my my parents loved this country.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband9:48

Window in the Mail wrote The Man Who Hated Britain famously.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband9:52

The reason I hated that so much was because it was so at odds with the way my parents think about this country. And Justine is a great walker. I I'm a bit of a moaner when it comes to to walking, but she loves walking in England's green and pleasant land. So it'll remind me of her, it'll remind me of my parents, and and it's a great hymn.

Presenter11:18

Jerusalem, played by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and choir, conducted by Carl Davis. So let's find out, Edmund Band, a little bit more about your parents then. Your mother's family. Her history is a very dramatic one. She was from a well-to-do family in Poland. In the time that she lived in, most of the rest of the Jewish residents were taken to Treblinka to be murdered by the Nazis. She eventually came to settle in Britain in the 1950s. Given that background, given the trauma and the drama that she'd been through, family as you were growing up must have been terrifically important to her.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband11:52

Yeah. She was five five years old or so when the war broke out and uh she was in hiding in a convent. Then they were taken in she was taken in by a Catholic family. But her her dad didn't survive the war. He was um killed in a concentration camp. I mean look

Rt Hon Ed Miliband12:15

Who can begin to describe that experience and what it does to somebody? I mean, she's the most stoical, currently at the age of seventy-eight, you know, stoical, go-getting, amazing person. But, you know, it's terrible to lose a parent, all appalling, but in and in and in those circumstances and with that dislocation. And then she came to England, I think, at the age of fourteen or fifteen on her own, lived with a family, you know, and it's just a sort of how how can you begin to describe it?

Presenter12:45

And your father, too a very, very dramatic escape he had. He was on one of the, as I understand it, either the last or one of the last boats to leave for Britain. He arrived on the nineteenth of May in nineteen forty. He was from a Belgian Jewish family.

Presenter13:00

I understand though that it was only half the family that got on that boat. What happened to was it his mother and his sister that were elsewhere? Where were they?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:04

So him and he and his father decided it was time to get out of Belgium and they walked from Brussels to Ostend, and I think it's 100 kilometres, got on the boat, and then left behind my grandmother, so my dad's mum and his sister. And the story about them and how they were saved and how a number of members of my family were saved is an extraordinary story. My grandmother sold hats in a market on a Saturday, and a woman she sold hats to was, I think, the wife of a farmer in a Belgian village.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:38

That means they weren't Jews. They took them in.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:41

And they took in a whole number of I think tens of members of my family were hidden in that village.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:46

And uh

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:48

They survived the war.

Presenter13:50

You spent um some time with all of your family in America, and then on one occasion, I think, alone with your father when he was teaching over there. And of course he was this uh renowned Marxist intellectual, a great thinker. How were his home making skills when you were living together?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:52

And a gun.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:55

Mm.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband13:58

Marxist

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:02

Hopeless. Hopeless, it's fair to say. After about two and a half months of me having spaghetti with uh cold pasta sauce from a jar, I suddenly said to him at the age of twelve, Dad, I think you're supposed to warm up to the pasta sauce. And he said, I think you're right. Uh but but because he taught in America for a few months of the year, he would actually spend a lot of the year just writing in his study.

Speaker 114:13

So the path

Speaker 114:15

God

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:22

And when I'd knock on the door,

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:24

He would never say to me, I don't have time now. He was a great father.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:30

as well as being a distinguished academic.

Presenter14:32

You were only twenty-four when he died, so that's young to lose a parent who's been such a significant figure in your life.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:40

When I was three he had a he serious heart attack.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:43

Of course I don't remember that. But wh but when he

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:47

died is one of these things where

Rt Hon Ed Miliband14:50

He um he went into hospital. It didn't seem like it was that serious. And then suddenly, two days before he died, my brother rang me up and said and he said, I don't think they think he's you know, they think it's very, very serious. And I remember driving to the um hospital. And I think it's the only time in my life that I've ever prayed. Um I I'm not a religious person, but I remember saying, If there's a God, you please don't let this happen. And then he he he died and um

Rt Hon Ed Miliband15:27

I've said he was a lodestar. I didn't agree with everything he said, but a point of reference. But he was also an em you know, he's my father, so it's you know, look, it's the worst thing that's ever happened to me in my life.

Presenter15:37

Okay, we're gonna have some music, Ed. Uh, we're on your third. Tell me about this.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband15:41

And this is uh about my dad. It's the ballad of Joe Hill and it's sung absolutely beautifully by Paul Robeson. He had a brilliant voice and he used to sing, and he used to love, love Paul Robeson.

