Conference can tend to be a reminder of the fragility of the Greens in Northern Ireland, but, happily, the story of conference this year could have been so much different to the way it turned out. Instead we can talk of putting party leader Steven Agnew into the Assembly, and growing activism in local groups – Agnew spoke of this year seeing the greatest surge in Green Party activism since he joined the party.

It was a chance to recharge batteries and a starting point for the next election cycle, after spending the last three years fighting four successive elections – European, Westminster and local & Assembly. It’s been exhausting and we’ve had little room to breathe.

Consequently, the party’s purse hasn’t had much room to breathe either. A big challenge as we look towards the next set of European elections is party finance. During the first item of business, reports from the party executive, one party official noted how the PTA of his children’s school had a bigger budget than the GPNI. This remark is a stark reminder of how the party operates on a shoestring. As the only party in the Assembly that don’t take corporate donations, we need to redouble our fundraising efforts if we want to make gains in the future.

Technical motions were discussed early in the day – a proposal to cut links with the Green Party in the Republic of Ireland – of which GPNI is attached – was heavily defeated. Delegates noted the support given to the GPNI in its times of need in the past, and now that the roles were reversed, that it would be inappropriate. Others highlighted the fruits of good relations with Camohantas Glas – the mutual canvasses, the sharing of knowledge and collaborative efforts on green issues that don’t recognise the border. (On the subject of down south, the heartening 400% increase in the Green Party vote in the recent Dublin West by-election gives some hope for the future recovery of Camhoantas Glas)

50-50 gender representation for constituency delegates to the party executive was also retained with overwhelming support. Bloggers from Slugger O’Toole noted that they believed that the Greens had the ‘best gender balance I’ve seen yet at a party conference…and wide range of ages.’ That’s good, but considering this is Northern Ireland, it’s not the greatest accolade, and we must do better still.

Motions on party policy tended to cut across a broad cross-section of some of the main issues that the NI Greens are currently concerned about. Motions to support social tariffs and investment to fight pensioner poverty and fuel poverty were passed.  A motion to oppose oil and gas exploration licenses in NI was voted through. Exploration licences have already been issued for environmentally sensitive areas such as Larne Lough, Lough Neagh and Rathlin Island. The issuing of these licences could lead to hydraulic fracturing (or ‘fracking’) methods being used to extract oil and gas, damaging our health and our environment. The profits will go offshore and the local people and environment will be left with the costs – similar to the American corporation AES that currently owns two out of three of the North’s major power stations. (An interesting motion on making it party policy to establish Canadian and Scandinavian-style provincially-owned monopolies on alcohol sales narrowly failed to pass.)

Following Steven Agnew’s re-election as leader, his keynote speech laid out the big challenges ahead; being the critical opposition in an Assembly where 105 out of the 108 MLAs are in government. The need to contest the upcoming European elections, and to have more Greens join the Assembly chamber in 4 years time.

But perhaps most interesting of all is Agnew’s forthcoming Private Member’s Bill, which would place a statutory obligation on government departments to cooperate. To anyone not familiar with Northern Ireland’s complicated consociational system, this might seem innocuous. But with departments headed by rival parties and rival traditions, this legal duty (Which exists everywhere else in the UK) has the potential to end unnecessary duplication of services, inefficiencies and could provide a cure to Stormont’s gridlock.

Special guest at the conference was Minister for the Environment, Alex Attwood. Personally, I wasn’t sure what to make of this. Yes, Attwood’s status as a vaguely centre-left, non-climate denier makes him probably the best environment minister devolution has given us yet. But the bar hadn’t been set high, and it was arguably inappropriate for a member of another political party – especially a man vying for leadership of said party – to address conference. There was talk of a chance to influence, but as one party member is fond of saying, ‘we’re not Friends of the Earth with knobs on,’ and influence is fine, but whether conference is the place to do it is debatable.

