Green party’s ‘progressive politics’ leaves members out in the cold | Letters

Readers respond to a piece by Neal Lawson on the party’s decision to expel activists who united to oust Jeremy Hunt

As a Green party member living in Jeremy Hunt’s new constituency, I was heartened to receive a communication before the general election inviting me to vote on whether the selected GP candidate, Steve Williams, should stand aside to help improve the chance of unseating Mr Hunt. I thought my vote and those of similar minds would count. But as explained by Neal Lawson (The Greens, expelling activists for uniting to oust Jeremy Hunt? So much for progressive politics, 29 July), the views of the majority of local members, who like me thought “country before party”, were brushed aside by the Green party national office.

They cited a conference resolution that empowered the national executive to install their own candidate if the local party didn’t put one forward. But the resolution doesn’t require the executive to do so, it just gives them the power to do it. In the case of Godalming and Ash, the possibility of defeating Mr Hunt at the general election was obvious. Yet the national office stuck dogmatically to the idea that every seat should be contested, come what may. And as a result, possibly kept Mr Hunt in parliament. Smart thinking it was not.

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