Former Downing Street policy chief and newly elected Labour MP, David Miliband, has been appointed to a key EU advisory group on the future of Europe.

Miliband, who has close links to Tony Blair's inner circle, will join a "sounding board" policy group at the heart of EU.

The group has been set up by Belgian prime minister Guy Verhofstadt, who will shortly be taking over the rotating presidency of the EU, to grapple with the controversy and disputes surrounding the future direction of the EU.

Belgium, which takes up a six-month EU presidency in July, wants to focus its energies on adopting an "integrationist" statement at a euro-summit to be held in Laeken in December.

In a recent speech Verhofstadt set out an agenda clearly at odds with the UK's.

"The EU is not just an inter-governmental setup. We want to go much further, to be a deeper, more profound organisation. In the Laeken declaration, we will try to go further than setting out a timetable...We want to turn it into a global project for Europe," he said.

Miliband will have the task of holding the line on issues such as the legal status of the EU's charter of fundamental rights and the balance of powers between Brussels and national governments.

He will be up against some heavy federalist hitters, including the former Belgian prime minister Jean-Luc Dehaene who the UK vetoed as too federalist to become commission president, former Italian PM Giuliano Amato and euro-sceptic tabloid hate figure Jacques Delors.