Murmurings about Ed Miliband after 'total disaster' in Scotland

[Hopeless Romantic]

There is no doubt that Nick Clegg emerges from this week's round of elections with the deepest wounds.

But the deputy prime minister faces no leadership crisis. This became clear in the early hours of Friday morning when Evan Harris, the former Liberal Democrat MP who is guardian of the party's grassroots interests, made clear there is goodwill towards Clegg.

Ed Miliband, on the other hand, faces the opposite problem. He has not suffered a humiliating personal defeat as Clegg has in the AV referendum. But, unlike Clegg, the Labour leader is facing murmurings at senior levels of his party about his leadership.

There appears to be little criticism that Miliband is on the losing side of the AV referendum. Miliband may have been responsible for inserting a commitment to the referendum in the Labour manifesto for last year's general election. But he had no hand in calling this referendum which was the key Tory concession in the coalition negotiations.

The murmurings about Miliband have been prompted by what is described as Labour's "total disaster" in Scotland. Senior Labour figures are aghast at the SNP's success in achieving something that eluded Labour even when it dominated the landscape in Scotland – winning an overall majority at Holyrood.

This is what one Labour source said:

It was a total disaster at all the key levels of policy, organisation, personnel and message. Where did one million voters go?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/wintour-and-watt/2011/may/06/edmiliband-nickclegg?

[non sociopath skin]

1. I like Ed and I'm still willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. However ...

... Labour can't afford many more days like yesterday if it wishes to be a contender.

Salmond looked like a Man with a Plan. Gray Iain looked like a Man with a All the Charisma of a Half House brick. And Ed sometimes seems like the Invisible Man.

Let's see a kick-start, please.

The Skin

[Anarcho-Socialist]

2. Regicide would be pointless

Having another Brownite or a Blairite as leader wouldn't have brought a better result.

[fedsron2us]

3. Labour hung onto most of their voters in Scotland

What they did not do was to benefit from the complete collapse of the Liberal Democrats
whose supporters appear to have switched en masse to the
SNP. As the Tories were vitually wiped out north of the border they
don't really have much to crow about.