Opposition in the house

There was never any doubt that David Miliband would be a contender in the contest to succeed Gordon Brown as Labour Party leader. By the time the deadline for nominations for candidates rolled around on 9 June, he had 81 fellow MPs on his side - and that’s minus the supporters he encouraged to switch allegiance to fellow hopeful Diane Abbott, pushing up her count to the 33 needed to enter the fray.

Forty four-year-old Mr Miliband is the bookmakers’ odds-on favourite to become the opposition leader on 25 September, when the winner is announced at the Labour Party conference in Manchester. He’s also the only one with ministerial experience of housing - he was the first minister of state for Communities and Local Government when the post was created in May 2005.

Inside Housing managed to interrupt the older of the two Miliband brothers vying to become next opposition leader in the middle of his busy hustings schedule, and asked what the housing sector could expect from a Labour Party under his control.

Overleaf, we give you the housing credentials of the other four contenders, and discover that, as far as their supporters are concerned, this is far from a one-horse race.

Inside Housing Should you win, what will your priorities for housing be?

David Miliband For me, community is one of the things that makes life worth living. And while it’s often said how fast moving the modern world is, a sense of belonging to the place where we live is still just as important as ever. That’s my starting point for thinking about housing policy.

Public housing is essential to meeting the needs of the poorest and most vulnerable in our society. I want councils to be able again to meet more of their communities’ housing needs - which the proposals in our manifesto would have allowed. [These included exempting house purchases below £250,000 from stamp duty for the next two years; working with housing associations to develop a new form of affordable housing targeted at working families, enabling them to rent an affordable home at below market rates while they build up an equity stake; and housing revenue account reform to enable local authorities to maintain properties at the decent homes standard and to build up to 10,000 council houses a year.]

I also think we need to ensure that the private rented sector is properly regulated and a viable option for people who do not want to own.

IH When you announced your leadership bid in your South Shields constituency in Tyne and Wear on 17 May, you spoke about the ‘politics of belonging’ - what the world looks like ‘out of your front window’ and building ‘strong communities’. What was Labour’s record in these areas while in government between 1997 and May this year? Are you saying that it failed on these counts?

DM I’m proud of much of what Labour did on housing during our time in government, especially the decent homes programme and our support for the sector during the recession. We increased the number of affordable homes being built by councils and housing associations as the need for housing rose. We supported the industry and supported the jobs of thousands of people in the toughest of economic times.

IH Prime minister David Cameron has removed the housing minister from cabinet. Do you think the housing minister should attend cabinet?

DM I believe government has an essential role in making sure people have homes that meet their needs and aspirations. However, it seems the Tory-Lib Dem government do not share this view. They have downgraded housing by removing the housing minister from cabinet and by targeting affordable housing budgets for some of the toughest cuts. In essence, I don’t think the Tories believe providing homes should be the business of government. There is a real risk that - left to the market - we will simply not get the houses built that we need.

Public support for housing should not only be a safety net for the worst-off. There are many people working hard on low and middle incomes who can’t afford the home they need. Part of the solution is to restore an effective yet prudent mortgage market, following the financial crisis.

But we should also be working with developers and housing associations to offer innovative ways for people to access good housing through shared equity and similar schemes that combine renting and a path towards ownership.

Housing is a vital public good - and I look forward to debating these important issues over the coming months during the course of the Labour leadership campaign.

The race favourite

David Miliband
44, MP for South Shields since 2001
Odds: 4/7

Brought up in a left-wing intellectual family, David Miliband and his brother Ed are the sons of Jewish immigrants. ‘They encouraged me to join the Labour movement, which they saw as the home for people to work together to create a better society,’ he says on Labour’s website.
Mr Miliband, the first leadership hopeful to throw his hat in the ring after Gordon Brown resigned as leader of the opposition on 11 May, was an advisor to former prime minister Tony Blair when New Labour stormed into power in 1997. He spent a year as minister of state for Communities and Local Government, but his public profile rose when he was secretary of state for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2006 to 2007, followed by a stint at the Foreign Office.

Reportedly nicknamed ‘Brains’ by spin doctor Alastair Campbell, Mr Miliband’s eco-credentials will appeal to many within the housing sector - he was responsible for introducing the Climate Change Bill in 2007.

In a speech to his constituents on 17 May he said: ‘We [the Labour Party] lost focus on education and anti-social behaviour. We were playing catch up on political reform, immigration and housing.’

Mentions of housing in campaign so far
On BBC One’s The Andrew Marr Show on 6 June, its eponymous host asked Mr Miliband, ‘How do you persuade people to get involved in politics…?’, to which he responded, ‘Well, people are passionate about affordable housing, safer streets, decent jobs…’

Backers

• Nick Raynsford, former Labour housing minister
• Caroline Flint, former Labour housing minister
• Lord Charles Falconer, former UK lord chancellor, Labour housing minister and chair of housing association Amicushorizon

‘David Miliband was one of the two people - him and John Prescott - who broke open housing as a policy area when he was in the Communities and Local Government department,’ says Lord Falconer.

‘He’s always been committed to the issue. He is the best person to be leader because we need an authoritative figure talking about economic issues including housing at this moment in time in our nation’s history.’

The opposition

They’re not even halfway through more than 30 hustings events in which they will try to prove to around 155,000 Labour Party members that they’ve got what it takes to lead the party through opposition and into government.

One of the hopefuls, Diane Abbott, has written that the leadership contest is ‘David Miliband’s to lose’ - so who are those trying to beat him, and what would a Labour Party under their control mean for housing? Read on to find out.

Andy Burnham
40, MP for Leigh, Greater Manchester since 2001
Odds: 14/1
His public profile may not be quite as high as that of the other contenders, but that doesn’t mean Mr Burnham lacks experience - he’s been working within the Labour party for the last 25 years.

