'You screwed it up': Ken Livingstone hits back at John Prescott over his attack on Ed Miliband
“Keep out”: Ken Livingstone says party doesn’t need Lord Prescott’s advice
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Ken Livingstone today launched a scathing attack on Lord Prescott after he criticised Labour’s summer performance, and told the peer: “You screwed it up — don’t try and wreck it for others.
” In a staunch defence of Labour leader Ed Miliband, the former Mayor of London tore into the ex-Deputy Prime Minister.
He urged Mr Miliband to ignore Lord Prescott, who became the latest Labour figure to raise concerns about the party’s performance.
Lord Prescott warned Labour was “running out of time” to up its game before the 2015 general election and called for under-performing Shadow Cabinet members to be sacked.
But Mr Livingstone, who sits on Labour’s National Executive Committee, branded Lord Prescott an “embarrassment” in government during the Blair years. “Retire — you have had your turn, you screwed it up, don’t try and wreck it for others,” he said.
“For Prescott to criticise anyone else given his record in government is just ridiculous. The last thing Ed Miliband needs to do is take advice from him.”
Writing in his column in the Sunday Mirror, Lord Prescott said Labour had “massively failed” to get its case across to the public over the summer.
He urged Mr Miliband to follow the example of former Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson and get rid of under-performing shadow ministers.
“If Shadow Cabinet members aren’t pulling their weight, give them the hairdryer treatment and kick ‘em out,” he wrote.
Mr Livingstone believes that next year half the Shadow Cabinet should take their holidays at the start of August and the other half in the last two weeks, to ensure Labour can mount a sustained summer campaign.
But he hailed Mr Miliband as “the most impressive Labour leader” since John Smith, who died in 1994, and backed his current “cost of living crisis” campaign. “He is a genuine Labour leader. He is not obsessed by short-term trivia, he is thinking about how Britain should be in 25 years’ time,” Mr Livingstone added.
But there is growing disquiet in Labour ranks, with Mr Miliband’s personal ratings hitting record lows according to two polls. Labour peer Lord Glasman urged Mr Miliband to “show he is a grown-up politician big enough to lead this country” and warned: “When the Labour battle bus should be revving up, it is parked in a lay-by of introspection.”
Mr Miliband is tipped to carry out a reshuffle shortly, with several MPs tipped for promotion including Walthamstow’s Stella Creasy. Shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna, a key ally of Mr Miliband, insisted the party would soon “be turning up the volume even louder.”
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