The Green Party (well to be accurate The People Party..which became the
Ecology Party which then went on to become the Green Party) was formed
in the 1970′s in response to “Blueprint for Survival” and the Club of
Rome 1972 “Limits to Growth” report.  It was obvious to me then that
pursing eternal economic growth is impossible on a finite planet. What
should have reinforced this was the first photo of the Earth taken from
space and a collective awareness that it is madness to trash our home. A
new economics was necessary that recognised there are limits.

20 years later the mainstream political parties greened up and assured
us that they had got the message that the environment is not an
expensive luxury but vital to both our well-being and survival.

Now and In the midst of the deepest recession since the 1930′s we are
told that everybody thinks economic growth is the most important goal
for government. Left and right may disagree with small details of what
actually has to grow but they are in agreement that growth is what is
needed. It is hardly surprising when neo-liberalisms and Keynesianisms
criteria for success is growth. But now in there desperate attempt to
please “The Markets” the bottom line is that our social and
environmental life lines must be swept aside on this holy grail.

Unsurprisingly the Green Party disagree.

I would  like more members  to contribute thinking about the
growing economic crisis at this critical time and our response.

References I have been using…..

Green Party National Policy (Last updated 2010)
EC310 Conventional economic policy uses economic growth, inflation, balance
of payments and unemployment as ‘economic indicators’, the normal criteria
against which progress is measured. Although it is the most usually quoted
indicator, gross national product (GNP) is a poor indicator of true progress
and does not adequately measure people’s sense of well-being. It measures
only the activity in the formal sector, regardless of what that activity is.
In consequence, current economic theory fails adequately to reflect the real
effects of human activity within a finite ecosystem, and is used to
‘validate’ economic activities which are ecologically unsustainable and/or
socially unjust.
Policy EC311 The Green Party would therefore replace the conventional
indicators with those that measure progress towards sustainability, equity
and devolution.

1. http://www.stiglitz-sen-fitoussi.fr/documents/rapport_anglais.pdf
This report commissioned by the French president in 2008 and its 12
recommendations carries a lot of credibility….note that Nicolas Stern was
a member of this commission. As usual like Cameron’s commitment to Wellbeing
it gets diluted to a meaningless sound bite. Always worth going back to the
original source.

2. http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/publications.php?id=914
Prosperity without Growth report. Clearly spells out that pursing growth in
gdp is inconsistent with cutting greenhouse emissions. If we fail to argue
for and adopt a low carbon economy wonderful though they are initiatives
like A Million low Carbon Jobs and Zero Carbon Britain will not see us
hitting CO2 reduction targets.

3.
http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2010/10/20/prosperity-without-growth-a-contra
diction-in-terms/
This is an example of the sort of response we are used to from our critics.

4. http://www.compassonline.org.uk/news/item.asp?n=14217
A good short summary of Richard Murphy’s 2011 book “The Courageous State”.
This is surely what the Green Party economic ideas are about ……

5. http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/pages/the_principles.html
These are the five principles of sustainable development which have recently
been given new life in the governments planning guidelines. An economic
strategy that ignores this just shows how bone-headed our political leaders
are.

6. http://mondediplo.com/2011/10/09germany
A frightening critique on the German Green Party “Neo-liberals on Bikes” and
which the UK Green Party must learn lessons. My concern is that keeping
quiet about our opposition to growth in GDP and failing to articulate a well
argued alternative will quickly see us being subsumed within “politics as
usual”.

Bernard Little

The recent referendum on elected mayors and the increase in Labour’s
majority have led to a debate about “single party” government. Labour now
hold nearly three quarters of the 84 seats on the council.  As one of the
two opposition parties, we believe we have an important role to play in
holding them to account, putting forward our alternatives to unfair cuts and
privatisation and standing up for our constituents and local communities.

Two arenas for doing so are the seven Community Assemblies and five Scrutiny
Committees (which are like the cross-party select committees in
Westminster). Until now, a proportion of these bodies were chaired by
opposition councillors, providing some balance. We were therefore
disappointed that, at the Full Council AGM following the city council
elections, Labour did not give a single scrutiny board chair to a member of
the opposition.

Are Labour so sure they represent the whole city and every shade of opinion
within it that they can safely stifle opposition in this way? Do they not
value ideas from across the widest possible spectrum of elected politicians?
Of course the leader and single-party cabinet can ultimately turn down
proposals they disagree with, but would it not make for stronger government
to respect the role of the opposition?

Yours faithfully

Cllr Jillian Creasy, Green Party

Jillian Creasy at Occupy Sheffield

Cllr Jillian Creasy, Green Paty city councillor sent the following message of support and encourages Greens to come along.

“Sheffield Green Party sends its greetings to everyone gathered in the Peace
Gardens to mark the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia. It
is hard to believe that it was only 22 years ago that the World Health
Organisation removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders. We
have made so much progress in terms of attitudes towards LGBT people since
1990. But there is still a long way to go, in UK and internationally. We
must allow gay and straight people to choose whether they want to enter into
civil partnership, or marriage or neither. We must keep up the pressure on
those countries where being gay is criminalised. Sorry I can’t be with you
in person, but I’m with you in spirit and I’m sure I’ll hear the one
minute’s noise as I’m cycling to another meeting.”

Dear Sir

The Green Party believes in multi-party government. The whole point of
electing councillors and MPs is so they can
represent a range of views within the city council or parliament. As the
third party in Sheffield, our voting power in the council is small, but we
have influenced the larger parties on housing, energy,
transport, community safety and many other issues. And we provide the
only opposition to privatisation of council services, for
instance waste management (Veolia) and the Highways PFI. If the number of
Green Party councillors reflected our share of the vote across the city
(10%) we could do even more.

Yours

Cllr Jillian Creasy, Green Party

This letter was in reply to the Star article “Is Sheffield set for a single party system?”

Greens come close second, beating former leader of the Council, Paul Scriven into third place.

Full results here

Full results here

Election Agent Eamonn Ward comments :

“Greens offer voters a real alternative to the mainstream parties on May 3rd. Central will be close between us and Labour as it always is. But we are the only party doing consistent year round work across the whole of the ward. That work has pushed our vote up year after year since Jillian Creasy was elected as the first Green councillor in 2004.’

He continues : ‘Broomhill looks like a close 3 way contest with Labour and the Lib Dems. We lost our ward agent at a crucial time in early 2011 due to personal reasons. This year we have tripled our activity to back up year round work. Bernard Little has been firmly focused on ward issues and has pledged to push for the community-developed Broomhill Ward Action Plan if elected.” ENDS

For more information please contact Sheffield Green Party Press Officer Eamonn Ward at  eamonn.ward@btopenworld.com.

Note :

Candidate profiles and election leaflets can be viewed at http://sheffieldgreenparty.org.uk/area/

Promoted by Eamonn Ward, 73 Eskdale Rd, Sheffield, S6 1Sl on behalf of Sheffield Green Party

See the Broomhill page for more information or find your local candidate here.