Speaker 115:54

I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night, Alive as you and me.

Speaker 116:04

Says I, But Joe, you're ten years dead, I never die, says he. I never died.

Presenter16:23

That was Paul Robeson's singing Ballad of Joe Hill. I have this image of this very political household with you all sitting round the kitchen table discussing animatedly politics, left wing or otherwise. Is that about right?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband16:35

Yes, it wasn't the only thing. But I think what was amazing was that, you know, you'd be I'd be a 14-year-old sitting around the kitchen table with my parents and people would be around for dinner and I'd pipe up and say something about politics and some unknowing guest would say, Well, I don't think that's quite right. I don't think I don't quite understand it. And my dad would say, well, hang on a minute. You know, just because he's fourteen doesn't mean he doesn't understand it.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband17:01

And both David and I obviously went into politics, partly because our parents sort of welcomed us into that conversation and didn't push us out, but it wasn't sort of das capital over the breakfast table. You know, I used to sneak off and watch Dallas on the telly, much to my dad's disapproval. And he was a dad who would do things with us which weren't about politics. So it wasn't it wasn't only politics, but but politics was a big part of it.

Presenter17:26

So I'll take a little hop skip and a jump through what you did. You did your O levels and A levels. You spent time in America where you interned on Nation magazine. On your return from there, you went to Corpus Christi College. You followed David to study PPE. I'm wondering why you studied the same thing as him. I'm wondering why you didn't think, well, my brother's done that. I'm going to do something different.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband17:46

Good question. Um

Rt Hon Ed Miliband17:50

But it's what interested me really.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband17:52

You know, I I I was fourteen or fifteen when he went to university and admired him, admired what he was doing. He seemed to be having a good time.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband18:01

And that's where my heart was, that's what I was interested in.

Presenter18:03

It's oil.

Presenter18:04

And you say that David seemed to be having a good time, but I wonder maybe if you had a better time than him, because he got a first-class degree and you didn't?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband18:10

What's the reason for that? I don't know. He was a better student than I was. Did it rankle with you that he got a first and you didn't? No, not at all, actually.

Presenter18:18

Didn't

Presenter18:20

Now, Ed Miliband, I've read this, and I hope it's not true. I read that you didn't have a girlfriend all the way through Oxford.

Presenter18:26

I was pretty square. So it's true.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband18:29

Well, I I my first serious girlfriend was after university, I think it's fair to say.

Presenter18:34

Okay, we've cleared that one up. Let's have some more music then. We're on your fourth disc of the morning.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband18:39

Okay, this is a cheesy choice.

Presenter18:41

Okay.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband18:41

It's take on me by heart and I can hear people sort of screaming at their radios. You've been a brave one. And you said I hadn't had a serious girlfriend until relatively late on. Maybe it's because I remember going to the school disco and I'm sure this was playing and wearing an extremely bad pair of white trousers and a purple jumper and it's no wonder I didn't pull given that.

Presenter18:45

In a brief one?

Presenter19:02

Uh

Presenter19:03

I don't know what to say, I'm saying anyway.

Presenter19:09

Today is a mother day turn you Shy it away

Rt Hon Ed Miliband19:15

I'll become a very lover

Presenter19:29

That was aha and take on me, you weren't uh tempted there, Admiral Ban to actually get up and dance, I noticed.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband19:34

Should have done I think that would have been really embarrassing if I'd done that.

Presenter19:36

So your rise through the Labour government then was meteoric. You became an MP for Doncaster in 2005. By 2007, both you and your brother David became only the second pair of brothers to serve in the same cabinet. David was foreign secretary. You were minister for the cabinet. You must have had so much to talk to each other about. You're at the centre of power and you both have important jobs around the cabinet table.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband19:59

Yes, and uh I remember coming to my first meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party and I remember m the Cabinet as it then was, I think, sits at the front and and David was was up there on ministers and I was sort of sitting in the corner and I remember catching his eye and both of us sort of slightly shook our heads as if to say can't quite believe this uh happened. I mean look if my dad was alive, I think he would have been surprised that one of us was in the cabinet, never mind both of us.

Presenter20:25

When did the idea of becoming

Presenter20:29

The leader of the Labour Party take root inside of you.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband20:32

It's hard to sort of say really. And people start prompting you and pushing you, and you sort of start to think maybe it's possible, and uh that was pretty dismissive of the idea for some time. But then I knew that if there was a vacancy after the twenty ten election there was a decision to make.

