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  1. Politics
28 September 2012

Miliband’s phone confiscated after texts to Cable

Labour leader's phone taken away by aides and replaced by one with a new number.

By George Eaton

After perhaps one too many text exchanges with Vince Cable, Ed Miliband has reportedly had his phone confiscated by aides. Today’s Times (£) reports that Labour tribalist Dennis Skinner and Ken Livingstone challenged Miliband over his conversations with Cable at a preconference meeting of the NEC, to which he replied that his phone had “recently been taken away by his aides”. It has apparently been replaced by one with a phone number that has been given to “a much smaller number of people”. Thus, politics continues in its mission to put The Thick Of It’s writers out of a job.

It’s not the first time Miliband has been parted from his phone. In his interview with the New Statesman earlier this month, the Labour leader revealed that he left his phone at home during his holiday in Greece. “It was such a relief and a liberation not having a phone,” he said. If someone needed to contact him, they were told to ring his wife, Justine, “which of course they were reluctant to do”.

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