Green Party UK

The left-wing environmentalists are just two points behind poll-topping Nigel Farage’s Reform UK in a new YouGov survey.

The 34-year-old plumber currently leads the Greens on Trafford Council, where she has represented the Hale ward since May 2023.

Earlier this week, the Green Party confirmed Polanski, who was born and grew up in Greater Manchester, would not be standing in the seat.

A top Welsh Labour figure has defected to the Green party under Zack Polanski.

Former Labour group leader on Carmarthenshire County Council, Cllr Robert James, has defected to the party as the so-called “Polanski effect” continues.

James is the first ever councillor to join the Greens in Wales and the party claims it is in talks with others “weighing up their decision”.

It comes as a Find Out Now poll carried out last week put Labour on just 15%, a staggering three points behind the Greens as Zack Polanski’s party continues to surge in popularity with voters.

The poll of 2,717 people put Reform UK on 33%, the Greens on 18%, the Conservatives on 16% and the LibDems on 11%.

Announcing the defection at Wales Green Party conference, Polinski said: “I know this will be the first of many councillors who we will be welcoming to the Wales Green Party.

“I’m delighted to be welcoming Robert in person at this historic Wales conference where members are planning how to break through into the Senedd in the elections in 2026.

“This defection of a country councillor shows that the momentum is building and more breakthroughs will follow.

“Rob is a pioneer – he was the youngest Labour group leader in Wales, and now the first councillor in Wales to join the Green Party from Labour.

Given that YouGov has them also climbing it's starting to look less like an outlier. Still a long way to go but my hope is still slowly and cautiously growing

Two Labour councillors have defected to the Green Party, following in the footsteps of a colleague days earlier.

Swindon Borough Council's Tom Butcher and Repi Begum will sit as Greens until the end of their terms in May 2026. Councillor Ian Edwards made the same move last week.

Labour still has 35 councillors, with a majority of 13. But a spokesman for Swindon Labour Group said the news was "hugely disappointing" and that the defectors were "elected by local people to represent them as a Labour voice".

New national Green Party leader Zack Polanski said: "Swindon is a political bellwether, and what we're seeing here is happening across the country."

In a joint statement, Ms Begum and Mr Butcher said: "Whilst our values and beliefs have not changed, unfortunately, Labour has moved away from those values.

"When we have been elected on our values and beliefs in a just and equal world, it's important that we can represent that authentically through a party which best aligns with those values."

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/37620990

In a shock poll, the Green Party under its new leader Zack Polanski has pulled ahead of Labour (just).

According to the pollsters Find Out Now, the Greens are on 15%, the same level as Labour. But as economist James Meadway notes, if you look at the detailed results, the Greens are on 15.31%, compared to 15.23% for Labour.

This is being a bit mischievous, because polling has a margin of error. But the trajectory is clear - the Greens are surging, and Labour is falling back. The Greens are enjoying their best polling in their history. Just 13 months after winning the election, Labour is on its worst polling recorded in the post-war period.

The new Green Party leader will get an 'in-depth' interview on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg after a slot from the party's conference was cancelled

The Greens complained after a planned interview with its new leader Polanski from the party’s conference was cancelled in the days before Kuenssberg’s Sunday show on 5 October.

A Green Party spokesperson said: “Every political party Leader other than Zack Polanski was given a slot on Laura Kuenssberg during their Party Conference. Aside from the generous slots given to Labour and Conservative Leaders, Reform UK’s Nigel Farage had a nine-minute interview and Ed Davey a seven-minute slot.

Polanski, who was elected leader of the England and Wales Greens in a landslide victory last month, after campaigning on a pro-trans, eco-populism platform, appeared on YouTube show Piers Morgan Uncensored where he was asked whether a woman can have a penis, a query seen by many as an anti-trans dog whistle.

“Yes,” he replied immediately, before taking a swipe at incredibly long NHS waiting times: “It’s going to take them a long time on the National Health Service to get rid of it but that’s another problem. I think we’ll leave it on a woman can have a penis.”

The Green Party of England and Wales has today announced that its membership has surged past 100,000 members, the highest in the Party’s history. This marks over a 45% increase since Zack Polanski was elected Leader of the party last month.

The news comes as the recent polling shows Greens on 15% nationally, their highest-ever figure, and just two points behind both Labour and the Conservatives, and a week after the Greens announced they had a bigger membership than the Liberal Democrats. Since then, it has been shown that the Liberal Democrats’ membership is actually just 60,000, and the Greens have grown an additional 17,000 in a week.

Fiona Bruce presents an hour of debate from Shrewsbury, with politicians, commentators and members of the public. On the panel, from the government, chief secretary to the Treasury James Murray MP; from the Conservatives, shadow culture secretary Nigel Huddleston MP; Zack Polanski, leader of the Green Party of England and Wales; Reform UK’s head of policy Zia Yusuf; and the Daily Telegraph columnist Annabel Denham