Guest election blog – The Workers’ Party by Mark Avery

I am one of the co-founders and co-directors of Wild Justice but I write this in a personal capacity. I am a scientist (evolutionary biologist and ecologist) by training, and I worked for the RSPB for 25 years. Since 2011 I have done pieces of freelance work for several wildlife organisations, written several books, blogged, campaigned and helped set up Wild Justice.

I first voted in the 1979 general election and have rarely voted for a successful candidate. I am a member of the Labour Party and have, in the past, voted Labour (often), LibDem (rarely but where they stood a chance of displacing the Conservatives) and Green (mostly in local and EU elections). I’ll be voting in the Corby and East Northamptonshire constituency on 4 July.

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

Things I like:

• quite a few things but the only ones about the environment were…
• “Our approach to the countryside is one of respect and wider public access“: sounds quite good, but could mean a host of very different things. I remain agnostic about increased access until its proponents spell out what it means in practice.
• “We will require demonstrable proof that all land held in the UK is being used for socially productive purposes – agricultural production, housing or infrastructural development, shared heritage, natural wilderness or parkland with easy access for workers and their families and so forth. We commit to the preservation of national parks and woodlands as well as meadows and other ecological treasures on this basis of full public access. Closed lands in excess of reasonable family or productive requirement will come under review for directed use and public access if they are left idle.“: this is a very radical socialist agenda. I’d need a lot more flesh on the bones before I could support it though.
• “Grandstanding projects of dubious value to meet liberal political needs will come to an end and be replaced by investment in clean water, efficient sewage, ...”: sounds good but is so vague…

Things I don’t like:

• Net zero: calling for a referendum on Net Zero sounds like a way of letting people say ‘no’ to something that we need. And pointing to the fact that there is money to be made (by nasty businesses) from achieving it, and money to be lost (by the workers) from achieving it, seems too one sided. The long term (my grandchildren’s generation) consequences of slow action are huge.
• ULEZ: opposition to clean air for working people?
• The Green Agenda: is portrayed as part of capitalism and the beneficiaries are big businesses.

Things that appear to be missing:

• farming, forestry, fisheries, nature are hardly mentioned.

Overall assessment: there are some things I like here because my politics are to the left of the current Labour Party, but none of them is about the environment. Treatment of Net Zero is very negligent. This manifesto has much (some of it sensible) about social and economic policies but practically nothing about the third leg of sustainable living – environmental policies. And so, it’s a Big Fail.

Would I vote for these environmental policies?: No, because of their stance on Net Zero, because it’s very much social and economic perspectives first and environment last (if at all) and because they don’t have a stance on very much as far as environment is concerned. But I will keep an eye on how Labour does and how this lot develops. Just as Reform may be the downfall of the Conservative party, a mixture of the Greens and Workers Party may be a kick up the backside for Labour.

This is one of a series of opinion pieces on the political parties’ 2024 general election manifestos. They were commissioned by Wild Justice several months ago by approaching a wide variety of conservationists and environmentalists long before the date of the general election was known. Some people who originally agreed to write pieces found the date and short timescale impossible and had to back out. We did not know what they would write and their only brief was to pick one or two political parties’ election manifestos and tell us what they liked and didn’t like about their environmental policies. 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.

If you think you could produce a review of one of the 2024 general election manifestos then we would need to receive it as soon as possible, but in any case before 26 June, in a similar format to that above, as a word file and with a .jpg or .png image of yourself, the author. Send any potential texts to admin@wildjustice.org.uk and we will look at them. We’ll let you know if we want to publish your piece and we may be able to pay you a small amount for it.