More than that, I feared that the small amount of coverage that the media are legally obliged to give this party conference would be dominated by talk of Attwood speaking to the Greens about ‘the environment,’ – akin to him addressing an NGO – which would make us look small and single-issue.

But in the end the media largely chose to focus on something which didn’t spark that much debate – the defeat of the motion to split ties with the Green Party in the south. Two minutes out of an entire day defined the whole conference for the BBC.

While pensioners shiver in their homes due to the greed of utility companies, while the Assembly schemes about a tax cut for big business and while our economy flounders despite a ready-made green jobs-based solution waiting in the wings, casting the whole frame of the conference as being some kind of sectarian north-south brawl was dishonest and lazy.

Clearly we’ve still a long way to go.

For an outsider’s view of conference and links to speeches, see below: http://sluggerotoole.com/2011/10/31/green-party-ni-conference-the-visit-of-alex-attwood-and-criticism-of-mlas-who-cant-read-or-believe-the-speeches-written-for-them/

This was one of the most enthusiastic chants I heard outside the Tory party conference on Sunday; two decades later, protesters in Manchester haven’t forgotten what happened under the governments of the 80s and 90s. But then Manchester has a very long history of resisting Tory policies, and to some people, the presence of so many visiting Conservative Party members in their city feels like a calculated insult. Manchester was the site of the Peterloo Massacre, home of the Chartists and has strong associations with the campaign for women’s suffrage. Today, there isn’t a single Conservative on the local council. The city is firmly rooted in the Left, and when add in the savage cuts that the coalition government have recently imposed on Manchester, it’s easy to see why the distinctive blue lanyards given out to conference attendees have been attracting so much verbal abuse.

On Sunday, the Tory conference was literally under siege. When we arrived, streets near the city centre had already been blocked off by solid metal police barricades – draped with “I (heart) MCR” banners in an attempt to make them look less threatening – while the main conference venue and hotel had been encircled by several layers of fences and police lines to keep the public out. When the shout went up that there were police snipers posted on a roof behind us, there were a few moments of nervous silence, followed by muttered indignation, before about a hundred people turned round to extend Vs and middle fingers to the men with guns and binoculars.

Although the MPs and party officials were hidden away from the trade unionists, students, and local families who had turned up to heckle them, the fact that their conference needed such heavy security is a bad sign for the Conservatives. This is a party which was elected to government by the support of only 36% of voters, and those fences showed just how precarious a hold they have on power. A government which has the consent of the people shouldn’t need riot police to keep 35,000 angry citizens away from their door. As the crowd chanted on Sunday: that’s not what democracy looks like.

The Conservative Party have always inspired strong feelings amongst the Left. In the words of Aneurin Bevan, founder of the NHS: “No attempt at ethical or social seduction can eradicate from my heart a deep burning hatred for the Tory Party. So far as I am concerned they are lower than vermin.” As I write this, somewhere in Manchester there is a Tory sipping a drink that has been spat in. Millions of people already hate the Tories’ selfish, individualistic ideology, and they don’t care who knows it. It’s not a mass movement yet, but it’s start.

At court all three men pleaded not guilty denying entirely that they caused danger to road users. Even the prosecution accepted in court that “no damage or injury was caused.” Two of the men were bailed on the condition that they do not enter Birmingham City Centre but the other one – a 22 year old from Fleet in Hampshire – was refused bail on the grounds of a previous conviction for aggravated trespass, as well as his continuing trial for the peaceful occupation of the Fortnum and Mason shop on March 26th of this year. He has been sent to prison awaiting a review of his bail.

Clair Lister, a witness, said

“The banner drop was very peaceful and no disruption or danger was caused to Motorists. When the police arrived at the bridge the men left immediately and went willingly into custody.”

