Guest election blog – The Green Party by Jasmine Isa Qureshi

I am a transdisciplinary ecologist, multimedia journalist, marine biologist, poet, researcher and writer. I have worked / published across multiple topics including conservation practice, ecology, identity, race and sexuality, worked with collectives and campaigns as a facilitator and educator, and I’m an ambassador for the Bumblebee Conservation Trust and Green Jobs for Nature. I sit on the advisory committee for RSPB England and I’m the Communications lead for Wildcard (a grassroots rewilding organisation).

Voting actually never appealed to me when I was younger. 

I grew up in the shadow of disparity in inner city London, watching the dismal legacy of governments now and past gone, chipping away at the meagre support and services presented as presents to the people in mine and others communities. Nature speckled here and there but it mostly became lost in the fumes and mortar.

Voting seemed an aspirational move, one you took when you had enough time to talk about it to a friend. Muslim families aren’t always ones to discuss the politics they suffer under at the dinner table, and mine was only different in that my father always spoke politically, but to tether his words to exact policies I would struggle to do so. 

Tories were off limits, at least that much was clear – we certainly scoffed and ridiculed their members more than enough to put those younger in the family off of even going near a conservative manifesto. Greens were joked about – we never received enough knowledge as a family, or enough trust that they would change things, to even consider them a party to vote for. Labour…well labour seemed the only hope. The desperate plea for some shift in the grey, disillusioned environment we moved slowly through. But then we became disillusioned further, leading to some of us giving up voting altogether (I almost did, as the combined lack of information and hopelessness surrounding politics seeped in.

Then hit 2015. My first time voting was in 2017, a couple of years after this – the year Jeremy Corbyn was voted in as leader of the Labour party – and at last something gleamed in the shipwreck we were drowning in. I’d learnt more, been more active as a young global majority speaker and writer, obsessed with wildlife and finding joy in an ever growing love of insect biodiversity, and was determined that at last, I’d be able to put my trust in someone who stood up for the people and environments I’d seen so downtrodden growing up. I voted in that election with a joy and hope I don’t remember ever feeling previous, and haven’t really felt since. 

The disaster of a campaign that followed snuffed that out as fast as it came in.

I voted Green in 2021. Greens became to me something that I think my family viewed Labour as growing up. That desperate hope for change. 

But now I view change differently. Gone are the days where I assumed a singular avenue as a direction for change, and gone are the days where I attribute that change to one person or even one group. Now more so I view change as multi-level, I view it as disruptive, and I view it as significantly a movement with an “undermining of previous stagnant linear structure” quality. My ever evolving view of nature and people as intertwined mechanisms and multiplicities in whatever environment we all exist in (because we will ALWAYS exist in the same environments), has opened up my perspective on what change is and how we will get there. I believe in the quality of questioning and understanding what we are told, and in the spirit of this, I think it only right to break down something often presented – in my opinion – extremely inaccessibly; the political manifesto.

This is my review of, and my thoughts about, the environmental implications of the Green Party election manifesto.

Things I like:

I like the fact that nature is mentioned in everything. Pretty much the majority of the manifesto makes reference to climate and nature, and intertwines the “everyday” faculties and services we need, with environmental implications. This highlights the fact that whatever we do, whoever we are, nature is affected and in turn this will affect us all.

Let’s begin, with the provision of “greener” homes – it looks very promising – stating how the Greens will change the policies that exist around housing to ensure local councils are able to provide green spaces for communities, reduce the environmental impact of new construction (Greens say they will campaign to change building regulations so that all new homes are require house builders to include solar panels and low carbon heating systems) and require local authorities to spread small developments across their areas, rather than build concentrated large estates. 

This could do away with large, corporate land ownership where houses are built en-masse and neither cared for nor supported infrastructure wise. 

This is MASSIVE in a country where housing development and building development has such a huge impact on the environment. This is usually because the materials are sourced unsustainably, and high carbon emissions are produced from pollutive resources and nature unfriendly practices, not to mention there are often hugely negative effects on local wildlife and biodiversity, because of unsupported, low quality standards of living that disregard peoples connection to a healthy environment – locally supported and sustained, good quality housing could counter this.

They’ve backed up their ambition with practicality, and I’m impressed with the attention to detail on energy – there is a lot that is mentioned on how they will adapt new and old buildings to be more energy efficient. This again is something often overlooked in the fight for a greener future – we have a large percentage of the population that is not provided with an efficient means to thrive in an environmentally friendly fashion, thus the support of these communities in order to create a society whereupon there is easy access to climate friendly housing, etc. will SIGNIFICANTLY help the environment and biodiversity thrive, due to a thriving atmosphere and climate. 

Not to mention, the possible divestment this could trigger from corporate energy companies that profit from our current highly inefficient means of energy production, and that are at the root of the biodiversity and climate crisis around the world. 

