Ed Miliband Defends #EdStone, Saying 'It's Got People Talking'

Miliband Defends What Boris Calls 'Some Weird Commie Slab'

Ed Miliband has defended engraving his campaign promises in an 8ft high piece of stone and pledging to move it into Downing Street if elected prime minister, saying it had "got people talking".

In an election where the role of the internet and digital media was predicted to be essential, the most talked about thing in the last 24 hours has been a method of communication that dates back to the Old Testament.

Boris Johnson asked whether Miliband believed he was Moses and stepped up his attack in his Daily Telegraph column, calling it "some weird commie slab".

Miliband unveils his stone

The London Mayor and parliamentary hopeful wrote: "It’s the smugness that gets me. It’s the brass-necked complacency. As a piece of premature chicken-counting combined with insolent disrespect to the will of the electorate, this Labour stunt is frankly unbeatable.

"Never mind measuring the curtains for Downing Street, Ed Miliband is so confident of victory this Thursday that he has already commissioned a vast monument to himself."

Johnson continued: "What was he drinking? What was he smoking? What was he on when he came up with this one? Keep taking the tablets, Ed – don’t erect them in government offices.

"There are all sorts of people who are capable of putting a stop to this vandalism. If (heaven forfend) Ed Miliband were indeed to find himself in Downing Street this week, then the head of the Civil Service would quietly tell him not to be such a confounded idiot.

"No 10 is a department of state; you can’t use it for party-political propaganda. Imagine the hoo-ha if I had festooned City Hall with the Conservative logo, after we kicked out the Labour administration in 2008.

The Labour leader appeared on The Today Programme on Monday. When presenter John Humphrys asked what how to refer to it, Miliband said: "A 'stone' is perfectly adequate."

He added: "It's got people talking."

When told of criticism from The Guardian, which endorsed Labour last week, Miliband said: "They don't always get everything right."

He added that he would "leave the landscape gardening to other people" when asked where he would place it or whether he would need planning permission to put it in the garden of the Grade 1-listed building.

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