The last year has been an encouraging one for the Green movement. Greta Thunberg's campaign and the school strikes, the publicity attracting to David Attenborough's Blue Planet - and increasing numbers of adverse-weather-related events - appear finally to have had some impact on public awareness of the climate emergency. The emergence of Extinction Rebellion (XR) and the effect of direct action on the public consciousness has also added to a change of sentiment. We have seen an increasing number of local authorities declaring Climate Emergencies followed more recently by Parliament. We've yet to see a lot of substance to these bold statements, but it’s a start.
The Green Party itself has benefited in the polls from this change of mood, and its consistent stance on Brexit in sharp contrast to the Labour Party. The Greens have more than doubled their number of local councillors and increased their representation in Europe at the recent elections. Their polling has held up well against other progressive parties and they are enjoying a membership surge. The European elections and recent gains by Greens across, at least, western Europe - especially Germany - suggests that the breakdown of traditional voting patterns in post-industrial democracies may well favour more environmentally conscious parties. Does this mean that the potential for a parliamentary breakthrough for the Green Party has finally arrived? In this article I argue that this isn't the case and can't be while the UK remains wedded to a first-past-the-post (FPTP) system for Westminster elections. The Green Party may well need to review its political strategy.
Under FPTP a party can poll in excess of 20% - and the Greens are well short of this - and still not add to its parliamentary representation. A party polling 35% against divided opposition (Johnson's Tories?) can end up with a landslide victory. A similar situation operates at local authority level. The two ‘main’ parties benefit disproportionately from this blatantly unfair system. It would require the wholehearted commitment of at least one of the two to make a change. This seems unlikely in the near future. As it is, if there was an election in the autumn, the Green Party would be most likely to be left with their one MP. In the European elections the party benefited from left-leaning Labour supporters (and members), lending their votes to make a point to Jeremy Corbyn. Some will stay with the Green Party, but most will return to Labour in another polarising Brexit General Election as in 2017.
