Green Party (British political party)

The Green Party, officially the Green Party of England and Wales, is a left-wing party in England and Wales. It has one representative in the House of Lords and three members of the European Parliament, as well as one seat in the House of Commons. The Green Party has many more representatives on a local level.

History
The Green Party has its origins in the PEOPLE Party, later renamed the Ecology party and then to the Green party. This Green party, however, were a party on a national scale, not just existing in England and Wales like the party that is commonly referred to as the Green Party is today. What prompted this was the Scottish branch splitting away to form their own political party, the Scottish Green Party. Shortly afterwards, the Green Party in Northern Ireland also formed.

In 1989, they polled 15% of the vote, making it only third to the tories and Labour. However, this surge in popularity and votes didn't lat for long however, as in the space of 18 months before 1992 the party had lost half of its members! This was due to a lack of clear structure in the party, according to those polled. Unsurprisingly, therefore, they performed poorly in the 1992 general election.

To prevent the party from going bankrupt, they sought to build alliances with other parties in the next few years, in particular and controversially Plaid Cymru. This was eventually called off in 1995 due to ideological differences.

In 1997 the party wanted to shift to capturing ex-labour voters who were disgruntled with Tony Blair's new labour. As during the next few years their share of the vote started to increase somewhat, as well as accruing their first seats in the European parliament and many local councils, this could be considered mostly a success.

In 2007, the roles of leader and deputy leader were replaces with two 'principal speakers.' They ended up being Caroline Lucas and Adrian Ramsay. Over the next few years they acrued more seats on a local level like they had been for the previous decade.

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