Presenter20:48

So you and your brother are in Cabinet and he is tipped here, there and everywhere as you know, one day he's the guy that's going to lead the Labour Party. Did you talk to David about it?

Presenter20:57

Yeah.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband20:57

Um not really. I suppose I suppose we were I was getting on with doing the job and after all we were about to try and fight an election, win an election. Um

Rt Hon Ed Miliband21:10

We had conversations, but they were probably quite elliptical conversations.

Presenter21:14

Well you sort of danced around it.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband21:16

We probably danced around it a bit because neither of us particularly wa was sort of desperate to confront it, I suppose, in either direction. We didn't we didn't have a sort of, you know, kind of total heart to heart about it.

Presenter21:30

You have been very careful as leader to distance yourself from new Labour. It is interesting to note, however, that as a Minister you voted very strongly against an investigation into the Iraq war. You were very strongly in favour of ID cards, very strongly voted for a stricter asylum system. We accuse our politicians of being politically expedient, of being open to compromise.

Presenter21:54

It could fairly be said of you. I mean, those are very new Labour things you voted for and you now position yourself very differently.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband22:01

Well look, this may not sound like a great defence, but it's it's the truth, which is that you have collective responsibility in government. So you vote for a policy whether you agree with it or not. Now if you disagree with it so much, then you leave the government.

Presenter22:15

You were never in danger, then, of having a sort of Robin Cook moment where you thought actually this far and no further?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband22:21

Not not really, no. I was I was sort of starting out. But look, you know, I in private conversations I would have conversations, for example, about ninety days with Gordon and say I think it's really not agr you know, this is really w where is this taking us? So, you know, you you you kept I kept my conversations private.

Presenter22:30

Yeah.

Speaker 122:30

Doing it's worth it.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband22:37

Let's have some music. What's your fifth? So the next record is Sweet Caroline by Neil Diamond. I am a huge fan of the Boston Red Sox baseball team. We lived in Boston various times. They've just won the World Series. They've just won the World Series and I stayed up till 4 o'clock in the morning watching it. And I could bore on for hours about this. I won't. Okay, I won't, I promise. But I'm a zealous fan. And I suppose it prepares you being a Boston Red Sox fan for being a sort of progressive politician because you have disappointment. But hopefully it comes good in the end. And in the bottom of the eighth inning, which is just before the end of the game, they're always playing a Sweet Caroline by Neil Diamond. And the fans sing a lot.

Presenter22:50

They've just wondered.

Speaker 122:56

Well

Speaker 123:20

Good times never seem so good

Speaker 123:27

I've been in fly.

Speaker 123:31

Two

Presenter23:31

Believe that never was but now I

Presenter23:39

Look at the night

Presenter23:43

Uh

Speaker 123:43

And it don't seem so lonely

Speaker 123:46

We fill it up with only two

Presenter23:50

That was Neil Diamond and Sweet Caroline, and unfortunately, the listeners didn't have the benefit of hearing you sing along with that.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband23:50

Uh

Rt Hon Ed Miliband23:55

I think that's a blessing for them.

Presenter23:57

You're right, you're not musical. Let's go to twenty ten then. The election resulted, of course, as we know in a hung Parliament. Gordon Brown resigned as PM and Labour leader, and you announced your intention to stand for the leadership of the Labour Party.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband23:58

Not music.

Presenter24:11

On doing that, you said, David is my best friend in the world. I love him dearly. Is he still your best friend?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:18

Yes, but it's been incredibly tough. Really, really tough. And, um.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:26

I didn't take this decision lightly. Uh I knew it would have an impact on my family, on him.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:34

Um

Presenter24:36

Yeah. Did you did you underestimate the impact?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:38

Possibly.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:39

Possibly.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:40

Look look what I thought was

Rt Hon Ed Miliband24:44

This is going to be hard, but I've got things to say and things to do which I am in a better place than him or others to say and do about the way we need to move on from New Labour, things that need to happen in the country. You mentioned earlier the Brown Blair thing. Brown didn't stand in 1994. And I thought deals and uh arrangements that's different because we're m we're brothers. But

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:13

I thought I was I thought you have to in the end do the what you think is the right thing, but it's but it but it's hard.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:19

Yeah.

Presenter25:19

Yeah.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:19

In the fourth round.

Presenter25:19

And of voting then, you won by one point three percent of the vote. David had been the choice of MPs and MEPs and the ordinary members of the party.

