Labour leader Ed Miliband makes vow to middle classes
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Ed Miliband: "You have put your trust in me and I am determined to repay that trust"
Ed Miliband has begun his first day as Labour leader with a vow to defend the "squeezed middle" of the country.
Mr Miliband won the leadership after beating brother David in a dramatic vote ahead of the party's conference.
Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, he said a "new generation was entrusted with transforming our party".
Mr Miliband also said Labour would now aim to "set out an alternative" but would support the coalition government "when it is right" on making cuts.
His victory comes as the Labour party conference starts in Manchester.
The former energy secretary, who will be interviewed on BBC One's Andrew Marr Show later, wrote in the Telegraph: "My aim is to show that our party is on the side of the squeezed middle in our country and everyone who has worked hard and wants to get on.
"My aim is to return our party to power. This is a tough challenge. It is a long journey. But our party has made the first step in electing a leader from a new generation."
Mr Miliband pledged not to oppose every government cut, saying public services would need to learn to do more with less, and he suggested he wanted to replace tuition fees.
He added: "As well as setting out an alternative when the government gets it wrong, we will support it when it is right."
Referring to the leadership result, Mr Miliband said: "A new generation was entrusted with transforming our party and making sure that, once again, we stand up for the interests of families across Britain.
"We have a lot of ground to make up if we are to rebuild the broad coalition of support that swept us to power in 1997."
He said the party needed to accept it made mistakes in government and show it had changed, adding: "We must never again lose touch with the mainstream of our country."
Personnel decisionsMr Miliband won the leadership by just over 1% from his brother after second, third and fourth preference votes came into play.
How Ed Miliband won
- Round 1: David Miliband 37.78%, Ed Miliband 34.33% Diane Abbott eliminated
- Round 2: David Miliband 38.89%, Ed Miliband 37.47%. Andy Burnham eliminated
- Round 3: David Miliband 42.72%, Ed Miliband 41.26%, Ed Balls eliminated
- Round 4: David Miliband 49.35%, Ed Miliband 50.65%. Ed Miliband wins
Ed Balls was third, Andy Burnham fourth and Diane Abbott last in the ballot of MPs, members and trade unionists.
In the first three rounds of voting David Miliband was ahead - it was only when votes were reallocated as the other candidates were knocked out that his younger brother was pushed over the winning line.
Prime Minister David Cameron called Mr Miliband from his Chequers country retreat to congratulate him on his victory.
In a three-minute conversation, he told the new leader of the opposition that people would tell him that his was "the worst job in the world" but that it was not that bad and promised to keep him in touch with matters of national security.
Ed Miliband is the 20th person to take leadership of the Labour Party Mr Miliband, 40, replaces acting leader Harriet Harman in the contest triggered by the resignation of Gordon Brown.
He has immediate questions of personnel as well as policy to address, chiefly whether his defeated older brother - whom he does not mention in his Sunday Telegraph article - will be willing to take a job on his front bench.
After the result, David Miliband told BBC News: "This is Ed's day, it's a big day for the Miliband family, not quite the day for the Miliband family that I would have wanted - the Miliband D family, rather than the Miliband E - but that's the way things go."
However, BBC Newsnight's political editor Michael Crick says a source in the Ed Miliband camp said the brothers held several secret meetings during the week, once it became clear Ed would win.
Our correspondent adds that the source says David will be offered the job of shadow chancellor, although the Ed Milliband team is not very confident he will accept it.
The new leader will not be short of advice from colleagues.
In the Independent on Sunday, shadow Home Secretary Alan Johnson warned him not to move to the left.
Analysis
By Michael Crick, political editor, BBC Newsnight
An MP in the Ed Miliband campaign tells me they had predicted exactly the parliamentary Labour party section vote, and quite closely the union and affiliates' section vote, but they were disappointed with the members' section vote, as their figures had shown them winning among ordinary party members.
This might explain why several senior Ed Miliband supporters I've bumped into have been looking pretty glum.
Not to have a majority of your MPs, or party members, and to depend on union votes, leaves Ed Miliband in a very exposed position.
Ironically, he'll have to spend much of the next few weeks distancing himself from the unions and showing he's not in their pocket.
Shadow Welsh Secretary Peter Hain said Mr Miliband should not rely solely on attacking the coalition, but focus on policies for the next election.
Conservative Party chairman Baroness Warsi congratulated Mr Miliband on becoming leader of the opposition, but she said he owed his victory to votes of trade unionists, which she feared would lead to an "abandonment of the centre ground" by Labour.
She said it was now time for Mr Miliband to "to tell us how he'd cut the deficit".
But the joint leader of the Unite union, Derek Simpson, said the new leader was no "blast from the past".
"We're not extremists at all, Ed's not an extremist, he knows how to unite the party, we don't expect him to write blank cheques for us on policies - why would he and why should he?"
Ed Miliband, who has been MP for Doncaster North since 2005 and was energy and climate change secretary until Labour's election defeat in May, is a former aide to Gordon Brown at the Treasury. He joined the Labour Party at the age of 17.
Labour Leadership Contest
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The Ed Miliband story A profile of the new Labour Party leader Ed Miliband.
From other news sites
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Sky News New Labour Leader Backs 'Squeezed Middle' 14 mins ago
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Yahoo! UK and Ireland Miliband on the side of "squeezed middle" class 1 hr ago
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Press Association Miliband to state vision for Labour 2 hrs ago
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New York Times Brother Beats Brother in Labour Vote 6 hrs ago
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Channel 4 News Ed Miliband is new Labour leader 15 hrs ago
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