Latest news with #ZackPolanski
The Guardian
10-07-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
By learning to wield political power, Greens could fill the void at the heart of British politics
The Green party leadership election – by far the highest-profile in the party's history – has largely been seen through the traditional lens of left and centre. On the one hand is Zack Polanski, the deputy leader and London assembly member whose insurgent campaign has attracted a surge of former Corbynites to the party. He's seen as the left candidate. The incumbent, Adrian Ramsay (no relation to me), and his new running-mate, Ellie Chowns – both rural MPs – have been described as eco-centrists. While there is some truth to that, it's not quite so simple: after all, Ramsay and Chowns, like Polanski, have called for a wealth tax and renationalisations, and have denounced Israeli genocide in Gaza. This is hardly Starmerite centrism. To think about the real distinction, it might be an idea to go to Lancaster in 2007. At the time, the party was holding a tense annual conference that was split between two currents whose differences help make sense of what's happening today. I was one of the 'realos' (realists). We wore suits, hoping any passing journalist would take us seriously. The other side were known as the 'fundis' (fundamentalists), and they seemed to have exaggerated their hippy garb. I remember two people in druid gowns – perhaps because of genuine pagan beliefs, but probably also because they were trolling us. The realo v fundi terminology originated in disputes within the German Greens in the 1980s over whether to enter coalition governments. In the party in England and Wales, the stakes were lower: in 2007, we were holding a referendum on whether the party should have a leader, replacing the then system of having two 'principal speakers'. For realos, this change was a statement of intent: it was about becoming serious. For fundis, there was, as the realo Natalie Bennett, who joined in 2006, put it to me, 'a great deal of concern that this would be a major change in the culture of the party'. We won the referendum, but the leadership role it produced is highly limited. The leader gets the title, a desk, a salary if they don't have one, press office time and one vote on the party executive. They can advocate, but can't change policy, choose spokespeople or direct strategy. And they're easily replaced: elections are every two years. Many older Greens remain queasy at the idea of a leader – certainly a 'strong' leader. Both this queasiness and the limited power have shaped the party ever since, and meant that leadership contests have tended to focus on organisation-building strategy or presentational emphasis and style, not policy. In the first one, in 2008, the realo MEP Caroline Lucas and permanently besuited 26-year-old Norwich councillor Adrian Ramsay were elected leader and deputy virtually unopposed; they advocated that resources be focused on the two target constituencies in which they were the candidates – leading to Lucas becoming the first Green MP in 2010. Afterwards, though, she was busy in Westminster, unable to tour the country building the party on the back of this progress and, despite the thriving anti-austerity movement, in which many of us were active, party membership stagnated. Our generation of (then) Young Greens developed a broadly shared understanding that the party was held back by two main things: the perception that we were just about the environment (rather than a party for the millions of leftwing voters abandoned by New Labour); and a fear of conflict. I had a mantra: 'Greens can either be controversial, or ignored. Too often, the party chooses the latter.' In 2012, Lucas and Ramsay stood down, and Bennett won the election – largely because she presented a serious plan for membership growth. She toured the country and cheerfully adopted leftist language. In her first leader's speech, she said: 'Ask not what the trade unions can do for us. Ask what we can do for the trade unions.' By 2014, membership had more than doubled to almost 28,000. In 2015, it surged past 60,000 … until Jeremy Corbyn ran for Labour leader, and thousands left to join that project instead. Many, though, didn't leave, and the legacy of that membership surge remained, both in party income and in hundreds of activists