When we look at the reasons why we lost the election campaign there is one regular experience on the doorstep which sticks in my mind. In marginal seats and in safe seats, people kept saying they didn’t know what we stand for or who we stand up for.

Losing sight of our values was our greatest weakness, as we ended up more as technocrats and managers rather than people who wanted to transform the country to be fairer, more just and more democratic.

But there were places where we won against the conventional wisdom that was bandied around the broadcasting studios. Those victories were of less surprise to those who fought in those seats. They may have been tough fights but there are lessons we can learn from where we won as well as from where we lost.

Where we won, vibrant local parties, rooted in the communities they served, understood the priorities of the people they spoke to not just as voters but as neighbours.  They campaigned by applying Labour values to the everyday challenges people faced.

We will need to harness the talents of the whole Party to make the most of those successes and bring that dynamism to our engagement with every community where Labour people live.

All of us can make the most of our everyday conversations, and the whole Party can learn from what we are hearing. The more we talk and listen to the communities we live in, and the more the lessons from those conversations are learned and applied by the wider Party, the better our answers will be to the challenges the country faces.

We won in so many hard fought battles because, in many areas, this is already happening. In campaigns that inspired not just members but also supporters to campaign, that reached out to other organisations that share our values, we were simply able to talk to more people in a more meaningful way. Those conversations bore fruit. Not just in votes but in understanding. Where highly motivated candidates and activists took time to build up whole community campaigns, we were engaged in more than narrow campaigning – we made a real difference and improved peoples’ lives.

I want to learn from these successes and lead a revolution of activism within our Party, so that every conversation we have isn’t one in which we simply ask how people intend to vote, but is also an opportunity learn what we can offer and what people, working with us, can achieve for their own communities. This is how will put our values into action whilst in opposition and how we can demonstrate why our values are so necessary in today’s Britain.

A simple start would be to be open about how many members we have in different areas and what they are doing for their communities. It shouldn’t be difficult to double our membership, we all know at least one person who voted Labour at the last election who might want to join. But the reason for joining should be clear; membership needs to be about what you can change rather than just attending meetings. We should recognise where this is already happening and give those local Parties the incentives to continue in their successes. The central Party should also be able to provide members with the tools and support to meet their goals.

I look forward to talking to campaigners like you who have signed up to Labour Values about how we can achieve this. I want to discuss how branches can reach out to other organisations that share our values; how we can make it easier for supporters to share all of their talents for the sake of their communities; how we can share power and responsibility so that activists can make decisions and a real difference; and I want to discuss how the lessons learned on the doorstep are spread across the country, for the sake of all.

The leadership has spent too much time treating the membership as a threat to sensible policy and direction, when in fact if we had listened more, on housing, on the 10p tax rate, on agency workers, we would have been a better government.

If you want a Party that trusts its members because they are its connection to communities, I ask you to elect me as your leader. As your leader I promise I will not leave the Party behind, but instead lead a party rooted in communities, dynamic and campaigning that can win the argument for a fairer, more equal and more democratic Britain.

by Ed Miliband MP