www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/se/05/football-sexism-wayne-rooney-scandal

The Green Party is fielding more Parliamentary candidates than ever before – now electors in over 300 constituencies will have the opportunity to vote for the only party whose priorities unites social justice, sustainable society and sustainable environment.

We are the green shoots of British politics. Even in our hostile electoral system our presence is being felt and it is helping to renew our bedraggled political culture.

In the last European Parliamentary elections,  the Greens came ahead of Labour in the South East and the South West. Greens beat the Tories in Brighton and Hove, Oxford, Norwich, Liverpool and Manchester.

The devolved jurisdictions in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have introduced forms of proportional representation and their governments are manifestly more representative of their voters. Not so in England where the unreformed Parliamentary electoral system has for the last 40 years distorted our political sentiments.

It is in local government that Greens have been able to get past our crazy electoral system. Already the Party’s impact is palpable.

Hampstead and Kilburn is a progressive constituency – the combined vote at the last general election shows that the anti-Tory vote is overwhelming. The addition of Kilburn wards makes the constituency even more like the Londoners who make London what it really is.

People say: but won’t voting Green risk letting in the Tory who currently trails behind Labour’s Glenda Jackson and the Liberal Democrats’ Ed Fordham? I say it is time for people to be allowed to vote for the candidate they really want to elect. If your priority is to keep the Tory out, don’t vote Tory.

Pressure for electoral reform is becoming irresistible – all the more reason to show by our votes that we want an electoral system that expresses Londoners’ green values, our social justice sentiments and diversity.

Let the green shoots grow!

You can contact me through this website

Beatrix

My new book, Agreement! The State, Conflict and Change in Northern Ireland, is published in May 2008, with launches in London, Belfast and Dublin.

‘The spinners of history are rarely the makers of history. The real story of Ireland’s journey to pace and justice is murkier, more treacherous and often moe inspirational than our political masters would have us believe. Bea Campbell is a great chronicler of our times: humans and politically astute, with a keen understanding of the double dealing, interplay and courage that underpinned the long peace process, which was really won by ordinary men and unsung women in Northern Ireland.’

Helena Kennedy

‘Outstanding … an impressive and insightful book. The story of international diplomacy and political deals has been told elsewhere, but this details another story, about the contribution of civil society, the women’s movement and a “coalition of the committed” to a unique constitutional moment, and to the means by which the state might reinterpret itself and be changed.’

Professor John Morison

The book is available to buy at Amazon

‘Blame‘, written by Judith Jones & Beatrix Campbell opens…

read more about Blame & book tickets online