Ed Miliband marries Justine Thornton ? after leaving it late

Couple tie the knot on a day the wind and a whiff of Tory disapproval couldn't spoil

In the end it was all rather sweet. Even the photographers, as tough a bunch of brigands to be found this side of Corsica, found themselves slightly impressed as the definitely happy couple delivered the ritual kiss for their benefit, then traipsed back up the windswept drive hand-in-hand.

On a blustery day in Middle England, all high hedges, tall, waving grasses and the pungent stink of manure, it had been a long wait for the snappers, though not as long as for the new Mrs Miliband and her two sons. Back in London, Dan and Sam now face a lifetime of stigma in advanced Labour circles: parents who are married (to each other).

The wedding of Ed Miliband, 41, to Justine Thornton, 40, has been like no other among senior British politicians except Gordon Brown and Edward Heath, who both left it late, too late in Ted's case. Most ambitious young thrusters marry quietly and have kids before they become important. Ed and Justine did it the other way around.

As a result, their modest nuptials at Langar Hall on the outskirts of the Nottinghamshire village of Langar ? close to where Mrs M grew up ? have been dissected, bitched about and mocked more than most, even by Lily Allen who turns out to be tying her own knot with builder Sam Cooper, next month, the sentimentalist!

Did it mean the Labour leader was selling out (some Labour activists are gagging to be betrayed) by embracing a form of bourgeois domesticity advocated by David Cameron? Did Ed's failure to drag Justine to the altar earlier in their six-year tryst mean he was a commitment phobe? Or (more likely) a disorganised workaholic? Was he doing it for the pollsters ? or was this the real deal?

Long before local registrar Hazel Tait had done the deed ? neither promised to obey, but then, nor does the Labour party ? this was a wedding that had launched a thousand columns. Would the environmental lawyer be keeping her maiden name at work? Yes. And would her Alice Temperley dress be as good as Kate Middleton's? Different, but stylish in its own, Regency high-waisted way. After all, the bride was once a child actor.

Driving past the media huddle outside the gates,? TV cameras are not easy to miss in sleepy Langar ? one Tory suggested a new, if not original, line of attack. Pointing at the nearby spire he called "There's a church over there if they want to do it properly." Too late for that, but they did it properly in their own low-key way. Fifty guests, all family and close friends, only one MP (apparently Ed's brother, David, is a budding politician too); only two speeches ? bride and groom ? during a wedding breakfast of asparagus, lamb and pavlova.

The couple later returned to London for a party with friends ? and will fly off for a five-day European honeymoon today. No, they will not be Facebooking their whereabouts for the Daily Beast to stalk them, but Milibandologists know their man is too progressive to ignore the web entirely on such a happy day. "Thanks for all the good wishes. Really looking forward to the day. Feel like the luckiest guy in the world to be marrying Justine," he tweeted. Taciturn Clem Attlee could have done it in 140 characters, but probably not Ed's fellow-atheist, Neil Kinnock, who married his Glenys in a chapel to please their parents.

As might be expected in the fox hunting-and-Stilton countryside of the Vale of Belvoir, Langar Hall turns out to have Tory connections: Ken Clarke, whose sacking the groom recently demanded, is the local MP and the Earls Howe (the current one is junior health minister ) are also Langar-linked. Imogen Skirving, who runs the hall (she was born there), is an ex-Tory councillor with an eye to publicity. Her hotel's honeymoon four-poster rents at �195 a night, but has a single rate of �140 for marriages which don't survive the reception.

This was not the case on Friday. "It went absolutely smoothly, one of the happiest, easiest weddings we have ever done," Skirving reported as hacks and snappers ? kept at safe distance, like feudal retainers ? awaited the promised delivery of the couple.

Langar itself seemed unmoved. Two policemen were seen patrolling on foot. Members of the nearby Keyworth and District Cycling Association ? most of pensionable age ? briefly stopped pedaling to observe that the Labour leader had not exactly married with reckless haste. "You probably won't have our vote," biker Tony Fletcher shouted. "Probably definitely."

Dave Bishop, the Nottingham exhibitionist and campaigner, who stands at byelections, turned up to wish the Milibands well and ? quite incidentally ? advertise the Militant Elvis Anti-Tesco Popular Front under whose banner he got 322 votes (a personal best) in this month's council elections.

Dave was dressed as Elvis. But not even this could distract the media posse from the long wait or the whiff of manure, nature's revenge on city-dwellers. Politics never smells so rank in the Westminster village!

At 12.52, two small, distant figures could be seen walking down the long avenue of limes from Langar Hall. One was wearing a high-waisted cream dress. It is a long time since DH Lawrence spun his fantasies in these parts. In a working Nottinghamshire village on a Friday in 2011 such an apparition could hardly be Connie Chatterley and Mellors. It had to be ? and it was ? the happy couple.

As the westerly got into its stride they looked freezing, but were clearly bent on going, if not the extra mile for the hacks, then at least the extra 300 yards. Awkward, ungracious even, he may occasionally have been about love, in a Prince Charles sort of way, but yesterday they glowed.

"She's looking radiant" and "she's lovely" called the snappers along with "kiss, kiss" and ? just in case ? "and again, sir, please." "How is it going so far?" asked the Guardian. "Very well, great," said the groom. Everyone seemed to mean it.

As they walked back to the reception, Ayesha Hazarika, the leader's spokesman, briefed us on what lovely things the pair were about to say about each other in their speeches. They hadn't actually said it yet, but hey, this procedure is normal in politics, if not in Langar. It was all under embargo, of course, just in case they changed their minds.

On this evidence, they won't.

Michael White

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