Green leadership elections - we are so different from the others

Amid the clamour of Labour ripping itself in half and the crowning of Theresa May, us Greens are behaving in a civilised and measured fashion with our bi-annual leadership elections. Unlike the others we have fixed term leader, ensuring stability and democratic mandate.

 

While the leader post should be an easy win for Caroline Lucas and Jon Bartley (did I mention that we like job shares?), they will still need your vote - don't be lulled into complacency! They will be brilliant of course and having met Jon last weekend I am particularly impressed by him.

The deputy post is a more interesting race where we are spoilt for choice. There are three people that I would be very happy to see as deputy so I'm urging you to vote for one of them:

Andrew Cooper is our northern powerhouse. Literally. A councillor in Kirklees for 20 years where he has held the balance of power on the council, driving them to put £9.3m solar panels up plus they were instrumental in getting an offer of free insulation for all of the homes in Kirklees. Andrew is passionate, driven and a true leader. He would be a fantastic DL as well as giving the party more of a northern focus.

Amelia Womack is one of our current deputy leaders. Her work over the past two years has been superb and she has shown herself to be a true asset to Green politics. I was especially impressed by her support during the 2014 Rochester and Strood by-election and I have seen her consistently strong delivery of our Green agenda throughout her current term. Amelia would also be a fantastic DL!

Shahrar Ali is our other current deputy leader. He is a great speaker and has delivered some of the most engaging and passionate conference speeches that I have seen. He has been a great supporter of Kent Greens and has visited us on many occasions. Shahrar would also be a fantastic DL!

So we are spoilt for choice but those three are my favourites and with our single transferable vote voting system, we can ensure that our votes count in this election.

But... although I would like to see one of the above in the post, the other candidates, Alan, Storm, Kat and Daniella all seem good too.