Responding to the Green Party Manifesto

Our Head of Public Policy Tim Dieppe gives his assessment of the policies in the Green Party’s manifesto

The Green Party manifesto is naturally focused on environmental issues, with the phrase “climate emergency” being used five times.

But you would be mistaken if you thought this was a single-issue party. There are many policies unrelated to environmental issues, some of which are worth highlighting.

Transgenderism

The Green Party manifesto states that it: “supports self-ID, so that trans and non-binary people could be legally recognised in their own gender through self-declaration.” It also advocates ending the spousal veto so that a married person can change legal gender without requiring permission from their spouse. The party also wants to legally recognise non-binary gender identity and to enable people to use an ‘X gender marker’ on passports to indicate this.

‘Conversion therapy’ is not mentioned in the manifesto, though the party’s single outgoing MP Caroline Lucas has advocated for a ban.

Life issues

The Green Party wants to legalise assisted suicide, “allowing people to choose to end their lives”. It mentions the need for “proper safeguards”, though the universal experience of countries where euthanasia has been legalised is that the safeguards are gradually watered down over time.

There is no mention of abortion in the Green Party manifesto. By contrast, there is a proposal for a new “Rights of Nature Act giving legal personhood to nature.”

Education

The Green Party wants to: “Retain a full, evidence based and age-appropriate programme of Relationships, Sex and Health Education, including LGBTQA+ content and resources.”

It also plans to remove the charitable status of private schools and charge full VAT on fees, with an interim exemption for children with special educational needs. We are concerned about the impact of 20% VAT on small independent Christian schools which struggle to make ends meet and often have volunteer staff to keep fees to a minimum.

Israel and Palestine

The Green Party condemns the murder of hundreds of civilians by Hamas, but also states that “Israeli forces have committed war crimes that have caused the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians.” The Green Party calls for an immediate ceasefire and wants to recognise the state of Palestine and “end the illegal occupation of Palestinian land.” It also states that there is “strong evidence” that “Israel is guilty of genocide in its conduct in Gaza.” It wants to: “end all UK arms exports to and military cooperation with Israel.”

Other

The Green Party wants to “decriminalise personal possession of drugs.” It would also scrap the government’s Prevent programme aimed at stopping people becoming terrorists. It intends to rejoin the European Union. It would replace the House of Lords with an elected second chamber and introduce proportional voting.

On the positive side, the manifesto does claim that the Green Party will “protect the right to religious expression”, and that it would scrap “legislation that erodes the right to protest and the right to free expression.” It also intends to abolish the two-child benefit cap.

Conclusion

There is much for Christians to be concerned about in this manifesto, and very little that we would welcome. These policies would take us further away from the Christian values that have historically shaped our nation.

We need to pray for our candidates and their parties. Do join us for our weekly prayer meetings and the prayer rally on the eve of the election. Do also question your candidates on the issues that matter to you. This is your chance to make your views heard.