Updated on
Summary
Newly elected leader of British Labour Party Ed Miliband vowed Tuesday to ditch the baggage of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown and revamp the Labour Party to propel it back into power.In his first major speech since taking over, Ed Miliband said that Labour had only themselves to blame for losing office after 13 years in May's general election. Let the message go out, a new generation has taken charge of Labour, Miliband said, in a speech aimed at establishing a fresh face with British voters. This country faces some tough choices and so do we. A change is essentially required. Above all, I lead a new generation not bound by fear or the ghosts of the past, he added. He also said that Labour must acknowledge its mistakes under Prime Ministers Blair and Brown, including the highly divisive 2003 invasion of Iraq and the climate of financial deregulation blamed by some for the economic downturn. Miliband said it was no accident that the party had lost five million votes between its landslide victory in 1997 and 2010. A political force founded on its ability to adapt and change lost its ability to do so, he said.
