Miliband spotted at football match after cancelling NHS speech due to illness

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/ma...P=FBCNETTXT9038

 

Ed Miliband has been forced to clarify why he was spotted at a football match this weekend three hours after he was due to address an NHS rally that he pulled out of due to illness.

 

The Labour leader was set to speak to health professionals and union activists at a planned protest against NHS reforms in Hull at noon on Saturday.

 

His address was scheduled as part of Labour's Drop The Bill campaign against the government's health and social care legislation currently making its passage through parliament.

 

Miliband pulled out of his appearance on Friday, complaining of illness. The event was later cancelled.

Questions were raised after he was spotted on the Saturday attending the Championship clash between Hull City and Ipswich Town, which kicked off at 3pm.

 

Miliband explained that he had been sick at the time he made the cancellation.

 

Speaking at a press conference earlier on Monday, Miliband joked: "It's the first time I've been accused of putting football above the NHS."

 

He went on: "I was not well on Friday so we said I wasn't going to be at the rally. The rally was then cancelled. I kept a long-standing engagement on the Saturday."

 

Miliband was pictured at the KC Stadium alongside the Hull City chairman, Assem Allam, whose team drew 2-2.

 

The opposition leader normally counts himself a fan of Hull City's Yorkshire rivals Leeds United.

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What an absolute TIT.... Even taking him at his word, you still wouldn't be DUMB enough to cry off something due to illness and then go off to a football match, most people I think would have the sense to watch the game on TV at home and then the accusation wouldn't even arise.. It just doesn't LOOK good, does it..? We have Ed Miliband hob-nobbing at a football match instead of being at an event that he SHOULD be at related to opposing the NHS reforms... And while he's at this match, we have the Lib Dumbs basically voting away the future of the NHS... This then looks DOUBLY bad for Miliband...

 

Frankly, I question his whole fitness to be leader of the opposition, it just seems to me that when there's something really importand "Mr Ed" is just nowhere, he's got nothing.. Cameron and Clegg are DESPISED by the country at large, the leader of the opposition should be riding high in the polls, and yet "Mr Ed" isn't... Why is that...? It's clearly because even though people might detest Cameron and Clegg, they certainly dont think very much of "Mr Ed" either... I seriously reckon it's time for Labour to think again..... And not just on a new leader, they need to re-examine their whole approach.... No one wants to hear the "New Labour" crap anymore, we want our REAL Labour Party back....

Looking at just this incident, of course it was an outrageously stupid decision. Can't really say much about that one.

 

Looking at his leadership as a whole he's entering a critical time, and this summer will either make or break him. The local elections in May will be very telling - last year was the first opportunity for the electorate to get one over the Lib Dems and as such Labour's true popularity was masked by the results. This year there will be nowhere to hide if the party performs poorly. Then his full policy review is due in about September I think? It was certainly a two-year plan and were he to get a bounce in the polls from its announcement he could go into 2013 with a comfortable lead.

 

I do think it's unfortunate that our parties have become so presidentialised - a leader is given a disproportionate amount of attention when if you look at the past, the strong/charismatic ones have ended up being the most dangerous ones and those perceived as "dull" have often got an awful lot done with the help of a strong Cabinet.

Leaving aside the fact that the match wasn't on television it was a pretty stupid thing to do. It's not as if there was any chance of him not being spotted.

 

Oh, and the Lib Dem conference didn't vote to support the NHS restructure despite the best efforts of the leadership to turn it into a vote for or against Shirley Williams. I would have preferred them to have debated the "Drop The Bill" motion as I think it would have been passed. However, they still chose to remove a line calling on Lib Dem peers to support the Bill which was a pretty clear indication of party opinion.