getting themselves elected as councillors (a phenomenon the MP and 2018-2021 co-leader Siân Berry describes to me as 'Natalie's legacy'). Since the end of Corbynism, space has opened up again on the left, and this, combined with effective mobilisation of resources, led to hundreds more Green councillors and four MPs in 2024. But the last year has felt stagnant. With Starmer lurching right, there's an obvious space in British politics that the Greens are struggling to take. The average score in the past 10 polls for a Westminster election – about 11% – is better than ever. But sluggish compared with Reform UK. In April, Adrian Ramsay was asked on BBC Radio 4's Today programme whether he agreed with the party's policy that 'trans men are men, and trans women are women', and failed to answer five times – triggering condemnation from the Young Greens. Two weeks later, his co-leader, Carla Denyer, announced that she wouldn't seek re-election and, in May, Polanski launched an energetic campaign with the slogan 'We need bold leadership. Now.' Ramsay and Chowns' campaign is, instead, focused on their parliamentary roles – being 'in the room where it happens'. This seems to me a mistake: historically, Greens have thrived when the leader isn't stuck in Westminster. For some longstanding members, Corbynites joining to 'back Zack' is scary. Some fear Polanski's mooted ecopopulism, worrying it will attract people who 'aren't really Green'. Much of this fear isn't about policy difference, but culture. Older fundi-types who liked Corbyn's socialism but feared that the movement behind his leadership was a 'cult of personality' now have similar worries about Polanski. Chowns and Ramsay, on the other hand, exude the kind of gentle, conflict-averse, consensual leadership style that the fundis used to advocate (sitting uncomfortably with their hyper-realo insistence on the centrality of Westminster). In other words, the Green party division isn't really so much about left and centre as it is about differing ideas about political power and how to wield it. For me, Polanski takes the realo acceptance of the need for charismatic leadership and blends it with the fundis' belief in extraparliamentary organising and social movements. His position – that the party should be bolder in articulating its positions, that it shouldn't be embarrassed by opinions that the Daily Mail considers scandalous (but are shared with much of the population), that it should lead the left – isn't a new, un-Green one. It's one that our generation of members has been making for two decades. Indeed, it was the approach that delivered the vast membership surge in 2013-2015, which made the subsequent electoral successes possible. And it's the approach that will be needed to stop the recent membership surge directing their energies to Zarah Sultana's new project. British politics is in a moment of flux. The two-party system is clearly breaking down. Huge numbers of people fundamentally distrust our whole system, and large numbers of seats, particularly left-leaning urban constituencies, are actively looking for a proudly progressive alternative to Labour. Polanski's bolder platform offers Greens a chance to step up. I hope the party takes it. Adam Ramsay is a journalist and Green party member. His forthcoming book is Abolish Westminster and he writes a Substack newsletter of the same name
Times
06-07-2025
- Politics
- Times
Zack Polanski: Greens should join forces with Jeremy Corbyn
The Green Party should be open to an alliance with Jeremy Corbyn and other former Labour MPs to emulate the populist success of Reform on the left, a frontrunner for the party's leadership has said. Zack Polanski is challenging Adrian Ramsay and Ellie Chowns to become the next leader of the Green Party in elections that will take place this summer. The London Assembly member, who defines himself as an 'eco-populist', has won more than 100 endorsements from Green councillors and is viewed as a powerful contender for leadership of the party. Polanski said he was open to a pact with anyone who could challenge the rise of Reform. 'We have an increasingly unpopular Labour government that not only doesn't know how to handle it, but is actively making the conditions that are spurring on Nigel Farage even worse. So I will ally myself with anyone who shares my and the Green Party's values,' he said.