Michael Chessum from the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts and NUS national executive said

“”It is appalling that students taking part in peaceful protest are being victimised in this way. It is ludicrous that anyone would be remanded in custody for a minor traffic charge – and it’s clear that the behaviour of the police and the court is an attempt to intimidate and muzzle protests against the Liberal Democrats’ betrayal of education. Whether it’s kettles, intimidation, or tactical charges – it is becoming increasingly difficult for students and young people to say that they have a meaningful right to protest.”

And what a chance to see first-hand the excellent work of the City’s two Green Councillors – Jillian Creasy and Rob Murphy – and the whole of Sheffield Green Party.

Campaigning to cut pollution and save lives with a 20 mile an hour limit on all residential roads.

Providing the only opposition within the Council to deep and avoidable cuts to vital services.

Standing up for local people over the threatened closure of care homes.

So on behalf of Conference, as well as the people of Sheffield, I’d like to thank you for everything that you are doing.

And where better for us to be this autumn, as the Coalition’s nasty edge becomes ever clearer, than here in what was once a Liberal Democrat stronghold?

For this is not a true coalition.

This is a Tory government being kept in power by the Lib Dems.

It’s no wonder the people of Sheffield gave them a bloody nose in this year’s local elections.

In a coalition, the idea is that both sides get some of what they want.

But with this so-called coalition, the Conservatives have everything, and the Lib Dems get a bodged referendum that wasn’t even in their manifesto.

And what a sad irony that their own unpopularity in the country helps lose them that referendum.

Of course, the Lib Dems have five seats in Cabinet. What a chance to make a difference.

We have Chris Huhne there responsible for clean energy and fighting climate change.

Yet in the past few months alone, his Government has slashed support to marine renewables, caused chaos in the solar industry, promoted new deep water drilling, and given the green light to shale gas fracking.

Then there’s Vince Cable at Industry. Whose sole idea for more employment seems to be boosting the arms trade.

Who missed the chance to see Northern Rock turned back into a mutual, rather than sold off to the highest bidder.

And who has failed to secure the far-reaching banking regulation that he once promised.

We have Danny Alexander at the Treasury. And one of his top ideas for reducing the deficit? Selling off our forests.

And Nick Clegg, of course. The Minister for meeting angry people and being shouted at.

Is it any wonder, then, that people inside and outside the Liberal Democrat party are asking – if we’re not getting what we want, why stay in?

But it’s worse than that.

The Lib Dems aren’t getting what they want.

But they’re also helping the Tories give the rest of us things we don’t want, and never voted for.

Like privatization of the NHS. Like the cuts in services. Like £9,000 tuition fees.

That’s not why most people voted Lib Dem last year. Not in Sheffield. Not in Eastleigh. Not in constituencies across the SW of England. Not on the university campuses.

And is it any wonder that former Libdem supporters are increasingly turning to the Green Party?

A Party whose members decide policy, and whose elected representatives stick to their principles, and still get things done.

Now, in this hall today are people from all kinds of different backgrounds. Former Conservatives. Former Labour. Many people who would never have been involved in politics at all if it hadn’t been for the Greens.

We welcome you all.

But I have a special message for those Lib Dem supporters who are beginning to despair of the path their leadership has taken them down.

If you became involved in politics to serve your local community, to protect the environment, or to challenge inequality, then join us.

We are working for the same ends. You’ll find many former Lib Dems among our ranks. And your contribution to politics in our country is more valuable than ever.

And there is so much to be done.

–

Take the growing influence of big business in government.

You’ll remember how Francis Maude and other Tories boasted of how they were getting rid of all the over-paid consultants?

Good news, you might think. Except that our investigations show a different picture.

Instead of paid consultants, government departments are using secondees from big business to advise ministers and help manage public services.

There are now so many that the government has to admit that it can’t count them all. It can’t say even which companies they come from or what they’re doing.

Now there are very few businesses who will lend their top employees to government for nothing.

No, they expect something in return. Influence. Access. The inside track on the next fat contract.

How typically Tory. What looks like a reform turns out to be making the situation even worse.