Presenter25:28

The difficulty for many people is the perception that here is a man leading this party who put

Presenter25:35

Party loyalty before family loyalty, and many people don't find that palatable. Do you get that? I understand

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:42

Stand up.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:43

Uh uh I do understand that. Um

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:48

It was hard it was hard for the fam for my family. It was hard for David. Very very hard.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband25:56

But I suppose I felt

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:01

That it was the right thing.

Presenter26:02

What about your mother? Wh who did she vote for?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:04

Oh, she didn't vote. Um, right, and you know, look, she she she uh

Presenter26:08

What what did she say to you afterwards?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:09

Button

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:12

Uh well, I mean, sh you know, we talked about, I suppose, during and a bit afterwards, about that it was hard, that it was difficult. She was absolutely scrupulously neutral. She wasn't going to take sides in this between her her two boys.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:27

You know, but she never said to me

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:30

Don't do it. She sort of said, Look, you've got to do the right thing as you as as you see it.

Presenter26:34

Time has passed, and David has gone on to make a different life for himself outside of politics. How often do you talk now? How close are you now?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:42

We do talk and I saw him two weeks ago and he was back from New York and

Rt Hon Ed Miliband26:46

But we discussed this thing about him serving in the shadow cabinet or not, you know, on and off over a period. And in the end he said to me, look, I want to lead an organization. That's what I feel I need the freedom to do in my own way. And he's leading the IRC and a refugee organization. And he seems incredibly exhilarated by doing it. And I found that very I'm very pleased about that. And that's a conversation we had two weekends ago.

Presenter27:13

Does it does it feel like things are healed?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband27:15

Healing

Presenter27:16

Healing. Healing.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband27:16

Healing

Presenter27:18

Let's have some music.

Presenter27:19

What's next?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband27:21

Okay, more cheese, I think. Uh it's fair to say. My sixth record is Angels by Robbie Williams. It's a song for Justine, my wife. From the first time I met her I knew there was something very special about her. And when we were falling in love we were at Live Eight and Robbie Williams did an amazing, amazing performance of Angels.

Speaker 127:41

And through it

Presenter27:41

And oh she offers me protection.

Presenter27:47

A lot of love and affection.

Presenter27:50

Whether I'm right or wrong

Presenter27:54

Down the waterfall, wherever it may take me I know that life won't break me when I come to call

Presenter28:07

She won't forsake me.

Presenter28:12

I'm loving angels instead

Presenter28:16

That was Robbie Williams and Angels and memories for you, Edmund Banda, that Live Aid concert, and hearing that with Justine and knowing that you were falling in love. You've been together six years and had two children when you decided you wanted to get married. Why was that a good moment for you? And you'll know why I'm asking this, because people say, well, he was doing it because, of course, he didn't want the tabloid press breathing down his neck.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband28:36

I'm sure they'll breathe down my neck about something, so I don't think that's very effective if that was the strategy. No!

Rt Hon Ed Miliband28:41

We always said we would get married at some point and uh I wanted to get married. It's a sign of public commitment and uh we did it in a what you might call a twenty first century way. We had uh Daniel and Sam and then got married. She's an amazing person and uh I feel incredibly blessed and lucky to to be married to her.

Presenter29:00

How does she find it coping with the relentless scrutiny?

Presenter29:04

Hard.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband29:04

Yeah.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband29:05

Hard.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband29:07

You know, we often joke, she says I could have had a easy life married to somebody else But it would have been a less interesting life is what she's always kind enough to say. Look it's incredibly hard for the family. I'm sure David Cameron or Nick Clegg would say the same thing. You know being a good dad and being a passable decent husband, that weighs on me. You know, what's one of the best things I do any week is to take Daniel to school or sound to nursery. It's telling Daniel the stories that my dad used to tell me about two sheep in Yorkshire called Boo Boo and Heehee. My dad sort of often joked that he would maybe he would become a best-selling author, not from Marxism, but from stories about sheep on the Yorkshire moors. So my family mean everything to me. You know, it's it's the most important part of my life.

Presenter29:52

Let's have some more music. We're on your sevens, the head milliband. Tell me about this.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband29:55

The seventh record is by an American singer called Josh Ritter, Change of Time. And when Justine and I were going out with each other, before we had kids, we had a great holiday in America and we got into Josh Ritter. And this is a song which got a kind of a well not exactly seaside, but but maybe a desert island relevance. And if I've got this record, I will think of her and I'll love the song.

