LABOUR must keep its promises to workers and ignore the “haunting spectre” of Lord Mandelson, the STUC warned today.

Lord Mandelson — architect of New Labour in the 1990s and EU free-market diktats in the 2000s — had penned a piece in the Sunday Times calling for Labour’s New Deal for Workers’ plans not to be “rushed” for fear of losing the support of business. 

STUC general secretary Roz Foyer welcomed senior Labour figures disowning the remarks, but warned: “The comments from the haunting spectre that is Lord Mandelson fly in the face of the promises given to our movement on the importance of the New Deal.

“Labour’s New Deal represents a hopeful new dawn for trade union and workers’ rights throughout Britain.