Now if the Lib Dems were in opposition, this is the kind of issue we’d have expected them to take up.

But no. They’re too busy saying sorry for the Coalition’s mishandling of every crisis going.

And Labour’s leadership, who still have a lingering love affair with big business, are silent too.

So it’s down to us. We’re the ones putting the questions. I have today written to the Cabinet Secretary, Gus O’Donnell, to ask him to investigate the position on secondees.

After all, when Vince Cable’s own Department for Business can’t even say where 14 of its own staff have been seconded to, you have to wonder.

–

And look at the consequences of this pandering to big business.

Take the new draft planning policy framework.

The Government is tearing up protection for precious landscapes so their friends the developers can make more money.

Gone is the policy of building on brownfield sites before greenfield sites.

Gone is the duty to ensure that new developments minimise the need to travel and don’t jam up the roads.

Instead there is to be a presumption in favour of so-called “sustainable development”, a concept which the Government conveniently declines to define, no doubt giving lawyers jobs for life as they debate competing definitions for years to come.

And let’s be clear. Of course we as Greens recognise the need to build more homes.

We have a housing crisis in this country. And I see it first hand in my constituency in Brighton, with a housing waiting list of over 12,000.

But it’s not the planning system that is preventing the building of more homes. It’s the lack money.

And I have to say to Eric Pickles, the Captain Mainwaring of Communities and Local Government, that cutting the affordable housing budget by 60%, as this Government has done, is a very strange way of demonstrating any kind of commitment to more house-building.

It’s not just planning.

The Government is also ramming through nuclear power, with hidden subsidies, to please their corporate friends at EDF.

And worse, the shockingly cosy complicity between the Department for Business and the nuclear industry to play down the significance of the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan.

This is a Government that simply cannot be trusted, and that is why we Greens will continue to make the case that nuclear power is unsafe, uneconomic, and unnecessary.

And over Climate Change, we see everything that’s wrong about this Coalition.

The warm words. Behind the scenes lobbying. Inaction and delay.

A failure to be honest with the public and explain the scale of the problem.

We had thirteen years of this under Labour.

We simply don’t have the time to carry on ducking the issue and hoping future generations will pick up the pieces.

–

A year ago, as soon as the Coalition was formed, we saw the responsibility that would fall to the Greens.

Labour were simply too compromised by their record in office to make their criticisms remotely credible.

On student fees. Who introduced them? Labour.

On PFI? Who introduced it? Labour

Privatisation of the NHS? Who accelerated this? Yep. Labour.

The party of Nye Bevan. It was their 2006 Health Act that first let American health firms in to run NHS services.

And paved the way for the Tory’s final assault on our National Health Service.

Now they are out of government, they have seen the scale of public opposition.

And perhaps they are not getting quite so many visits from health industry lobbyists.

But it’s not enough simply to oppose the Tory Bill. If we are to save the NHS, we have get rid of Labour’s 2006 Act as well.

That’s the challenge we face.

Increasingly, the media and the public see that what passes for the “official opposition” in Parliament is not up to the job.

We Greens, inside and outside Parliament, must help provide that vital independent and principled check on the excesses of the political elite.

–

We must also provide people with a positive vision. With practical remedies for our country’s ills. That’s how we can rebuild people’s hopes and trust.

Take the public services. They’ve been under attack for so long, underfunded for so long, that we’ve forgotten how good they can be.

Imagine the National Health Service freed from the market.

Consultants who perform operations, rather than dream up reorganisations.

Staff who have the time to care for patients.

Cooks and cleaners on decent wages and permanent contracts, who can take real pride in their work.

An NHS run on its founding principles by people who believe in putting something back into society.

More responsive to patients, though. So that vital services like mental health and palliative care would get a fairer share of resources.

More local, too. National standards but much more scope for initiative for each hospital and GP practice.

That way, there’d be less bureaucracy and more scope for the NHS to work with other agencies on social care, drugs treatment and supporting carers.