Speaker 130:19

I had a dream last night.

Speaker 130:22

I dreamt that I was swimming

Presenter30:24

And the stars up above

Presenter30:27

Directionless and drifting and somewhere in the dark

Presenter30:32

Were the sirens and the thunder And around me as I swam The drifters who'd gone under time

Presenter30:42

Time, love, time, love.

Presenter30:48

That was change of time from Josh Ritter. So, Ed Miliband, election in a run about eighteen months or so. Labour needs something like between thirty five and thirty eight percent of the vote to win a majority. Are the rumours of a secret conversation between you and the Lib Dems that is ongoing uh true?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband31:03

No. Not a word has been spoken about the possibility of a coalition. Look look, I I've got one focus in mind, which is to get a Labour majority. That's what I'm working for. And in the end, the British people are obviously the judge of that, but that's where my focus is.

Presenter31:04

Not a word has been spoken about the possibility of a collision.

Presenter31:17

Your little boys, when when the time comes, w would you recommend to both of them that they should go into politics?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband31:24

No. I I think I wouldn't recommend against it. I would say do what you want, do what your heart where your heart takes you. I remember having this conversation with my Dad just before he died and saying to him, Uh, Dad, I said, Oh, I'm not gonna be an academic. Politics is what drives me and he said, I know.

Presenter31:41

How practical are you? On this desert island, will you be able to lash up a shelter? Will you gut and skin a rabbit? Y you're wincing now.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband31:47

Yeah. This is an authentic answer here. We joke actually that it's Justine's dad who is he is the practical

Rt Hon Ed Miliband31:55

Daniel, my four year old, says, Oh, we're gonna make a list for what grandpa can do but look, uh, force of circumstance, if I'm alone on this desert island and I gather I am alone, which I'm not I'm not gonna like very much because I like being with people, I'll just have to sort of accept the challenge.

Presenter32:10

Okay.

Presenter32:11

It's time for your final piece of music, Ed Miliband, tell me about this.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband32:14

So the last record is Je Regret Real by Edith Piaf. Again, it's a song that my parents used to play. And one of my regrets is that both of my parents were French speakers, but my French is awful. So we are trying to sort of put it right with the next generation. So my mum comes round and tries to help teach the kids French. And this is the I went through my dad's record collection and this is a recording from 1960 from a concert in Paris. And this is the recording that we used to listen to as a family.

Presenter32:45

And I have to ask you, do you have any regrets about decisions?

Presenter32:50

Mm.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband32:51

Not about big decisions. I I I think you reg somebody once said a wise thing to me, which is

Rt Hon Ed Miliband32:56

You regret the things you don't do, not the things you do do, and that's that's the way I think about it.

Speaker 233:02

Michel Vauquer and Charles Dumont, no, I don't regret it.

Speaker 233:19

Uh

Speaker 233:21

Horriad.

Speaker 233:36

Uh

Speaker 233:37

Usabianega

Presenter33:42

That was Edith Piaff and General Gretz Rouienne. So, Ed Miliband, I give you some things to take with you to this island. You get a couple of books, you get the complete works of Shakespeare and the Bible, and you get to take one other book along. What will you take?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband33:56

I have decided to go for Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. I think I think it's famously said to be a trilogy and I think it's in four or five parts. And one of I think the final book or the penultimate book is So Long and Thanks for All the Fish. So I think uh you know, what better choice?

Presenter33:59

Let's see.

Presenter34:12

Right, you can have that collected works. And a luxury too, something to make life a little nicer on the other side.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband34:17

Okay, well you said to me that I was I practical but I think just to sort of keep me going not in a nutritional sense because I go that's not allowed I'm gonna opt and I hope you'll allow it for a takeaway an Indian takeaway once a week from my local Indian restaurant and so if you'll allow me a delivery once a week

Presenter34:38

Yes. Once a week.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband34:41

I have a chicken tika five

Presenter34:43

Oh, okay. Right, it's yours then. And a track to save. Which one would you save from the waves?

Rt Hon Ed Miliband34:49

It's got to be angels because I'd want something to remind me of Justine and of Daniel and Sam and uh and I think the best thing to do that is angels.

Presenter34:58

It's yours. Ed Miliband, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Rt Hon Ed Miliband35:01

Thank you. I've really enjoyed it.

Presenter35:20

You've been listening to a download from the BBC. You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website: bbc.co.uk slash Radio4.