The Greens continue strong, dipping further into energy policy, doubling down on a phase out of fossil fuels, stopping all oil and gas extraction projects, cancelling fossil fuel licences, and my personal favourite part – “Government will have failed if the infrastructure for sustainable energy generation is primarily in private hands”. Greens say they will push for all and any ownership of sustainable energy infrastructure to have a minimum  ownership by community (is this a reference to local council or just community representatives? Perhaps. Maybe we should take it with a pinch of salt).

 If we care about the environment, we should be pushing for the agency of our systems to be public and community led, and if the Greens mean what they put down here, this is a big step towards that. 

Ok, we’ve got community energy, and there’s an emphasis on net-zero economy and sourcing renewable energy too –  the Greens say they are determined to move towards an economy that doesn’t rely on fossil fuels, and that they’re aware that this could pose problems in a system that has so many of us reliant on those fuels and sources, and that in-lieu of this they will push for a just transition that is led by workers and unions. 

One of my biggest peeves (to put it lightly) with manifestos or groups that campaign for futures without toxic energy sources or products, is that they tend to forget the huge amounts of people in underprivileged communities who rely on these  products and processes (not by fault of their own, but by fault of a constructed system of exploitation and disparity where they have no choice due to personal financial / other instabilities). The Greens are showing that they have a plan to ensure this change is sustainable, and not just for those who can afford it right now.

Bringing Nature back to life. Every environmentalist’s eyes light up reading those words. The Greens admit something here that we’ve been talking about for years and something that frankly, is quite a hard sentence to say; “we are one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world…”. That introduction sounds terrible, but it gives me hope for the rest of this bit, because it means an awareness that we desperately need to do something. The biggest part of this new chapter for the UK is the Rights of Nature Act – a set of policies which, if implemented, allows there to be legal personhood assigned to ALL of nature. Again, something that I like because it covers so many bases, and doesn’t signify the need to protect nature as simply a resource, instead perhaps provisioning direction towards a mutual respect of “nature” as a complex set of entities and interactions. 

The phase out of harmful pesticides that is mentioned, and the push for interconnected climate and nature protective policies, that also makes reference to clean air and the right to breathe clean air, once again gives me hope that this party understands the inherent need to have interconnected policies that protect people AND wildlife, which seems to me the only way to build an alternative system of sustainable growth and rich social health and  biodiversity.

The Access to Nature section flows nicely from this, setting out a pathway towards providing a Right to Roam Act for England (they don’t snip this from the air either, it’s based on a model already at work in Scotland), which is bolstered (if you had any reservations perhaps – as I did – about this being only for those with access to land already or access to financial support / transportation) by the emphasis on campaigning to ensure equal access for everyone to live within a short distance of “nature-rich” greenspace. I especially like the focus on “rewilding urban areas”, in this section – “reintroducing nature into our urban environments” includes (widespread?) tree street planting, hedgehog holes in fences, swift bricks and bee corridors, not to mention conservation worker training being made more accessible and available. All things that make me feel once again, there is an understanding of nature and people being connected in this fight. 

The element of “right to roam” that scares people most I think is the uninhibited access to nature, which can often result in destruction or abuse of said nature. I have an issue with the premise of this argument – the current model of nature access (without the right to roam act) appears to be one of people with primary access to nature (referring to those with gardens, access to reserves, SAFE parks, etc. – meaning they are financially supported in order to be transported or own transport to these environments), and the luxury of learning about ecology and developing a “love” for wildlife (remember, care is developed – lived experience, environmental and peer pressure, plus a healthy access and involvement with nature, all influence and develop care for nature), being the ones to decide that no one else who has not been afforded these luxuries is allowed to develop this same care and compassion. The right to roam act should be brought in with complexities that the Greens do reference – “renewed and strengthened Countryside Code which sets out clearly the rights and responsibilities when accessing nature” – and changes to educational access which will be brought by the campaigning for injection of green spaces into any place you live in. If the only argument against this is that “we’ve seen that people don’t care so they shouldn’t be allowed in”, then I’’d say you need to re-approach why it is they “don’t care”, who it is you’re referring to, and what systemic structures and limitations have ensured so many “don’t care”.

I like the emphasis on the de-privatisation of utilities as I’ve mentioned, and I like the intention to end the culling of badgers, another inherently void-of-evidence conservation practice that has been disproven time and again by conservation organisations and yet seems to still persist, due to backing by collectives of influential farmers and landowners.

Things I don’t like:

I would say that I’m not someone easily impressed, but I must say, there isn’t a lot that I don’t like about this manifesto. Perhaps that it might be too ambitious? I’ve seen it written that the aim to achieve Net Zero by 2040 as opposed to Conservative and Labour aims of 2050 is not realistic or achievable, and that it is made harder by the abolition / phase out of nuclear power, and that the mass injection of renewable energy – primarily that of wind farms – is not realistic and actually is harmful. 

