Umunna fires warning over party feuding

Labour will not regain public trust if it turns in on itself in a new outbreak of internecine strife, a senior shadow cabinet minister warned yesterday.

Shadow Business Secretary Chuka Umunna dismissed reports of a rift between party leader Ed Miliband and Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls as “utter nonsense”.

At the same time, however, he acknowledged the party could not afford a repeat of the bitter feuding between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown if it was to rebuild support following its “catastrophic” defeat in the 2010 general election.

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“What we learnt towards the end of our time in government is that when we turned in on ourselves it didn’t work,” he told BBC1’s The Andrew Marr Show.

The comments by Mr Umunna, seen as a close ally of the Labour leader, follow reports of tensions between Mr Miliband and Mr Balls – who was one of his rivals for the leadership.