Green Party Watch

In an series of posts at his Facebook page last night Chris Alders has been reporting on Green Party victories in England. Here are the results:

Breaking News: English city council elections’ vote count underway. Green Party incumbents John Coyne (Liverpool) and Jillian Creasy (Sheffield) have won re-election!

Breaking News: Green Party candidate Jo Henderson wins election to Norwich City (England) council with 41% of the vote!

Breaking News: Green Party city councillors Denise Carlo, Amy Stammers, Lucy Galvin, and Stephen Little are re-elected in Norwich (England) local government elections!

Breaking News: Rachel Eburne of the Green Party is declared re-elected, running unopposed in Mid-Suffolk (England) city council election.

The rest of the results are below the fold. read more »

Alternative voting, quite similar to Instant Runoff Voting, is on the ballot today in England. The video below explains how cats can use AV to keep their country from going to the dogs. Results will be posted here later today.

– Scott McLarty

The review can only be read at Z Magazine if you have a subscription, but McLarty also published the review here and here.

The book, A No Nonsense Guide to Green Politics, is recommended by both Carolina Lucas, recently elected Member of Parliament for the Green Party of England and Wales, and by famed historian Howard Zinn. Here’s a short excerpt from the review.

If a Green ideology exists, it’s based on humane and ecological principles rather than single-model prescriptions for economics, government, and other spheres of human behavior. The classic ideologies of the 19th and 20th century — laissez-faire capitalism, bureaucratic collectivism, fascism, and various theocratic fundamentalisms — all value abstractions, systems, and doctrines over human life. Stalin made communism work by allowing millions of Ukrainian peasants to starve to death; fascists liquidated ‘useless eaters’ and scapegoat minorities; business owners resisted the right of workers to livable wages, reasonable hours, and safe workplaces; corporate polluters dumped lethal substances regardless of the effect on nearby residents; religious zealots condemned queers and unsubmissive women in the name of a savior, prophet, or edity. Derek Wall recognizes that deep ecology, taken to an extreme as a single-model ideology, reduces humans to ecological cogs. He mentions deep ecologist Dave Foreman’s claim that AIDS and famines in Africa should be welcomed because they reduce human populations and thus mitigate the environmental harm that people cause.

From his Facebook page:

Breaking News: Rachel Eburne of the Green Party is declared re-elected, running unopposed in Mid-Suffolk (England) city council election.

Breaking News: Green Party candidate Jo Henderson wins election to Norwich City (England) council with 41% of the vote!

Breaking News: English city council elections’ vote count underway. Green Party incumbents John Coyne (Liverpool) and Jillian Creasy (Sheffield) have won re-election!

Mark Easton of the BBC reports on Mark Kennedy, a police officer who “infiltrated” environmental groups in Great Britain. Kennedy apparently lied to environmental activists about his identity, interests and goals, and found himself in the leadership of some of these groups, even handling meetings and finances.

read more »

The text is here, and also available at the party website. H/T to Ballot Access News.

Caroline Lucas delivers maiden speech to Parliament

Mr Speaker,

I am most grateful to you for calling me during today’s debate.

The environment is a subject dear to my heart, as I’m sure you know, and I’ll return to it in a moment.

I think anyone would find their first speech in this chamber daunting, given its history and traditions, and the many momentous events it has witnessed.

But I have an additional responsibility, which is to speak not only as the new Member of Parliament for Brighton Pavilion, but also as the first representative of the Green Party to be elected to Westminster.
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The first story covers California Green and former Congressman Dan Hamburg in his race for Mendocino County Council. Hamburg maintains a Facebook page, and donations to his campaign can be made via his campaign website The story at IPR says that Hamburg is likely to be in a run off.

Mendocino County’s 5th District is awash with well-known, seasoned liberal candidates vying for a seat on the Board of Supervisors, making a November runoff nearly certain.

Source: Press Democrat

The primary is set for June 8th.

In another piece written by Ross Levin, Lynne Williams has announced that she’s abandoned her gubernatorial bid, and is instead running for a seat in the state legislature.

As always, I will continue speaking out about the issues that concern me, particularly the right of self-determination for local communities and local school districts, preventing inappropriate industrial development from invading our rural communities, supporting local foodscapes, and ensuring that farmers and fishing families are able to create sustainable businesses.

Meanwhile, in international Green news, IPR reports on the Green Party of England and Wales, and their newly minted manifesto The party’s campaign theme, Fair is worth fighting for, is explored in a video, which you can see under the fold. read more »

H/T to Mike Emperor

England and Wales use a system that permits the Prime Minister to call elections within a time frame that suits his or her political ends, and Prime Minister Gordon Brown has apparently decided that now is that time. The elections are fast approaching, and media coverage of Greens is increasing as voting closes in. Four articles from St Albans, Yorkshire, Oxfordshire and and Oxford are below the fold. read more »

The United Kingdom will hold a parliamentary election sometime between now and June 3.   Although the official date hasn’t been announced, candidates are up and running.  Green Party of England and Wales party leader Caroline Lucas represents South East England in the European Parliament.  She’s standing in the UK Parliamentary seat of Brighton Pavilion in the upcoming election.  The Greens already control the local Brighton council and, as we’ve noted before, it looks like Lucas has opened up a small but significant lead in an independent poll.

