ED WON!

[pinkbasket]

There you go.

Please let's remember that union members vote AND that unions members are also people and have a right to have their vote count??!!

Still think that EM should would have done best not to win this time?

yes, but it isn't one member one vote, is it?

The turnout amongst the unions was abysmal too. I haven't done the maths but I suspect that the average union member's vote counted for a lot more than the average Labour member's vote, when weighted for turnout.

Another party member happy here.

(and a bit surprised, I'm not used to people I vote for winning anything)

Heard the live declaration on the radio.
Just a series of numbers and the chance to try and add them up mentally before total was announced for each candidate.

Plus a rather baffingly piece about the deputy contest where apparently someone was supposed to leave their glasses on to indicate 'early' to a news provider that ALan Johnson had won. Apparently in the excitement they had forgotten about the glasses which they left on but Alan Johnson had not won. Weird............

No, as a member of a union, or of an affiliate organisation you get additional votes. Harman, for example, had four votes (although abstained iirc).

I am not sure how happy I am yet, will wait n see!

Am gutted.

LOL, the older child always claims the younger one wins by cheating. And they have to spend their tender years letting the younger one win. Hilarious. I'm sure the photos on the envelopes will have made a big difference though - a photo's worth a thousand words, isn't it?

I'm really glad red Ed, has won it means 'New labour' is no more.....and the Labour party will be in the political wilderness for the next 20 years hurrah... Abbot should have won then they would have been in the wilderness for 40 years!

Journos will be scouring London eateries for the next few weeks hoping to find Milli-minor and Milli-major cooking up a 'you be leader for a few years and then pass it on to me, OK?' deal in the grand Labour tradition..

Great news! (I'm a Tory ......)

He is sooo weak compared to David. And that GMB thing is appalling.

David should be secretly grateful.

Leftie Ed will likely keep Labour out for the next election, and then David will be able to step in to sort out the mess his little brother will have made

gingercat, I feel for you being gutted. Tribalism aside, I wanted David to win (rendition and all, but I tend to see them as all together in that).

he's the candidate I would have got the drinks and nibbles out for and we'd have enjoyed a good argument and agreed on some stuff too. Ed I can't warm to.

I think the cartoonists and impressionists will be rubbing their hands in glee though... I remember Rory Bremner bemoaning the 'blandness' of Cameron, David Miliband, Clegg etc, saying there 'wasn't enough about them to characterize'.

Meanwhile Ed has a face just crying out to be made a Spitting Image puppet (oh.. those rubbery lips and lispy way he talks!)

Thanks, vesela.

Obviously, I will support Ed now, but I have to agree with complimentary about wilderness etc.

Oh my boy came good.

He is the spit of my DS. Who is 6. Not that that's why I voted for him. I'm not that shallow.

< decants the red red wine >

Now that we've got three fresh-faced youngsters at the helm, do we think PMQs next week will be replaced by a conker fight? Wedgies for the loser?

rofl @ Miliwedgies

I don't think David Milibrother will be able to stand again for leadership - surely it's all over for him now? He bottled it innumerable times, then when he stood, he lost. To stand again would just be ridiculous. Mind you, the Blair/Brown thing was ridiculous and it still happened.

I don't know... if the MPs/ party members feel aggrieved about the way the Unions acted to get Ed elected they may try to get rid of him in favour of their 'candidate'.
The fact that they are brothers make it soooooo ugly though. I bet if they weren't David would be 'looking into' the promotional activities of the GMB.

The GMB's totally impartial ballot envelope:

1.bp.blogspot.com/_diYwc4J0q1c/TJOkTpktnXI/AAAAAAAAD2Q/VFmLwUMtLnU/s1600/PICT4996.TIF.jpg

Agree with chil1234. I think this is only temporary and even fortuitous for David. They didn't want him to peak too early in case the public got mightily sick of him. So Ed will will take the lead for a few years while Labour are in opposition, then David will step in near election time. Ed will be the Iain Drunken Smith interim figure.

All the pundits and journos were saying that this is David's career in politics finished and that he will disappear from politics in a years' time. I think that is nonsense, he'll be back grinning when the time is right and the election draws near.

it is really something when posters like longfingernails go to the extent they do to rubbish EM's election. It's as if they have something to worry about.

It is all over for DM. He will take up a position in Ed's shadow cabinet, then quietly leave politics and probably the UK. I am quite sure of it. Beckysharper is right. He bottled it earlier on, and he does not want to turn Labour into the nasty party with constant infighting.

Also DH thinks that if EM fails, the electorate would see the same problems with David - too intellectual, etc.

Ed might pleasantly surprise us. His majority is not huge, so he might quietly adopt some of his brother's policies. And he said he would listen. We'll see.

I would not like to be DM when he wakes up this morning.

Pan, I am a party member and have been involved for years, and trust me LFN and all the ohte tories have nothing to worry about.
This country has made it plain again, and again and again, that it has no appetite for left politics.
That is why Kinnock and Blair and so many others spent so many long yeras modernising the party - we were unelectable.
I really feel that this vote is taking us backwards.
Lots of Labour voters turned away at this election because they couldn't stomach Gordon - I know that for the first time in years I refused to campaign for him. I was not alone.
Ed is even more unplatable than GB.

We faced a very stark choice in these elections. Do we wish to be an opposition or do we wish to present an alternative for governance. This is our answer.