The Guardian
02-07-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Green party leadership race is between joint-MP ticket and deputy's ‘eco-populism' bid
The battle to lead the Greens has been confirmed as a straight fight between a joint ticket comprising two of the party's MPs, Adrian Ramsay and Ellie Chowns, and the more insurgent offering of Zack Polanski, the deputy leader. A final list of nominations to head the party in England and Wales has resulted in a two-way battle for the leadership, while nine candidates are vying to be deputy leader. Since 2021 the party has been led by Ramsay and Carla Denyer, two of the Greens' record haul of four MPs elected to Westminster a year ago. In May, Denyer announced she would not stand again, with Ramsay opting to stand again alongside Chowns. The leadership race is broadly a competition between two contrasting styles: the more organised and elections-led approach of the two MPs, versus Polanski's aim to make the Greens a radical, mass-membership 'eco-populism' movement. Polanski, who has been deputy leader since 2022 and serves as a London assembly member, said the party had to meet the challenge of Reform UK, which has a membership about four times the size of the Green party and won nearly 700 councillors in May's local elections, against 79 for the Greens. Ramsay and Chowns have dismissed this implicit criticism, saying their record in winning rural, Conservative-dominated seats a year ago – Chowns won South Herefordshire from the Tories while Ramsay took the new seat of Waveney Valley on the Norfolk-Suffolk border – showed they could win over new supporters. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion The Greens in England and Wales normally hold leadership elections every two years, but there has not been a vote since 2021. Denyer and Ramsay were initially elected for three years, as their election was out of sequence after Siân Berry, now the fourth of the party's MPs, quit a year after a vote. The contest was then postponed for another year because of the general election. Voting by party members for the posts of leader and deputy leader opens on 1 August and runs for the whole month, with results announced on 2 September. Denyer decided not to run again for the leadership of the party, saying she wanted to focus on her Bristol Central constituency and campaigns such as net zero and affordable housing. The candidates for the deputy leadership include a number of councillors but are largely unknown outside the party. The hopeful with the highest profile is Mothin Ali, a Leeds councillor who intervened to stop rioters last summer and has received death threats for his vocal support for Gaza.
Daily Mail
01-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
The firebrand plotting to turn Britain Green: He's been an Extinction Rebellion activist, a 'boob whisperer' hypnotist and an actor, now he wants to win over virtue-signalling voters
The would-be leader of the Green Party proudly wore a t-shirt loudly proclaiming 'We are all Palestine Action' at Glastonbury, days before it was due to be proscribed as a terrorist group. Zack Polanski posted pictures on his social media showing his backing for the organisation accused of breaking into an RAF base and vandalising aircraft. While support for Palestine Action, and criticism of the plan to outlaw membership is not uncommon in Green ranks, Mr Polanski, 42, shared the picture on Sunday as the festival was mired in a storm over anti-Israeli performances. On Saturday Sir Keir Starmer led criticism of pro-Palestinian rap duo Bob Vylan after they shouted 'Death, death to the IDF', the Israeli Defence Forces, in a performance livestreamed by the BBC. The timing of the post is unlikely to be accidental as Mr Polanski, 42, vies to become the next leader and use its recent electoral success to turn it into the main left wing party in the UK. The current deputy leader has called for the UK to quit Nato because of Donald Trump and wooed disenchanted current and former Labour MPs to join his party - including Jeremy Corbyn. The London Assembly member has been nicknamed 'the boob whisperer' by online wags over a 2013 interview with the Sun when, while working as a Harley Street hypnotherapist, he purported to help women increase the size of their bust. He has also been a small-time actor, an Extinction Rebellion activist and a member of the Liberal Democrats. Born in 1982, Mr Polanski didn't even join the Greens until he was in his mid-30s, according to his own campaign website. He was born David Paulden in Salford but changed his name aged 18. He told the Big Issue in June that he chose Zack because of the Jewish refugee character in Goodnight Mr Tom. Polanski was his Jewish grandfather's name before he changed it to evade anti-Semitism after moving to the UK. He unsuccessfully stood as a Lib Dem London council candidate in 2015 and 2016, but then switched to the Greens, winning election to the London Assembly in 2021 and again in 2024. While a Green candidate in 2019 he was among the first Extinction Rebellion activists to be arrested for blocking Waterloo Bridge in London, as part of a six-day protest bringing roads to a halt across London. Writing about it for the Huffington Post he said he was 'proud to have played my part'. Mr Polanski is running to replace Carla Denyer, the Bristol MP who is not seeking a new two-year term as co-leader. He is up against two of the party's other three MPs, Ellie Chowns and the current co-leader Adrian Ramsay, who are running on a joint ticket. Asked if he would like Labour MPs to join the Greens Mr Polanski added: 'Anyone who aligns - and I believe that Zarah (Sultana, the former Labour MP, left)) and Jeremy (Corbyn, right)do align with where the Green Party are - that's a decision for them.' They want the party to 'focus on turning growing public trust into real political power - grounded in credibility, experience and a clear vision for change'. While their campaign is about making steady progress on their record haul of seats at the last election, Mr Polanski's has been more focused on making waves. He announced his candidacy with an interview in May in which he said he wanted the Green Party to drop its support for the UK staying in Nato. 