Green Left sees the first past the post voting system as unfair, undemocratic and in urgent need of replacement by a PR voting system and supports campaigning to achieve this. It has long been Green Party policy to support a voting system that delivers proportional representation.
The outcomes of the recent general election make it clear that several other minority parties as well as the Green Party could benefit in terms of numbers of elected MP’s from a move to PR. One of these could be UKIP.
In our view UKIP is a malign political influence in British politics. Their rhetoric is not only anti-immigrant, but often also homophobic, sexist, derogatory to poor, disabled and vulnerable people, and dismissive of climate change . They have helped to promote prejudice and bigotry in political and mainstream media discourse and we fear that it has had dangerous and damaging social consequences and that it continues to do so. We do not think the Green Party should associate itself with UKIP in campaigns for PR.
The Green Party should still campaign for PR in general and local elections because this would allow more voters to have their voices represented in supporting policies for an environmentally safer and more socially just future.
Greens must, at the same time, make it absolutely and unequivocally clear that they totally oppose the hateful politics of UKIP and actively campaign against the bigotry and prejudice that UKIP promotes. Greens must continue to work, alongside others, to counter the myths and lies that UKIP and others use to divide us and allow the ruling class to maintain their wealth and power.
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