text: The former BBC economics editor made headlines last week after it emerged she had been ‘secretly’ dating Ed Miliband . Former BBC economics editor Stephanie Flanders yesterday broke her silence over her fling with Ed Miliband, describing it as 'fleeting and very costly'. She made headlines last week after it emerged she had been ‘secretly’ dating the Labour leader when he first met his wife Justine in 2004. In a brief message on Twitter yesterday she said: ‘We “dated” fleetingly in 2004. Very costly few weeks it turns out’. It was unclear whether Miss Flanders was voicing regret over her relationship with Mr Miliband, or was embarrassed by the media coverage – or both. Miss Flanders, 46, accused the media of ‘raking over’ Mr Miliband’s past in the run-up to the election. But in fact the revelation about the timing of her relationship with the future Labour leader was revealed by Mrs Miliband during a soft-focus interview with the Labour-supporting Mirror newspaper, which was headlined ‘How I fell in love with Ed’. Mrs Miliband revealed the couple had first met at a London dinner party hosted by Miss Flanders in 2004. She recalled: ‘I thought he was good-looking and clever and seemed to be unattached. But we just went down a conversation cul-de-sac. Apparently we had nothing in common. ‘He just wanted to talk about economics – one of my least favourite subjects. None of our conversations went anywhere.’ Mrs Miliband said she had been ‘furious’ when she later found out that her future husband was not ‘unattached’ at all and was ‘secretly going out with’ the woman who had invited her to dinner. She did not name Miss Flanders. But Tony Blair’s biographer John Rentoul later revealed it was common knowledge in Labour circles that the BBC woman had hosted the dinner party. Mr Rentoul said: ‘Could the secrecy have been because he was a Treasury special adviser and Stephanie Flanders was a BBC economics journalist?’ The revelations also revived stories about Miss Flanders’s former relationship with Labour’s shadow chancellor Ed Balls, which is said to have been more serious than her fling with Mr Miliband. Miss Flanders, daughter of Michael Flanders of the musical comedy duo Flanders and Swann, met Mr Balls in 1989 at Harvard University where they were both Kennedy scholars. They later worked together as leader writers at the Financial Times. Miss Flanders, 46, accused the media of ‘raking over’ Mr Miliband’s past in the run-up to the election. Miss Flanders, now a mother of two, went on to spend years reporting on economics for the BBC, firstly on Newsnight and then as the corporation’s economics editor. In 2013 she quit the corporation to take a lucrative job as chief European market strategist for the fabulously wealthy US investment bank JP Morgan, where Tony Blair is a senior adviser. Last week’s revelations led to a series of stories about Mr Miliband’s tangled love life before he met his wife. In an interview yesterday, the Labour leader played down the controversy, saying: ‘I’m not at all bothered about attacks on me, but I don’t think it’s very nice for the other people who are not in the public eye.’ Labour sources also dismissed the row, saying it would help dispel characterisations of him as a geek. But one poll yesterday showed a sharp deterioration in Mr Miliband’s approval ratings among women. The Opinium survey showed that the Labour leader’s approval rating among women fell by nine points in a week. Just 24 per cent of women think Mr Miliband is doing a good job, compared to 45 per cent who do not, giving him a net approval rating of minus 21, compared to minus 12 the previous week. His approval rating among men is minus 15.
target: Ms Flanders was ‘secretly’ dating Labour leader when he first met Justine .
  Yesterday she confirmed story, tweeting: 'We “dated” fleetingly in 2004'
  Miss Flanders, 46, accused the media of ‘raking over’ Mr Miliband’s past .