Five things we’ve learnt from the Guardian’s profile of Ed Miliband’s campaign

Ed Miliband’s general election campaign was clearly dysfunctional, but now we have an insight into just how bad it was. The Guardian’s political editor Patrick Wintour has produced a fantastic long read on the undoing of Miliband, revealing the fear and loathing inside his operation. The piece is such a fascinating read it’s worth buying a copy of the paper for. If you aren’t able to make it to a newsagent, here’s a summary of the five most interesting things we’ve learnt from it.

1. The Edstone went through ten approval meetings

The Edstone (pictured above) will be Miliband’s legacy. If he is remembered for nothing else, it will be for engraving his pledges onto a 8ft 6in piece of limestone. Incredibly, Wintour reveals that the stone wasn’t an off-the-cuff ill-advised decision:

‘The only reason it got through 10 planning meetings was because we were all distracted, looking for a way to punch through on the SNP’

Plans were even drawn up to break it up and sell the pieces in the instance of a Labour defeat.