'Clearly NATO has got a lot more complex since Donald Trump has become president, and I don't think anyone should consider him a reliable ally,' he told the Byline Times website. 'I think the age of NATO is now fully over. We voted at the last conference to maintain a relationship with NATO and reform it from within but I think we have reached a point where Donald Trump has made being in an alliance with America very, very difficult while he's talking about annexing Greenland. 'We clearly need to be making sure that our policy is meeting the moment, and I think the world is changing quickly, and the idea that we can reform NATO by working with Donald Trump at the moment in a so-called special relationship is an idea that's on its last legs.' More recently he has been batting his eyelids at disaffected leftwing Labour MPs who find themselves on the fringe of the party under Sir Keir Starmer, urging them to come to the Greens as a home for the wider left. 'Anyone who aligns with our values in the Green Party is very welcome to join the party, and so I'd love to see progressive leftwing MPs in the party,' he told the Sunday Times at the weekend. 'I'd encourage anyone right now, whether they're a member of another party, or indeed, an MP from another party, if they align with our values, to join with the Greens.' Asked if that offer extended to Jeremy Corbyn, who was kicked out of Labour for failing to refuse for anti-Semitism under his leadership, Mr Polanski added: 'Anyone who aligns - and I believe that Zarah [Sultana, the former Labour MP] and Jeremy do align with where the Green Party are - that's a decision for them.' Showing support for Palestine Action will do no harm if Mr Polanski wants to attract these MPs, all of whom are pro-Palestine. Alongside the picture, he posted online from Glastonbury Mr Polanski wrote: 'Our government is selling arms being used to commit genocide. Israel kills a child every 45 minutes. We are all Palestine Action.' But his support also came just days before Palestine Action is likely to be outlawed. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said she would lay an order before Parliament in the coming days to make membership and support for them illegal, after a number of the group's members were accused of vandalising two planes at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire. However the group is seeking a legal challenge against the Government's bid to proscribe the group under anti-terror laws. An urgent hearing was held in the High Court yesterday related to an application for judicial review on behalf of one of the founders of the direct action group, Huda Ammori. A further hearing will be held on Friday to decide whether the Government can temporarily be blocked from banning the group, pending a hearing to decide whether Palestine Action can bring the legal challenge. Writing about his arrest at the ER protest for the Huffington Post he said he was 'proud to have played my part'. Other Greens have also spokenout in support of the group. Ms Chowns, 50, the MP for North Herefordshire, said that proscription was 'a shocking overreaction to a couple of protestors using paint' at RAF Brize Norton on June 20. Five people have since been arrested on suspicion of a terror offence in relation to the incident. Last week a Green Party peer has said she would vote against proscribing Palestine Action if the order reaches the House Of Lords. During a talk at Glastonbury Festival's Speakers Forum with Palestine Action activist Francesca Nadin, Baroness Jenny Jones said people inside the Lords had told her she 'should not be sharing a platform' with the group, but she added she was 'proud' to be with them. But one issue that does not seem to go away is Mr Polanski's time as a hypnotist. In 2013 he featured in a Sun newspaper article in which he purported to help women increase the size of their bust. He told a reporter to picture herself with bigger breasts as part of a treatment and said his method could become 'popular very quickly, because it's so safe and a lot cheaper than a boob job.' The newspaper said he then told her: 'Imagine you're in a movie. I want you to make the image bigger and brighter so it fills the screen. Now step it up and feel what it's like having your new breasts. Are you walking differently? Do you look happy?' He apologised for his comments on breasts to a local news website, when he was running as the Green candidate at the 2019 election in Cities of London and Westminster. But speaking to the Big Issue last month he claimed he had been the victim of 'misrepresentation'. Mr Polanski has been approached to comment. The Green Party leadership election result is announced on September 2.