Today’s UK Guardian has a brief article explaining why Lucas’ chances make this one of the more interesting contests in the upcoming election.

“One more Tory MP, one more Labour MP – what difference is that going to make?” says Lucas. “The first Green MP, I think, would have a far greater effect.” To that end, she is fighting hard, and doing as well as you’d expect among people who live in Brighton’s bohemian centre – though much of the battle will be fought in the seat’s more suburban patches, split between traditionally ­Labour-supporting estates and more Tory-favouring areas, with extensive gardens.

The Greens are on the upswing in the UK, with 125 councilors not including Scotland, but this Brighton Pavilion is their best shot at breaking into Parliament.  In the last election, the Greens nearly tied for second with the Conservatives in this constituency.   The party has built up a strong local base and now Lucas is in a position to campaign as the real progressive choice against the Conservatives.

I wish there was a way to embed the video accompanying the article into this post, because its fascinating.  Journalist John Harris doesn’t pretend to be completely disinterested in politics.  He tells everyone straightforwardly that he’s a disgruntled Labour voter.   All three candidates address him not so much as a journalist, but as a potential convert.

He asks tough questions of all three candidates, but completes the video by admitting that as a disgruntled Labour voter, he’s got a dilemma.  Although he’s concerned about voting in the Conservatives, he no longer feels that New Labour represents his politics.  He wonders if its only his “old tribal loyalties” that would stop him from voting Green.

This will be one to watch.

Links:

• Article: Could Brighton Pavilion elect Britain’s first Green MP?. John Harris. Guardian. February 8, 2010.

• Video: Brighton Pavilion: A Green leap forward? John Harris voyages to the seaside seat where Caroline Lucas could become Britain’s first Green MP

• Brighton & Hove Greens party website

• Caroline Lucas campaign website

• Wikipedia: Caroline Lucas

In the most recent piece the Arizona Green Party is covered as they go to go to US District Court hoping to overturn laws that shorten the deadline for filing petitions and which forbid out-of-state petitioners.

Only slightly older is this piece which discusses recent polls which indicate that the Green Party of England and Wales may elect their first Member of Parliament. It includes a link to an article at The Independent which says that Green Party leader Caroline Lucas has an 8% lead over the Conservative challenger.

But the most significant development is the candidature of Caroline Lucas herself, Britain’s most accomplished Green politician. Articulate, passionate, radical without seeming threatening, the former Oxfam adviser has been MEP (editorial note: Member of the European Parliament) for South-east England for 10 years, and is a world away from the old image of the Green party activist as someone who lived in a tepee eating brown rice.

According to the News and Star, the Green Party in Carlisle, England, is opposed to a proposal to lengthen shopping hours next year during the holiday season.

Legislation restricts larger stores, any over 3,000 square feet, to opening for six hours anytime between 10am and 6pm.

Boxing Day 2010 (December 26th) falls on a Sunday and so retailers are asking for the law to be relaxed, arguing that in the current climate it has become one of the most important days of the year.

In a posting at the Green Party of England and Wales website, the party takes the German power company Npower to task for the way the company has handled it’s responsibility to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

“It’s time energy companies really started taking their responsibilities seriously. Dodges like this are inexcusable.

What was their dodge? read more »

According to this article, Green Party of England and Wales leader Caroline Lucas believes that the Greens are poised to win a seat in Parliament. She is quoted saying that the Labour Party, led by Gordon Brown, is responsible for the nation’s economic and social difficulties.

“The government’s response to the current economic crisis is creating more inequality, not reducing it,” she said.

She also pointed to recent Green Party votes across Europe as proof that the Green Party’s message is resonating with voters across the continent.

“A million people who responded to our policies, our candidates and perhaps, above all, to our values,” she said.

“A million voices calling out for honesty in politics, for tackling the issues that really matter, like climate change and good quality public services.

“A million people who wanted fairness from a party they could trust. What a message for the other parties.”

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Spiegel Online reports on the growth of the Green Party in Germany at the expense of the Social Democrats. According to Spiegel, the Greens and Social Democrats are struggling for the “New Center” in German politics. In a quote that could apply to some US cities, Spiegel writes

In many major cities, it has already risen to become the second-biggest political party.

The article also covers the German Green Party’s efforts to connect with voters via their own Internet radio station.

In what may be the most telling quote, a German voter addresses the current financial problems, and the traditional party approach.

“There’s not so much money left, so it needs to be spent intelligently,” says Katharina Blumenstock, a gynecologist in Cologne. “The development of electric cars is more important to me than the Opel bailout. We need to invest in the future.” She says she trust the Greens most to find the right path out of the current financial and economic crisis.

Much more, from New Zealand, Ireland, Argentina, Belgium, Scotland, Palestine, and many more can be found by clicking this article’s headline.
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