Miliband makes his pitch to British business – and it turns out there’s plenty they might like

Ed Miliband is off to speak to the CBI today. After half a week of public angst over his leadership (fuelled by anonymous remarks) the Labour leader will be looking to get back onto the front foot.

Speaking to the heads of some of Britain’s biggest businesses might not automatically seem like the perfect way to start the week for Miliband. The prevailing media narrative has been that businesses are unhappy with the Labour Party under Miliband’s leadership due to his desire to regulate the markey. Yet the reality is far more nuanced than that. Senior business figures have previously told me that they aren’t annoyed with Labour because of regulation. Of course most busisses would prefer to have as few regulations as possible, they realise that’s not feasible and that they already live with regulations. What concerns them far more is when Labour’s plans which impact on their ability to compete appear out of the blue – sometimes, as far as they are concerned, at random.

So today Ed Miliband has an opportunity to present a clear picture of what a Labour government will look like, how he’d approach British business as Prime Minister – and how that differs from the Tories. That means not only stressing his key message  – that Britain’s economic recovery is only benefitting a few – but also a line that they’re likely to be far more receptive of:

“If I am Prime Minister I will never risk your businesses, British jobs, British prosperity by playing political games with our membership of the European Union.”

On a day when David Cameron is also speaking to the CBI, this is the message that Miliband will want to ram home to business leaders, and it his his strongest card with them. David Cameron can’t say what changes he wants to the EU. He can’t say if he thinks he’d get those changes. And he can’t say if he’d support keeping Britain in Europe or not. All he promises is a referendum in 2017, which could drag Britain out of our biggest market in an attempt to appease the Tory backbenches.

Today – when the Tories are getting themselves in a lather over the European Arrest Warrant – it’s a great opportunity for Miliband to show that whilst Labour has problems, it’s the Tories who are really facing division at the moment.

And with the CBI calling for Britain’s prolonged pay squeeze to end – echoing Labour’s “cost of living crisis” narrative – it turns out there’s plenty that the Labour leader has to say that British business might like.

Here are some extracts of what Miliband is expected to tell the CBI:

“We are a country with an economy that is at last growing again. We have fantastic businesses creating wealth, profits and jobs. But this is a joyless recovery for so many because it is a pay-less recovery for so many: a recovery without wage growth.

“Millions of people believe this country is not working for them. They fear deeply for the future of their kids.  And they see a Britain that works only for some.

“In Scotland, the problem was said to be the rest of the United Kingdom and the answer was to leave. Others say the problem is the European Union and the answer is to leave that: close our borders, turn our back on the world, and return to the way things used to be. These voices are loud and insistent. But in my view they are dead wrong and they need to be taken on. Leaving the single market and stepping away from a trading block that allows us to work with the new economies, like Brazil, India and China, would be a disaster for our country. It would risk businesses billions of pounds in lost profits, risk millions of jobs and would make Britain weaker, not stronger, in the world.

“There are some people in our country who advocate exit from the EU.  There are others who flirt with it, thinking they can do so without consequence and perhaps with advantage to Britain. In my view both are equally dangerous. Giving succour to the argument that the real answer is leaving the EU, or contemplating it, simply drags us closer to exit. And every nod and wink to those who want to leave sends a message to potential investors in our country that we are not open for business.

“We have seen over the last couple of years that trying to use exit as a threat has simply weakened our influence not strengthened it. And I will not be part of it. A country making ever-more incoherent demands, ever-more isolated from its partners, means we are on the conveyor belt towards exit with no idea how to get off. We have seen it again with the controversy over the EU budget: banging the table one day, then paying up the next.

“It is a betrayal of our national interest.  It is a clear and present danger to our future prosperity. Instead, we will build alliances with others, not burn them, to help change the European Union so it works for Britain: completing the single market; longer transitional controls; protecting the integrity of our benefits system; and getting on with the long overdue reform of the EU budget.

“If I am Prime Minister I will never risk your businesses, British jobs, British prosperity by playing political games with our membership of the European Union. The way to overcome these false solutions is not to pander to them.  Not to posture about finding ways of accommodating them.  Not to make promises everyone knows you cannot keep.

“But mine is not an argument for no change or business as usual. That would simply make the forces demanding false solutions stronger not weaker. The answer is to directly address the discontent people feel, to understand the sources of the problems we face, and offer big change in our country.

“It is not our membership of the European Union, but that globalisation – including immigration – have placed huge pressures on our country. Old jobs have gone, the chances for the next generation do seem worse than the last, and people don’t think the country is run in a fair way.

“We must change fundamentally the way our economy works so that it meets the basic aspirations of the British people for, good jobs at decent wages, proper opportunity for the next generation, and a country that is seen to be fair. And I want to do this in partnership with you.

“We won’t agree about everything if I am Prime Minister.  But in everything I do there will be consistent leadership.

“I am not going to say it is OK to carry on as we are with the economy we have. Because I don’t believe it is.

“I am not going to say we should close our borders. Because I don’t believe we should. I am not going to play politics with our membership of the European Union because I don’t believe it would make Britain stronger or more confident in the world.

“But I make you this promise:  I am going to work, every single day, with you, to make the changes we need to make so that we ensure our economic recovery works for everyone and not just a few.”