The son of a telephone engineer and a receptionist, Mr Burnham worked as a researcher to arch-Blairite Tessa Jowell in the run-up to the 1997 election. He’s best known as secretary of state for health, the position he held until Labour’s defeat at the general election in May.

Mentions of housing in campaign so far
In The Telegraph on 27 May, Mr Burnham is quoted as saying: ‘[Immigration] was the biggest issue in constituencies where Labour lost. People aren’t racist, but they say it has increased tension, stopped them getting access to housing and lowered their wages.’

Backers

• Hazel Blears, former communities minister
• Clive Betts, chair of the Communities and Local Government select committee

‘He has a clear understanding of the need for a properly funded and larger scale house building programme,’ says Mr Betts, who nominated Mr Burnham, but has not yet decided whether he is supporting him in the long-run.

Diane Abbott
56, MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington since 1987
Odds: 28/1
A member of the Labour Party for more than 30 years, Diane Abbott became Britain’s first black woman MP in 1987.

She secured her position on the Labour leadership shortlist just before nominations closed on 9 June. Unlike the other contenders, Ms Abbott has never held a ministerial post , concentrating instead on the grassroots.

The most left-wing of the hopefuls, Ms Abbott was one of the small group of Labour MPs to vote against the Iraq war in 2003. For many people, Ms Abbott is a familiar sight snuggled up to Michael Portillo on the BBC’s political programme This Week.

Mentions of housing in campaign so far
On 20 May, she told Radio 4 that none of the frontrunners in the leadership race would admit that the immigration system is ‘still inefficient and unfair and brings abuse, but nobody will say we have to address the underlying issues behind black and white working-class unease about immigration, about housing, job insecurity’.

Backers

• Jon Cruddas, MP for Dagenham and Rainham and Inside Housing columnist
• Harriet Harman, acting leader of the opposition
• Alistair McIntosh, chief executive of the Housing Quality Network

‘In this media age, she’s the only one who’s trying,’ argues Mr McIntosh, who isn’t a Labour Party member, though ‘once tried to join in Glasgow, but it was full up.’

‘She’s the only one who’s practised sparring [with opponents] and I can see her in a tub-thumping role,’ he says. ‘The others are part of a squeaky clean elite that makes it to the top. Diane Abbott is fresh and different.’

Ed Balls
43, MP for Morely and Outwood, West Yorkshire since May 2010. Previously MP for the abolished constituency of Normanton, West Yorkshire
Odds: 10/1
Well known as Gordon Brown’s closest ally, Mr Balls was chief economics advisor at the Treasury for 10 years. Known for his combative approach, he could be strong in opposition, especially during the tough economic climate of recent years. Mr Balls has worked on key Labour policies, including Bank of England independence, the new deal jobs programme, Sure Start, tax credits and the national minimum wage. Most recently he was Labour’s secretary of state for Children, Schools and Families.

He is married to former housing minister Yvette Cooper - maybe he’s picked up some housing knowledge from her. ‘I would only ask Mr Balls why he doesn’t stand aside for his wife, who is a far better candidate,’ jokes one housing association director.

Mentions of housing in campaign so far
On 14 June he told the Mirror newspaper that his constituents’ concerns covered ‘immigration, education and housing’.

Backers

• Yvette Cooper, his wife and former housing minister
• Ian Austin, former parliamentary under secretary of state at the Department for Communities and Local Government
• John Healey, shadow housing minister

‘Each of the four serious leadership candidates [Diane Abbott excluded] has said that one of the first lessons to take from the election was in housing. We came to housing late, in particular, letting councils build again,’ says Mr Healey. ‘I go back a long way with Ed Balls. I want some one who is tried and tested, who can make the arguments to the Tories, and who has demonstrated they can get the big decisions right. I’ve seen [Mr Balls] equally at ease talking to pensioners and school pupils. He talks the language of ordinary people.’

Ed Miliband
40, MP for Doncaster North since 2005
Odds: 5/2
A long-standing member of Gordon Brown’s inner circle of advisors. Like his older brother, he’s well known for his environmental role, having been made the first secretary of state for Energy and Climate Change in 2008. He was the one to set the target for every new home in Britain to be carbon neutral by 2016.

Although he worked on both the 2007 and 2010 Labour manifestos, the younger Miliband seems keen to make a clean break after this year’s election. ‘Our party is defined by our values and our determination to transform those values into change that improves the lives of the British people. But at the last election, the voters decided that they did not want us to continue pursuing that mission in government,’ he writes on the Labour Party website.

Mentions of housing in campaign so far
In a column in The Guardian on 1 June, he wrote: ‘We [Labour] were too slow to recognise the squeezed living standards people faced in our economy and the centrality of housing. This explains some of the heightened concern people expressed about immigration.’

Backers

• John Denham, shadow and former secretary of state for Communities and Local Government
• Margaret Beckett, former housing minister
• Karen Buck, Labour MP for Westminster North and executive member of the Labour Housing Group
• Marianne Hood, vice chair of the Labour Housing Group
• Gerald Chin-Quee, tenant chair of arm’s-length management organisation Carrick Housing

‘Based on my own experience of working with the candidates, I have been enormously impressed by Ed Miliband,’ says Ms Hood, speaking in a personal capacity - the Labour Housing Group has yet to decide who to back.

When brainstorming with Mr Miliband on Labour’s 2007 manifesto, she found that, ‘he picked up on all the connections between housing and other social policy areas. He’s very receptive and he’s a people person.’

Mr Chin-Quee, a Labour party member, says that he’s most likely to vote for Ed Miliband because of his track record on environmental issues. ‘He’s much more natural and much more inclusive [than his brother],’ he says.

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