Times
28-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Green firebrand challenges Corbynites: Join me in the radical left
On June 29, 2016, Jeremy Corbyn appeared at a central London rally and made an attempt to move on from the Brexit referendum held the previous week. The Labour leader was instead heckled by a 33-year-old hypnotherapist actor who, unbeknown to the left-wing activists present, had just launched his political career as a candidate for the Liberal Democrats. 'What about Europe, Jeremy!' Zack Polanski jeered. 'Where were you when we needed you?' Corbyn, brow furrowed, appeared speechless, leaving his supporters to hiss and drown out the noise. Today, Polanski is neither an unknown on the left nor a Lib Dem. The tiggerish London Assembly member is running to become leader of the Green Party, of which he is already deputy and whose politics over the past decade have tracked him in moving steadily leftwards. He is still generating headlines and posing complicated questions of Corbyn and the Corbynites. The surprising dynamic is that Polanski — a gay vegan Jew who long ago traded his native Salford for north London — is now doing so in the spirit of comradeship. Addressing the question of his transformation, he invokes Corbyn's hero, Tony Benn: he is interested in where people are going, he says, not where they are from. As such, Polanski has spent recent weeks positioning himself as the radical socialist and pro-Palestine — for which read Corbynite — candidate for the leadership not only of the Greens but of the British left in its entirety. The size and political complexion of the Greens' grassroots membership today is poorly understood (last year it was estimated to number about 57,000, albeit it is thought to have grown since) but his 'eco-populist' vision has generated more noise than his two rivals, MPs Adrian Ramsay and Ellie Chowns, who are running on a joint ticket. In the event that he wins the contest, the results of which will be announced at the start of September after a summer of campaigning, he wants the independent MP for Islington North in the tent. Speaking from the Glastonbury festival, where he is busy canvassing, and where Corbyn appeared on the Pyramid Stage at his peak in 2017, Polanski said: 'Anyone who aligns with our values in the Green Party is very welcome to join the party, and so I'd love to see progressive left-wing MPs in the party.' Does that include Corbyn? What of his parliamentary protégés, including those in the Socialist Campaign Group, the left-wing faction of Labour MPs? He confirms: 'Anyone who aligns — and I believe that Zarah [Sultana, the firebrand MP for Coventry South] and Jeremy do align with where the Green Party are — that's a decision for them.' He rattles off a list of socialist positions he would seek to enact: 'protecting the NHS'; 'building social homes'; a 'wealth tax'; and stopping the 'genocide in Gaza'. The reason such pronouncements are causing much debate, and a degree of discomfort, on the left is that it has spent the almost two years since October 7 discussing the future of progressive politics — but failing to identify a clear solution or leader before the next election. Polanski, as one Corbynite puts it, is threatening to 'eat [our] lunch'. Since last year, Reform UK has taken centre stage as the main opposition to Sir Keir Starmer and the established order in Westminster. Yet the Greens won four seats, their most so far and one fewer than Reform, secured two million votes, and came second in 40 seats. Elsewhere, disgruntled socialists and Muslim voters delivered five independent MPs, Corbyn among them. The difference is that Nigel Farage has long personified the anti-immigrant, anti-woke sentiment; is a dominant figure within Reform who has vanquished all internal allies; and has singular communications skills. The radical left has no such person. It has a more complicated relationship with hierarchy in the first instance. It is also less of the view that parliament is the only place where proper politics can be done, especially on the issue of Gaza. Parliamentary chicanery has had far less impact, and visibility, than weekly marches up and down the country, attacks on allegedly pro-Israel businesses and the recent infiltration of RAF Brize Norton. Polanski is adamant that opposition to Israel's actions in Gaza is not limited to the party's traditional urban base — in cities like Brighton and Bristol — nor the British Muslim community. He says of the Red Wall areas where Greens have performed surprisingly well — among them South Tyneside council, where they are the second largest party now: 'In fact, I think in those seats, people are equally concerned with the genocide in Gaza, and people are really affected by inequality.' The Greens — who were the first party in England and Wales to call the Jewish state an 'apartheid' and the first to say it was committing 'genocide' — has at times faced criticism for its track record on expelling antisemitic councillors, but also its focus on the Middle East. Its current leader hand-delivered a petition to her local council asking the mayor to write to the foreign secretary to demand a ceasefire, and prior to the last election circulated leaflets featuring the Palestine flag and images of rubble. Polanski is unapologetic about that. 