Ed’s inbox – February 16th

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk

If Ed Miliband could only read five blogposts each day, he’d read these ones…

Tom Watson finds a new voter group: the Ed Miliband Tory – Labour Uncut
By Tom Watson

While holding my tie in his clenched fist, Benjamin Wegg-Prosser once described me as “that Prescottite” who tries to be a “hard man of the soft left”. No, I never understood what he was on about either. It was late. We were young. Ish.

In so doing, Benjamin was unwittingly demonstrating that labels are usually unhelpful. Sometimes though, they help the non-activist understand the complex world of UK politics. And, even more occasionally, they help a politician understand UK politics. – Read more.

Why Cameron failed, by his new director of strategy Andrew Cooper – Next Left
By Sunder Katwala

Andrew Cooper is to become Downing Street director of strategy, having been head of the pollster Populus.

There was a nervous reaction from Tim Montgomerie, the influential editor of ConservativeHome, who quickly tweeted:

“Andrew Cooper once described the Tory grassroots as “vile” to me. And now he’s head of strategy for David Cameron.”

There is good evidence that Montgomerie, and the Tory backbench and grassroots right more generally, have substantive reasons to be nervous. Cooper has a good claim to be a Tory moderniser long before David Cameron. – Read more.

Calls for Tory MSP to be sacked after rape comments – Political Scrapbook
By Socialist Animal

Big hat-tip to the New Statesman who’ve obtained a leaked transcript of the phone interview in which the Convenor of the Scottish Parliament’s Justice Committee and veteran Tory MSP Bill Aitken suggests that a Glasgow rape victim may have been a hooker. The outrageous remarks have led hundreds of Scots to join a Facebook group calling for his head. Aitken laughed after being told that the woman was dragged up a lane before being raped by three men. – Read more.

Boris Johnson slammed by brother Jo – Tory Troll
By Adam Bienkov

Tory MP Jo Johnson has slammed Transport for London for “failing residents” with an “unacceptable” change to a bus route.

His underlings on the local council have also hit out, calling on the head of TfL to resign over their “shambolic” handling of the issue.

Now I’m not sure whether it has slipped Jo’s notice, but the last time I checked the Chair of Transport for London was none other than his brother Boris Johnson. – Read more.

Breaking News: £250m could buy 250m things that cost £1 from Sarah Hayward’s Blog
By Sarah Hayward

Back in January the Yes to AV campaign wound me up so much, I was tipped over the edge. It struck a chord, it’s still by far and away my most popular blog.

Yesterday the No2AV campaign, clearly feeling overshadowed by the stupidity of the yes campaign, decided, at their official launch, to pull out all the stops and really go for broke in the egregious claims stakes. Apparently, to change the voting system to AV will cost £250m.

If you believe the No campaign that’s 8000 nurses or a whopping 70,000 primary school places. No it’s not and your campaign is stupid. – Read more.

Our suggestions for Ed’s inbox are limited by what we read – so if you’ve seen a blogpost that should be in Ed’s inbox, let us know.