The Green Party has proposed a raft of original and striking initiatives at their annual conference. Members came together for three days in Newport to shape policy and develop campaigns.
Abolish the Home Office; In his opening speech Jonathan Bartley proposed the complete abolition of the Home Office in light of the Windrush scandal. He said, “There’s a growing realisation that the Home Office isn’t fit for purpose in so many ways. It’s the hostile environment, the debacle over detention centres. There’s a culture there that is perverse and is dangerous.”
Listening to young people; The Greens also proposed the establishment of a Young Person’ Select Committee made up of representatives from a Youth Parliament and designed to hold the government to account with respect to the needs of young people. Greens already advocate lowering the voting age from 18 to 16 and allowing persons of this age to be elected to both the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Jonathan Bartley said, “Today I am setting out how the Greens would give young people real power. Young people must be heard.”
A Sustainable Economy Act; Following what Caroline Lucas has called ‘a terrifying picture of nature’s collapse’ which has emerged from the State of Nature report 2019, Greens also unanimously passed a motion calling urgently for a Sustainable Economy Act. Now enshrined in Green Party policy is the recognition that ‘the pursuit of infinite economic growth is a major driving force behind the destruction of nature, and that prioritisation of the environment in all government decision making and adoption of alternatives to GDP growth as measures of success are urgently required’. The new policy also commits the party to replacing GDP growth with the health and wellbeing of people and nature as a primary economic objective.