'I think fundamentally, there's a genocide in Gaza. And actually, the Palestinian people are the story here,' he says. 'And I think often we can all get distracted by talking about groups and actions. And actually, I'd much rather focus on stopping the war, working for a ceasefire, and ending the occupation of Israel.' Adding to the complexity is the fact that many of the left's leading lights — such as Sultana — are still part of Labour, even if she is currently suspended. And others still suffer from what their nemesis, Lord Mandelson, has called 'long Corbyn': the trauma of his suspension from Labour, his repudiation at the ballot box in 2019 and the allegations of antisemitism. Still, leading figures on the left are increasingly of the view that something needs to be done to capitalise on the political moment. Gaza remains a galvanising force — and anti-Labour sentiment is not going away, either on the activist left or in the Muslim community. Support for Labour among committed progressives has fallen from 67 per cent in 2019 to 49 per cent at last year's election, and down to 39 per cent last month. Over the past week, three Greens have won council by-elections triggered by defections or resignations from Labour — including most recently its first in Greenwich. Current polling suggests that — even without a Corbynite tilt — the party would win ultra-safe Labour seats such as Huddersfield. Meanwhile, Luke Tryl, of the pollster More in Common, points to the fact that, in local elections in May, in seats where more than 30 per cent of voters were Muslim, half voted for independent candidates. Within a political tradition known for its splittism, there is unanimity within the left only about the fact such feeling demands one of three things: a new party, a parliamentary grouping or a national movement. To that, Polanski's rejoinder is simple: all three already exist in the form of the Greens. In the event he wins, he says, he intends to depart from the party's traditional identity — as a 'single-issue party' of polar bears and saving the countryside — and pivot towards full-fat leftism. He explains: 'So it's up to anyone what they want to do in terms of starting new things. But actually, I'd encourage anyone right now, whether they're a member of another party, or indeed, an MP from another party, if they align with our values, to join with the Greens.' While his party has a quixotic structure that requires leadership elections every two years and involves the grassroots in policymaking, Polanski has been unusually prepared to speak the usual language of conventional politics. He says the party needs to be less timid and to 'learn' from Farage, whose communications skills, and clarity of vision, have made him favourite to be the next prime minister. And despite the queasiness on the left about the role of parliament, Polanski has resolved, as Farage did, that all roads to power run through Westminster. He says: 'I actually have a constituency in mind, and I want to be one of the first group of new London MPs, or first group of London Green MPs.' • Baroness Jones: You're never too old to be arrested as a Green The question then — beyond the outcome of the race — is whether or not the rest of the left has a rival plan. After a More in Common poll suggested a party led by Corbyn could win 10 per cent of the vote, Andrew Murray, his former aide, last week revealed in an eyebrow-raising account in the socialist daily Morning Star two options had long been under consideration. One was Collective, a new national party founded by Karie Murphy, Corbyn's former chief of staff, whose central idea is to install him as interim leader. The other, which is nameless, seeks to create a looser parliamentary grouping of pro-Gaza MPs, possibly with Corbyn or Sultana as figureheads. Murray added that those two tendencies had now combined, indicating a new organisation could be launched imminently. For the Greens, or any new party, there is a final question. Even if the left found a way to unite, what is the best it could achieve at a general election in 2029? The idea of a progressive alternative to Starmer has acquired momentum precisely because of his rightward shift and his determination instead to court Reform votes. Yet if he continues to fall in the polls, would liberal and left voters not support him in order to avoid opening the door to Farage? More in Common says that most Green (57 per cent) and Lib Dem (51 per cent) voters would vote tactically to keep out Reform. For now, it appears that, whatever its configuration, in Westminster at least, the left is likely to remain on the periphery.
