The Green party are playing with fire in Gorton |
A good pub quiz question in the year 2050 will go something like this: ‘True or false, the “green” in the “Green Party” originally referred to the environment.’ By this point, the etymological origins of Britain’s sectional Islamic party will be as obscure as the relationship between British Conservatives and 17th century Irish bandits.
A key milestone, our mid-century quiz regular will inform his teammates, was the 2026 Gorton and Denton by-election in which the Greens stood neck and neck in a three-way race with Labour and Reform.
If decades of generous immigration policies have created constituencies where people vote along religious lines, there is nothing to stop someone appealing to that market. It’s within the rules of democracy, if not the spirit
If decades of generous immigration policies have created constituencies where people vote along religious lines, there is nothing to stop someone appealing to that market. It’s within the rules of democracy, if not the spirit
Eagle-eyed observers these past weeks will have noted how the once environment-focused party have been pitching at particular sections of ‘the community’, with campaign leaflets featuring candidate Hannah Spencer wearing a red and black keffiyeh while posing in front of a mosque.
Written in Urdu, the pamphlet calls for voters to: ‘Push the falling walls one more time. Labour must be punished for Gaza. Reform must be defeated and Green must be voted for. Vote for the Green party for a strong Muslim voice.’ Then it adds, in English, ‘Stop Islamophobia. Stop Reform.’
There was also an Urdu-language video linking Reform party candidate Matt Goodwin and leader Nigel Farage with Donald Trump and ICE deportation raids. The video then cuts to Gaza, before showing Keir Starmer beside India’s Narendra Modi. Subtle stuff.
The video states in Urdu: ‘A cruel politician can win if we don’t vote Green to stop the Reforms… Workers, cleaners, drivers, mothers – it’s us who keep this area running. But the politicians are not working for us… The Reforms want to break up our communities. They want to deport families who have lived here for years, and they want to tax people born abroad even more. They give air to Islamophobia, and they put our safety and dignity at risk.’
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Over the weekend the party told activists that ‘We hit all 14 mosques this Friday… Our Ramadan cards went down a treat, even with the battle of the leaflets against Labour! We are now in our critical final five days, and we need volunteers to help with Taraweeh conversations and leafleting. Do you attend evening Taraweeh at any of these mosques? If so, can you help with leaflets and conversations after prayers?’ Spencer even shared on Instagram that she was fasting to observe the beginning of Ramadan, although she only fasted for a day – in February. In northern Europe.
Party leader Zack Polanski seems to think it’s all very funny, as does his deputy Mothin Ali. Look how the right-wing trolls are triggered! Ali justified the video on the ground that ‘We’ve tried to appeal to people from all kinds of backgrounds. Some of the slogans are based off Bangladeshi or Pakistani typical political slogans. The same slogans have been used to find a message that people can resonate with. That’s just about inclusivity.’ Sure – nothing says inclusivity like campaigning in a foreign language which 97 per cent of the UK population cannot understand.
But then, in the worldview of some, ‘inclusivity’ is anything which furthers the interests of favoured minorities, just as ‘equality’ is anything that raises their status relative to less favoured groups. Everything is about power imbalances, the thinking behind asymmetrical multiculturalism, in which the sectional interests of minority groups are to........