Could David Miliband return to UK politics in 2017?

Could 2017 see the return to UK politics of former Labour MP David Miliband? There are plenty of sympathisers in the centre-left who would like to see him return from New York.

Who is David Miliband?

The one-time South Shields MP held several ministerial positions under Tony Blair before becoming Gordon Brown's foreign secretary in 2007, serving until Labour lost power in 2010.

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"Milifans" may be better acquainted with his brother Ed, but it was David Miliband who was seen as the more promising candidate during Labour's 2010 leadership election.

However, Ed Miliband's more left-wing outlook won him the backing of the unions and, ultimately, the leadership of the party.

Where has Miliband been since 2010?

Miliband quit the shadow cabinet after losing the leadership contest but continued to serve as an MP. He also taught A-level politics on a voluntary basis at the secondary school he had attended as a teenager, reported the Daily Telegraph.

He left politics in 2013, telling the BBC that he didn't want to become "a distraction" for Labour while his brother led the party, and moved to New York, where he took up the position of head of the International Rescue Committee (IRC).

Who wants him to return to UK politics?

Former Labour strategist John McTernan, for one. He has written an open letter to Miliband begging him to return from the US immediately and replace Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the party.

"Your party needs you, as does your country," he wrote in Prospect magazine, saying the alternative was "unthinkable" – a Labour Party with fewer than 200 seats, "dragged down by Corbyn".

Is that realistic?

The timetable does seem tight, given that the election is in seven weeks and Corbyn has given no indication he will give up the leadership. But McTernan is adamant the practical problems can be swept aside with the backing of the unions and Labour's organising committee.

Does anybody else want him back?

Twitter or Google "return David Miliband" or "come back David Miliband" and you'll find the idea is a popular pipe dream among some on the centre-left.

According to the right-wing political blog Guido Fawkes, Miliband himself considered a return. Fawkes claimed at the weekend, without evidence, that Miliband had "contacted at least one veteran moderate MP to ask if they might step down and grease his path back to parliament".

It also asserted he had decided not to return at this election.

Who doesn't want him back?

Perhaps not the Queen, according to Kevin Maguire in the New Statesman. He recalls a rumour from 2008 that the Queen had inquired whether Miliband had the "experience" necessary to be foreign secretary after his sanctions stopped a Scottish pipe band from travelling to Russia.

Why are the Milibands so involved in politics?

That is easily explained: their father Ralph Miliband was a prominent Marxist author who lectured in political science at the London School of Economics and counted Jeremy Corbyn and Tony Benn among his friends.

In 2013, two decades after his death, he was described by the Daily Mail as "the man who hated Britain".

The paper refused to apologise when Ed Miliband objected, despite the then Labour leader also having the support of Conservative prime minister David Cameron.