Miliband and his 8f t monument to hubris

EVEN by the standards of a politician who cannot eat a bacon sandwich and falls off the stage during a live election debate, yesterday was beyond satire.

how else can one describe the scene of ed Miliband standing in a field and unveiling an 8ft slab of l i mestone – chiselled with Labour’s manifesto promises – that he intends to install in the Downing Street garden? Never mind the hubris of a man who stands little chance of winning an overall majority commissioning his own Moses-style tablet – by comparison, Neil Kinnock’s deranged performance at the 1992 Sheffield rally looks almost modest.

Forget how ri sibly vague his six commandments are. (how the stonemason must have laughed when he was asked to carve out t he words ‘ controls on immigration’ by a party that increased the foreign-born population of Britain by 3.6million between 1997 and 2010). Overlook the complete absence of judgment displayed by Labour aides who must have known their leader was making a huge mistake – but did nothing to stop him saddling himself with a monument that wouldn’t even get planning permission to go inside the grounds of No10.

What is most preposterous is the idea that it will be Red ed who will decide the direction of the country if, after Thursday’s election, he limps into office propped up by the SNP. he can bang and hammer what he likes into a lump of rock that was yesterday amusingly described as ‘the heaviest suicide notice i n history’ and the ‘policy Cenotaph’.

But it will be Nicola Sturgeon – with her demands f or a r ecovery- wrecking £148billion of extra borrowing – who will be delivering the instructions from on high. And that really isn’t funny.