What is the Green Party up to? As the Labour Party awaits the coronation of Andy Burnham, their opponents are setting out plans for how to approach this new administration. Burnham’s victory in the Makerfield by-election seemed to swallow the Green vote, leaving them on just 0.7 per cent and costing their deposit. But for Zack Polanski’s Green Party, the arrival of a more left-wing government led by Burnham in No 10 could prove an opportunity as much as a challenge.
There are differing opinions within the party as to how they should move. The Green MPs, who come from a different party tradition to their leader, think their party should wait and see, allowing the MP for Makerfield to get his feet under the desk before jumping to conclusions. “Let him make his own mistakes,” one source said.
But there is another school of thought. Allies of Polanski and some senior officials within the party want to take a more boisterous approach from the get-go. “Burnham is essentially Labour’s last card,” a source close to Polanski said. “They’re betting everything on him succeeding but we know he’s going to disappoint voters sooner or later.”
Polanski plans to challenge Burnham’s appointments, such as that of James Purnell as his chief of staff or the rumoured appointment of Josh Simons to a senior No 10 role. He will point out that while the prime minister may have changed, the Parliamentary Labour Party remains the same. “Starmer had a huge block of ex-lobbyists as MPs and now so does Burnham,” a source close to Polanski said. “Sticking a new face on Labour won’t change its makeup.”
But the polls are already suggesting a dip for the Greens; from almost 20 per cent in March to 13 per cent at the end of June. Could former Labour voters, who may have voted Green in protest at Starmer’s leadership, be brought back by Burnham? One senior Green refuted this. “We know that once people vote Green once, they tend to stick with us,” they said, “people don’t see it as ‘lending’ us their vote.”
The party performed well at the May local elections – taking councils from Labour in London, and confirming their foothold in the north-west, holding on to the wards that cover Hannah Spencer’s Gorton and Denton constituency. In response, the party is throwing all its resources at the Greater Manchester mayoral by-election. Polls suggest it will be a very difficult race for the party to win; they will have to break through in areas like Makerfield. But one insider tells me that it is places like Makerfield – the “left-behind places” – which the party has decided to target.
Polanski – who was brought up in north Manchester – has already been up to the city to campaign with the party’s candidate Geraldine Coggins, and plans to go again during the race. Coggins has been a councillor on Trafford Council in Greater Manchester for the past eight years. Next week the party plans to launch its manifesto for the race and on Friday (3 July) it will unveil a new campaign on affordable housing in the city region. The party plans to launch more explicit criticism of Labour’s record in Manchester in the coming weeks.
Other party insiders are unconvinced. One Green source told me that they do not expect to win in Greater Manchester, and think the party’s efforts are a waste of time. “We’re not going to win,” they said. Online, there was a backlash against Coggins’s latest campaign video, in which she positioned the Greens campaign as a straight fight against Reform. “It’s dishonest,” one insider said. The Greater Manchester by-election, unlike Gorton and Denton, will be fought under a proportional rather than first-past-the-post system. Under this system, some Green Party insiders feel it makes no sense to run an antagonistic campaign. The party should instead emphasise its progressive policies in order to encourage more voters in the city region to give Coggins their first preference vote.
This is uncharted territory for the Green Party. The high of Gorton and Denton has been difficult to replicate. The result in Makerfield, coupled with Burnham’s return, has dampened the hype around Polanski. As one insider notes, the way the party responds over the coming months will depend on “which Andy Burnham shows up”.
[Further reading: Andy Burnham’s devolution delusion]