Green party must avoid being taken over by hard left, says former leader

Adrian Ramsay says some new members would be ‘more at home’ in Your Party or Socialist Workers party

The former Green party leader Adrian Ramsay has said the party must fix its internal democracy to avoid a takeover by the hard left, saying that some new members “might be more at home” in Your Party or the Socialist Workers party.

Ramsay, who has been critical of the handling of the row over a “Zionism is racism” motion passed at the Green party conference, said there were a “small number” of individuals who used “divisive” tactics to influence the party’s agenda.

“I think there’s a real crossroads point for the party at the moment,” he told the BBC. “And one option is to dig in … but I think that there’s a risk it brings with it a quite divisive approach to politics, which you’ve seen from small groups of people on the hard left of politics who go around different parties to try to influence how those parties are run.”

He said there were some new members who had joined the Greens after the failure of other leftwing movements, such as George Galloway’s party or Jeremy Corbyn’s Your Party, who had their roots in hard left organising.

“There is also a small number of people who have joined, perhaps from the very hard left of politics, who might be more at home in the SWP or with George Galloway or with Your Party. [They] not only want to adopt some very hardline positions on certain issues, but have a very different culture to how they go about it,” he said.

He said those members were “seeking to change the direction of the party” and he said that needed the leadership to reassert the core values and ways of working of the Green party, which was “much more about consensus building, much less about highly fractional, highly tribal politics, and of course about the environment”.

Flaws in the party’s internal democracy meant small groups could have an outsized influence,” he said. “It was 0.4% of members who voted for this [the Zionism is racism motion] and I don’t think that’s reflective of party members as a whole, it’s certainly not reflective of those I speak to,” he said, adding there should be a ballot or survey of the wider membership.

Ramsay, the MP for Waveney Valley, welcomed the growth in membership of the Green party and said he was not calling for Zack Polanski to stand down as leader over the handling of the row.

He also said he was not intending to quit the party himself. “I’ve got no intention of going anywhere. What I want to see happen is this issue be clearly addressed,” he said.

But it was critical the party disavowed the Zionism motion sooner than the two-year cycle which party rules allow for, he said, and that the party changed its internal rules to give the wider membership more control over policy, rather than the small numbers who attend the party’s annual conference.

A spokesperson for Greens Organise – the grassroots group that backed Polanski’s leadership – said: “Adrian Ramsay put forward his case for the future of the Green party a year ago, and lost – by a landslide 84%. Over 150,000 members have joined the party under Zack’s leadership, and helped bring the party unprecedented electoral success.

“They deserve representatives who focus their energy on fighting for the radical solutions to the crises our country face.”

Ramsay said it was also clear the party needed to refocus on its core missions around climate and nature, as well as the cost of living crisis. “I think that will unite our members. I think it will ensure we still have a wide appeal as a party,” Ramsay told the BBC Newscast podcast.

Asked if he viewed Zionism as racist, he said: “No … I’ve made clear my position on the motion, as lots of other Greens have done.” He said the situation in Gaza was “appalling” but that the motion was contradictory to the Green party manifesto from 2024.

“We support equal rights for both Palestinians and Israelis, and Greens have always supported self-determination for all people.”

He said he had told Polanski directly he should have been present for the debate and vote, despite fighting a byelection in Holborn and St Pancras. “I do think he should have been there and he should have expressed his view clearly,” he said.

Ramsay said the party “need to find a way for this motion to be changed or rescinded sooner than the two years that Zack is talking about … changing the fact that a policy can’t be reviewed until two years is up.”