That’s the NHS the people want. It’s the NHS the Green Party wants.

Maybe, just maybe, we could help make it happen. Maybe it’s not too late.

And if we are to succeed, we must stick to our principles, convince people there is a better alternative, and show we have the policies and the skills to govern wisely and well.

And being a Party that is growing in membership, that is winning the battle of ideas, that is proving that there is an alternative to the self-interest of the other parties – that is a Party that can speak with authority in the media and at every level where we hold office.

–

And with that authority we have had an impact that we can all be proud of.

We have kept reform of Parliament on the political agenda, despite the opposition of entrenched forces who want the doors of the Westminster club to stay firmly closed.

The Party’s proposals for reform – changes that would make the House of Commons more efficient, more effective, and better able to hold the government to account – are now being debated in Parliament.

Better still, there is cross-party support particularly amongst the new intake of MPs for reform.

Outside Parliament, we have used our new credibility to highlight the wrong-headed and hypocritical.

Take David Cameron’s initial response to the Arab Spring.

Here is the chance of a generation for the Arab nations to determine their own future, free of despotism and of outside interference.

And what was Cameron’s first response? To go ahead with a delegation of arms dealers to the region.

Once, our protests would have been laughed off.

This time, Cameron had to face up to tough questions, and see first-hand that not everyone in this country shares his immoral and irresponsible attitude to the arms trade.

My most important responsibility, of course, is that of representing the people of Brighton Pavilion.

Every week, dozens of people come to us with their problems, their concerns.

Let down by government agencies. At the sharp end of the cuts.

Being their advocate, helping to guide them through the maze of central and local government, putting them in touch with the right agencies or charities – perhaps most importantly, showing them that there are people on their side – is a huge responsibility and a huge privilege.

–

I never thought there would be a moment quite like the moment when we knew we had won our first Westminster seat.

But now, a year on, we have secured another extraordinary achievement.

A whole community has put the running of their city in our hands.

Again, Brighton leads the way – though again, there are many other places around the country that will soon follow suit.

It shows we offer much more than a protest vote.

We have been trusted with a budget of over £700 million pounds a year.

Working on behalf of 250,000 residents.

Running 35 primary schools.

Providing critical services to thousands of vulnerable people.

And supporting hundreds of businesses and social enterprises.

Our first 100 days have been very busy – but very productive too.

Tackling inequality is a major priority. Greens are promoting a Living Wage for the city.

Already, around 340 of the lowest paid council staff and school workers are set to see their wages rise to £7.19 an hour.

A Living Wage Commission starts work in October, with business leaders, public sector bodies and trade unions all taking part.

We’ve taken steps to reduce the ratio between the highest and lowest paid council workers.

And we’ve started with both the Chief Executive and the Leader of the Council taking a voluntary reduction in their salaries.

We’re working with partners to increase the number of apprenticeships available in the most deprived areas of the city.

And we’re exploring all possible avenues to provide more affordable and sustainable homes, as well as a Tenants Scrutiny Panel to give council tenants the right to scrutinize any issue of concern to them about the way their homes are managed.

We want a Greener city too, of course.

One of the first announcements of the Green administration was the launch of the largest programme of solar panel installation ever seen in the city.

Clean energy and local jobs. The Green New Deal in action.

Our victory in Brighton is another huge responsibility for our whole movement.

But showing what we can achieve will give hope to communities up and down the country.

–

That hope is needed now more than ever.

I spoke earlier about our analysis and our values.

Why those two words in particular? Because they sum up what we have to offer.

We see things differently.

I think we see them more clearly, because we don’t have any vested interests to get in the way.

We don’t come to an issue like criminal justice and ask – what will the editor of the Daily Mail think about this?

We don’t look at nuclear power and say – the most important thing here is what our pals in the nuclear industry want.

We don’t look at banking regulation and tax reform and say – how do we keep our friends in the city happy?