To that I’d say that maybe we NEED ambitious protocol. We need ambitious policy reforms, and we need ambitious and radical change for an environment that is coughing and spluttering due to a fundamentally non-radical and soft approach to what vulnerable and underprivileged communities need (animals and humans). The other political parties have laid out manifestos that offer something different by a couple of years than the greens ambition, and not only this, but the greens have offered solutions to ongoing problems that I’d say are so disastrously ridiculous, that they require huge shake downs in order to be countered. I will say that what is also required here is continued support of people who already rely on these resources, and whilst the Greens do say that they want a just transition towards net zero, I would pressure them to say exactly how this will be achieved. 

Nuclear power being divested from is not a bad thing – Nuclear power might offer a certain type of “green” energy, but the infrastructure required to nurture that to be a safe resource, that doesn’t harm people and wildlife, and that doesn’t produce copious amounts of toxic waste, well that infrastructure doesn’t exist due to previous governments, exploitative investments and policy, and limited budgets. 

I don’t really like the injection of so much wind energy – the Greens do state that they want to pave the way for wind to provide 70 percent of the UK’s electricity by 2030; wind energy is one that doesn’t use power resources that are toxic to the environment so this all sounds amazing, however the production of so many units could in of itself lend to the destruction of environments elsewhere in the world (depending on the production), as the materials turbines are made from aren’t necessarily recyclable (the blades themselves particularly), however there is shown to be scope to reuse the parts in building other machinery. 

The transportation of so many units to various parts of the country (or offshore as is mentioned) could also produce considerable emissions. Wind turbines themselves are also responsible for the deaths of many thousands of bird species due to the positioning of them in areas and heights where the animals will come into contact with the blades, and can drastically disrupt the flight patterns and migration paths of thousands of birds – the counter for this and a big pressure on the Greens would be to ensure that there is very careful planning in terms of where these turbines are placed (even offshore this must be considered – marine organisms are affected negatively often when the correct protocols are not put in place), and that they don’t disrupt environments and nature in such huge ways as a lot of the wind farms we see now do (due to the factor of, well, wind, turbines can only work when the wind blows, thus many are often required in order to produce enough energy).

However, there is a significant emphasis in the manifesto on funding research into innovative ways of constructing energy resources, so Greens, please consider altering past bad practices of wind energy production. And we must also remember that if renewable energy is to be relied upon in a manner that is realistic and achievable, there will need to be more weight placed on resources such as wind energy, or we’re back to square one again and would have to also rely on fossil fuels and oil companies.

Things that appear to be missing:

It’s that hope thing again. But this time not the metaphorical, but the realistic. The reason that all those years ago my family wrung their hands and turned to Labour was because not only did they see a different set of values and policies than the system they were living in that would help them, but they also saw a tangible chance of that hope becoming a reality. 

The greens are an invaluable asset it seems in the fight for green new futures, and whilst they do need a more robust directive when it comes to:

1. Right to roam processes (the model is there, and the intention is good, but can they involve education and financial stability enough in this process to assure it protects people and the environment? That remains to be seen, because they promise a LOT, and it might put people off as it is weighed up as “unrealistic”)
2. Energy policy
3. Conservation practice in certain areas (e.g. insect populations, the foundations of our organisms and the crux of our food production, biodiversity and sustainable environments, are mentioned maybe once or twice, and just when referencing pollinators).

They have outlined a manifesto that platforms so much of what we need…but. And unfortunately there’s always a but…will enough people vote for them? This might be a strange thing to put in the “missing” section, but again, as someone who is now more focussed on multi-level change, I am worried that the political climate is one of desperation, and what I see missing from people’s votes is a green candidate time and time again. Perhaps what is missing is our ability to dream of new futures due to the expectancy of desolation the past has brought us. That is something the greens will have to factor into their election process.

Overall assessment:

Like I said. There is hope here. There is a consistent countering of desolation. I think there is a capacity to change specific elements, and I would stress that as we now approach a period where we need to focus on degrowth, untethering and divestment, and on the capacity and support required to build alternative systems in ecology, conservation and societal growth (all alongside each other and intertwined), that this is all contained in certain elements of this manifesto, and thus it does provide bedrock for the futures we are fighting for. It may be lacking in specific details around the process and achievement of some of those processes, but I think I’d challenge you to find a manifesto that didn’t lack that. Perhaps we are in need not of a longer and more detailed manifesto, but of a different format of communicating policy and intentions.

Would I vote for these environmental policies?

Yes. Yes I would.

This is one of a series of opinion pieces on the political parties’ 2024 general election manifestos. We invited them to share their thoughts on one or two manifestos of their choice. We didn’t tell people what to write and we haven’t edited what they wrote (except to squeeze things into a common format, to correct minor grammatical and spelling errors and typos). The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Wild Justice.