Miliband warned on policy by Blair-era politicians

Former Home Secretary John Reid said the party had to go beyond criticising the coalition and start producing policy solutions to the problems the country is facing.

Another ex-Home Secretary, Sheffield MP David Blunkett, said Labour had to stand for more than the “unhappiness of a resentful and selfish public sphere”.

Their comments echoed Tony Blair who, in his most significant foray into domestic politics since leaving Downing Street six years ago, said Labour could not afford to fall back into its “comfort zone”.

Lord Reid said that while Mr Miliband had succeeded in avoiding party splits, he still had a lot more to do.

“You have to move from being a voice of protest to offering solutions as you move from being an effective opposition to a potential government,” he told the BBC1 Sunday Politics programme.

“What he now has to do is to set out the direction of a future Labour government on questions like welfare, on the economy on housing and so on. There are some signs that that is beginning to happen.

“The first task has been accomplished. Labour under his leadership has avoided fratricide and is an effective opposition.

“The next two years will tell whether the second important stage has been fulfilled and that is becoming a potential government with answers and solutions, not just a critique of the status quo and the present Government.”

Lord Reid questioned Mr Miliband’s assertion that the political centre ground was moving left, saying he did not know what the evidence was.

“You’ll have to ask Ed Miliband that. I don’t think that the centre ground is necessarily moving left,” he said.

Writing on the The Observer website, Mr Blunkett said that Mr Miliband’s vision of a “One Nation” Labour Party had to be built on more than addressing obvious injustices.

“It has to be about a great deal more than politics built on grievance and the unhappiness of a resentful and selfish public sphere,” he said.

“More than putting right the playing-off of public sector workers against those in private enterprise. The retired versus the young, the migrant versus the resentful and excluded. Or, the badly housed versus the homeless.”

* Labour leader Ed Miliband has undergone an operation for a broken wrist.

A spokesman said he suffered the injury 10 days ago while hill walking in Devon with his wife, Justine.

However, it was only when he attended the accident and emergency unit at University College Hospital, London, on Friday that an X-ray revealed he had suffered a fracture.

On doctor’s advice, he returned to the hospital today for a minor operation to re-set the wrist.

He is now back home with his family and the injury will not affect his attendance at the funeral of Baroness Thatcher on Wednesday.

It is understood, however, that he required painkillers when he delivered his tribute to the former prime minister in the Commons last week.