And it’s because we’re free of all those vested interests – all the corporate lobbying, all the kick-backs and secret donations and the rest of it – that we can see things clearly and speak the truth.

–

For years, we have spoken of the dangers our country faces from within.

How globalisation and unrestrained capitalism have been eating away at the fabric of our society.

How big corporations and cynical marketing have left people feeling manipulated and exploited.

How consumerism excludes those who don’t have money and enslaves those who do.

How, in a society where individuals are defined as consumers not as citizens, those who cannot afford to consume effectively become non-citizens .

And we’ve spelt out how this greed-based economy was built on sand.

On the myth of cheap resources and on exploitation.

Alienation. The undermining of community spirit.

These are the practical effects of decisions by government.

Starving local authorities of the means to provide alternatives for young people.

We pointed out how crime was a symptom of this malaise.

How unless you got to the roots of these issues, then building more prisons or putting more police on the streets would at best buy you some short-term relief – but at the expense of a worse problem in the future.

–

Well, now it is the future.

We’ve seen scenes on our streets that might have come from a dystopian sci-fi film.

A kind of collective madness in which trouble-makers and gang members are mixed up with ordinary people acting out of character.

Such behavior must be condemned.

But while some politicians have spoken at length about a sickness in society, perhaps the riots have shown most clearly a sickness with politics itself.

It fell to David Cameron to deliver this response – but it is one that might have come from Tony Blair or Gordon Brown, or Ed Miliband.

The first instinct of the typical politician is to shed responsibility and try to pin the blame elsewhere.

So we have attacks on the police not only from gangs on the streets, but from the Home Secretary and Prime Minister.

The truth is, the police faced an unprecedented situation and though there are lessons to be learned, recriminations are a distraction.

The second instinct is tough talk.

Talk of calling in the Army. Of water cannon and baton rounds.

Heavy sentencing, cutting benefits, making people homeless.

All panicky and unnecessary responses made against the advice of the experts.

The third is to use rhetoric to cover up inaction. So we have Cameron’s inane sound-bite about a security fightback being followed by a social fightback.

How wrong can he be? It’s not about society fighting back against alien invaders.

The people who took part in the riots are from our society.

They are our neighbours and our work colleagues. We sit next to them on the bus and visit the same shops.

Casting them into outer darkness is exactly what you would expect from a ruling cabal who will not accept that the divisions in society are largely of their making.

And where are they to go, these enemies of our society, when the fight-back has been won?

Prison? Internment camps?

I fear Cameron already has the answer in his mind – though he will not speak it clearly.

It’s the idea of ghettoes, where the undeserving poor can be kept and contained through heavy policing, CCTV surveillance, and the use of benefits as a stick to intimidate, without the need to use the courts, with their inconvenient interest in evidence and justice.

That is Cameron’s vision.

–

I want to be plain about this. That vision is immoral. It is a betrayal of everything that we should be proud of in the traditions of our country.

It is a betrayal by the same elite that has gained so much at the expense of the rest of us.

Where is the leadership that those at the top should provide?

Well, when it came to putting themselves first, the leadership was there.

Those on the streets who grabbed what they could from JJB Sports and T K Maxx were little different from those at the top who took what they could from Barclays or RBS.

It’s wrong to take things you haven’t earned, whether it’s stealing from a shop or looting a bank.

Of course we should condemn the rioters.

Anything else would be a betrayal of the people we represent.

Of the vast majority of people who took no part in the troubles.

Including people in desperate circumstances, remember;

Who could never afford the designer clothes and fancy electronics apparently there for the taking , and yet who knew it was wrong to steal and stayed away.

Yes, we should condemn the rioters. Everyone should do so.

But how can those MPs who spent £8000 of public money on a TV set condemn the looters and expect to be taken seriously?

How can a Cabinet Minister whose experience of life is Eton, Oxford and a series of well-paid City jobs lay down the law on how we could prevent further riots – and expect to be listened to?

