The Greens get ready for parliament

On a very rainy day a few weeks ago, I took the train to Brighton to gauge the chances of the Greens in their top target seat, Brighton Pavilion. Caroline Lucas, the Green party leader, is standing there and she’s the bookies’ favourite to win the seat, which would make her Britain’s first Green MP.

I arrived to meet the Tory candidate, Charlotte Vere, dripping wet. She was kind enough to make me a cup of tea and talk me through her strategy for the seat. She believes that she can tempt voters in the wealthier north of the constituency, and is campaigning hard in the swing wards in Brighton. Her campaign literature, however, betrays the effect of a serious Green challenge on the other parties. Labour and Lib Dems alike–both of whom are also fielding strong female candidates–are forced to greenwash their politics and their literature, because green issues are raised constantly on the doorstep and the parties can’t sidestep the issue.

And the Greens have done their work well. Taking a leaf out of the Liberal Democrats' book before them, they bed down in an area, work hard, and practise old-fashioned grassroots politics. Green councillors, once elected, tend to keep their seats and increase their percentage of the vote.



But grassroots politics does not necessarily deliver parliamentary seats. For that you have to look sensible too (a fairer voting system would also help). The Greens have changed a lot since their self-confessed beard-and-sandal days of the 70s and 80s. They now boast members such as Emma Dixon, a high-flying barrister, and her husband, James Humphreys, a political analyst who used to work in Downing St with Alistair Campbell. They are standing in the two Islington seats; neither of them stands a chance to win this time. But Humphreys argues that whenever the green vote went up in elections, it had a “Pavlovian” effect on government, causing the ruling party to adapt its rhetoric and policies. Therefore the green vote, he claims, is never wasted – even if it does not deliver seats because of the vagaries of the voting system.

In Brighton, that hard work may well pay off. The Greens are throwing everything they have at the seat–the volunteers pour in every weekend and can leaflet much of the constituency in a morning. They have a fluent and impressive candidate in Caroline Lucas, who has cut her teeth in European politics as an MEP. Electing her as a single leader, rather than the confusing multi-spokesman system the party had before, has also helped. And Brighton, a university town with green leanings, is the kind of place where the Greens are most likely to do well. Tony Travers, of the LSE, says that they are strongest in southern university towns (look for the bikes and you’ll find the greens, is the rule of thumb)–so expect strong showings in Cambridge, Oxford and Norwich.

And their respectability, with a fully costed manifesto, should not be ignored. Meeting the New Greens reminded me of New Labour activists in the mid 90’s (although I’d note that the New Greens are, on the whole, a little nicer). They are highly intelligent, strategically minded and ambitious - the party has even appointed a fashionable advertising agency, Glue London, for a very slick campaign this time around. They are using techniques honed in the Obama campaign to get out the vote in their key seats–the Big Schlep friendship network being potentially the most effective.

The Greens remain odds-on favourites to win Brighton Pavilion. But their chances of winning any other seat is hampered by the electoral system. As Caroline Lucas says: “We have a system expressly designed to keep out smaller parties”. If the system changes, however, post May 6th, expect a highly organised and electable Green party to make solid parliamentary gains.

Katharine Quarmby is an associate editor for Prospect and is reporting for the Economist during the general election campaign