Labour Party conference, the final day, 2013

Ed Miliband spoke at the Labour Party conference yesterday (read our report here), making this final day here in Brighton one of digestion. The mood by the seaside this morning is sluggish. The main hall gets under way an hour later than yesterday and people are arriving late, coffees in hand. The conference stalls will begin packing up soon. Unite has by far the largest stand.

In its hung-over state, the party now has time to sit back in its chair having consumed yesterday's fairly hefty policy meal and consider whether it liked what the leader served up. The papers were divided over his speech, not least over the plan to freeze energy prices—and therefore the energy bills of consumers. It was a bold announcement. The word is that it was chosen due to the focus group factor, where the reaction was very strong indeed. The energy industry is, of course, not in favour, although Ed has sought to redress that by writing to the energy companies calling on them to be part of the solution, not part of the problem (read the full text here).

One lobbyist who spoke to the Prospector said the industry was already predicting "blackouts" some time in the 2020s. The Miliband proposal to cap their revenues would only make this threat more acute. The Morning Star, however, was more in favour. "Miliband: I'll stop energy profiteers," bellowed this morning's headline.

There is no doubt that yesterday's speech by Ed was impressive, made without notes and with an endearing mix of goofy, self-deprecating humour and punchy rhetoric. But it also demonstrates how Miliband risks being cast as something of an idealist. Who would not favour lower energy bills? It is an entirely honourable political aim. But to achieve this simply by government diktat would immediately lead to a whole host of problems, not least challenge under European law—it is not certain that Miliband's suggestion would even be legal.

But even if it were legal, Britain's energy infrastructure needs a substantial upgrade, and the construction of that new capacity will take decades to complete. If the industry thinks that nasty political surprises are a possibility, then it won't spend the money.

Once the enthusiastic reaction to yesterday's speech had died down, it became apparent that there had been a substantial omission—the economy. Miliband didn't go near it. Instead he went headfirst into the cost of living, how the few were creaming off all the rewards and Cameron's complicity in this elitist economic fix.

But the economy is the subject on which Cameron will attack Miliband, at the forthcoming Conservative conference and all the way up to 2015. Miliband will strike back with aspirational rhetoric and the line that he would make Britain a fairer place. But he will not get far unless he can add to his message a dash of pragmatism—an ingredient that on reflection was missing from yesterday's offering.