Yes! Green socialist wins as leader Leanne Woods is victorious

Ha ha Mrs Windsor!

Leanne Wood was elected leader of Plaid Cymru today on a programme of green politics, socialism and republicanism.

Plaid are a member of the European Green Party group in the European Parliament.

It has been a pleasure to support Leanne who victory is a victory for ecosocialists in Wales and beyond.

So vital to link the green left in different organisations and so vital not to moan on the margins but to organise in the difficult climate of the politics of a country dominated by hedge fund politicians.

In England we have with the exception of Caroline Lucas, three parties led by dull right wing men, lets draw inspiration from the Rhonnda!

The time is right for a Green Party of India

The time has come for a Green Party of India, writes Derek Wall, who recently met with a founder member of the country’s new Green Party


India’s choice of development model is key to the future of the globe. India is currently growing at a phenomenal rate with a GDP target of 9 per cent GDP per year. If the 20th century was the era of the USA, the 21st will be that not just of Brazil and China but also of India. It’s easy to believe that growth is good but there is a downside to the Indian story: hundreds of millions of citizens are not simply being left behind but are under attack. For some the Indian dream is a nightmare.



Environmental degradation, social injustice and war are the negative features of the Indian dream and they are the reason that activists have formed the Green Party of India to create a different sustainable and just path to prosperity. I was lucky enough to meet Daniel Taghioff, a founder member of the party, in London recently. Earlier attempts to create a Green Party have failed to take root but Daniel believes the time is right and that it is vital to construct an alternative Indian reality.



He is passionate about the need to challenge the process whereby corporate interests are increasingly running India for their benefit rather than that of most citizens.



Accelerating growth is causing an increasing demand for metals, minerals and timber. This means that many Indians, particularly indigenous people and peasants, face having their land taken away. Indian politics is increasingly dominated by resource conflicts. In the east of India mining interests are attempting to seize indigenous forestland and have been met with bitter opposition. This ranges from what is a largely unreported war with Maoist guerillas, the Naxalites, to forms of non-violent protest against companies such as the British-based Vedanta.



Arundhati Roy who won the 1997 Booker Prize with her novel The God of Small Things has been vigorously opposing the corporate control of the country. She noted in a recent article:



“Over the past five years or so, the governments of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal have signed hundreds of memorandums of understanding – all of them secret – with corporate houses worth several billion dollars, for steel plants, sponge-iron factories, power plants, aluminum refineries, dams and mines. In order for the MOUs to translate into real money, tribal people must be moved. Therefore, this war.”



MORE HERE http://www.greenworld.org.uk/page336/page336.html

Alex Phillips why I refused to vote for a Green Party cuts budget.

http://brightgreenscotland.org/index.php/2012/03/why-i-voted-against-the-brighton-budget/
Alex Phillips was the only Brighton and Hove councillor to reject a Green Party budget forced through by Labour and Tory cuts.  Good for her a rising star and we need more of them to keep green and not turn grey.

This blog is to explain my position. In short, I found our amended budget (by Labour and supported by the Tories), which included a Council Tax Freeze, unpalatable. I’ll clarify my thinking below.




First of all, I just want to say that I respect my colleagues, although I do not agree with their decision to vote ‘for’ the amended budget. I recognise that the other parties, who did not reveal their budget amendments until less than 48 hours before Budget Council, put us in an extremely difficult situation. This is despite us having spent almost three months in consultation with the city about our budget proposals.



I know from attending meetings in the run up to budget day that there were several distinct views in the Group on how to respond to the ‘Blue Labour’-Tory alliance’s voting through the tax freeze and all that means for more severe cuts to budgets next year. Some colleagues agreed with me and some did not. It is interesting that in the final days before the budget there must have been a shift among some colleagues in favour of supporting the budget should it be amended by the opposition on council tax as several colleagues had previously shared my position but I was the only councillor who ultimately voted against. I am told that the Unions attempted to put pressure on Labour but to no avail. But we knew that neither Labour nor the Tories would budge on their proposed Council Tax Freeze.



My view is that voting for the amended budget was incorrect, both strategically and in principle. For me it was down to a question of ethics, integrity, consistency of message and bringing our membership with us. In voting for the amended budget, I do not believe we managed to do any of these things – something that could be electorally damaging to us in the future.

MORE FROM THE BLOG AT BRIGHT GREEN HERE.