Greens new leaderships won’t deliver change – build a socialist alternative

Chris Sermanni, branch secretary Glasgow City UNISON (personal capacity)

This summer – within days of each other – both the Scottish Greens and Green Party of England and Wales elected new leaders of their respective parties.

The Scottish Greens announced MSPs Gillian Mackay and Ross Greer as their new co-leaders, continuing their preference for electing a joint leadership.

The Green Party of England and Wales, however, bucked this trend with Zack Polanski defeating the joint ticket of Adrian Ramsay and Ellie Chowns in a landslide with 84.6% of the vote.

Mackay and Greer, with no credibility at all, and Polanski – with more credibility – both stood on a platform that distanced themselves from their predecessors and promised to move their parties in a more radical direction.

That there was zero enthusiasm among Scottish Green members was evidenced by the fact that just 951 voted in the contest, a turnout of 12.5%.

In stark contrast, Polanski ignited enthusiasm among the membership with more than 20,000 voting for him. This pales when compared with the 800,000 who have signed up online to Your Party.

This desire for a change is not surprising when you analyse the record of previous leaders and of both parties when in government.

The Greens recent electoral success is largely thanks to some workers and young people voting for them due to genuine concerns about the ongoing environmental carnage being inflicted by capitalism across the globe and the urgent need for an alternative.

However, neither have provided this or indeed indicated a willingness to actually do so.

Bute House agreement

In Scotland, the Greens are still dealing with the fallout of the ‘Bute House’ agreement under the tenure of Patrick Harvey and Lorna Slater. Indeed Ross Greer was the architect of the agreement.

This agreement was effectively a coalition with the SNP government that passed on Westminster cuts with barely a whimper. A similar arrangement emerged in Glasgow where they have worked again with the SNP to pass cuts budgets to council services.

Not only has this alienated voters, but it has also led to an internal crisis and the emergence of a ‘Green Left’ disillusioned with the party being comfortable working hand in glove with the political establishment, within the confines of capitalism.

Mackay and Greer – even though they both supported the Bute House deal – have been keen to try and reestablish the Greens ‘radical’ credentials ahead of the Holyrood elections in May 2026.

However, both have voted in the past for Scottish Green backed SNP budgets that have implemented austerity.

Zack Polanski has promised a more confrontational style of politics, dubbed eco populism, for the Greens in England and Wales.

He called nationalisation a “no-brainer” and to tax the millionaires and billionaires – as he puts it, the “policies of the 99%”.

His predecessors were accused of championing ‘sensible politics’, building on electoral gains to project the image of a stable and credible alternative.

This was, like Scotland, out of step with large swathes of voters who believed them to be a credible alternative to mainstream capitalist parties.

Notably, Polanski cloaked his campaign in left wing terminology, promising wealth redistribution and taxing the rich. He has also been an outspoken critic of the Labour government’s role in the genocide in Gaza.

Crucially, he is the leader of a party that has over 850 councillors in England and Wales, including full control of some councils.

In his campaign, Polanski was completely silent on the role played by the Green Party in continuing to pass on Tory and now Labour cuts to already beleaguered local authorities.

Talking left, walking right

It is not only in the UK that ‘Green’ parties have talked left but walked like capitalists. This has seen parties in Ireland, Austria, and Belgium lose seats at elections and the common thread has been their inability to muster resistance to the onslaught capitalist policies inflicts on the working-class.

Whilst the rhetoric from the leadership has changed in the UK, history tells us that they are all too willing to compromise with the mainstream political parties.

As socialists, we understand why certain layers of the working class and youth would have been attracted to the Greens in both Scotland and England as a viable alternative to the misery that the capitalist system has inflicted on ordinary people.

We also understand that frustrations that will flow from their complete failure to provide that alternative.

We would urge any Scottish Green supporters who are trade union members and who are seeking an alternative to come to the Trade Unionists for New Party meeting on Monday 13 October. Come along and discuss how to build a mass workers’ party, as well as working with us in Scotland to provide a fighting socialist alternative at the Holyrood elections in 2026.

That alternative will stand for an end to cuts budgets, austerity and against the notion that the environmental crisis can be fixed within the confines of capitalism.