How can a Prime Minister, who couldn’t put himself closer to the News of the World, with its twisted values and its culture of criminality, now talk about the rule of law?

Those closest to the excluded in society had been warning for years of the dangers.

So why could the ruling elite not see what was coming?

Perhaps because they were too busy fiddling the system, awarding themselves pay rises and bonuses.

Why did they not work to lessen the gap between the richest and poorest in society?

Because they were the richest, and wanted very much to stay that way.

–

I don’t believe it’s only a coincidence that the further we move away from the European model of social democracy, in which the state works to include people at the margins, not push them further out – the worse our social problems become.

In looking to the United States for inspiration in responding to these disturbances, Cameron is, in effect, giving up on the British tradition of policing by consent.

Do we believe this is right? Or have we so lost faith in our future that we want to abandon one of the things that should make us proud of our country?

Greens don’t often talk about patriotism.

But I believe that true patriotism is seeing what is right, what is great about our country and doing all we can to protect those values.

Tolerance. Fairness. Community spirit.

And these values are more at risk than ever. It’s up to us to fight for them.

And we’re not alone. We have many allies. Campaigners, charities, trade unions, faith and community groups.

The many people in the public services who work incredibly hard for their communities.

Committed business people who want to engage positively with society.

Above all, there are all those many millions of decent people who are frightened by what they’ve seen but know instinctively that repression – Cameron’s crackdown – will solve nothing.

There’s no shortage of people who want what’s right. The only problem is, there are so few of them in traditional politics.

That’s why our Party is so important. Why it is growing. Why its influence is increasing. And why we have, in the space of a year, won our first seat in Parliament and won control of our first Council.

–

When I first became leader, I set out my belief in the direction that our party should take.

It was a single phrase – to show that you can stick to your principles and still get things done.

Well, we’ve stuck to our principles.

We’ve continued to say things the others won’t, to tell the truths they’d prefer to hide.

No New Greens. No Greens Lite.

No picture of a tree instead of a torch to try and make out you care about our planet.

We’ve stuck to our principles – and people are increasingly able to see that we can get things done.

As councillors, as Assembly Members and MEPs.

In Parliament. And now in Brighton.

We’re being tested to deliver the kind of leadership that people want.

Not the kind that makes big promises and then runs up unimaginable debts to pay for them.

Not the kind that keeps the majority comfortable by exploiting or marginalizing the minority.

Instead, the kind that tries to find a place for everyone.

That doesn’t leave people behind.

That looks to support communities, not cowering behind iron gates but coming together in streets and parks.

That supports jobs that mean something to people; that you can be proud to have; that won’t be scrapped at the whim of bankers in New York or Shanghai.

That provides service not as another way to increase shareholder value or meet daft Whitehall targets, but because we know how much people depend on those services.

On their side – not working for BP or E.ON or ATOS.

We know this is the way politics should be.

The Green Party is making it happen.

Over the next year, and further ahead, we are going to see the imposition of those fees, strike action from the Universities and Colleges Union (UCU), departments cutting courses, firing staff and closing entirely across the country, and attempts to fully privatise our education. A united and strong left campaign that brings together all those who believe education is a public good is going to be absolutely essential. It was heartening, therefore, to see a wide variety of political groups at conference: the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty (AWL), Workers’ Power, Student Broad Left (SBL), Counterfire, Green Parties (both Scottish and England and Welsh), Socialist Party (SP), Labour Representation Committee (LRC), People & Planet, anarchists and other independent socialists. There was a reasonable geographical spread too, with all the devolved nations represented. It was a little disappointing, however, to see no Socialist Workers’ Party (SWP) members there. One of the most pleasing aspects of our movement over the last six months has been the lack of sectarianism, and I hope that whether or not the SWP choose to get involved with NCAFC — and I hope they do — we can continue to work together against our real enemies. We’re never going to agree on everything, but we’re all anti-cuts, pro-public services, and want to build a more democratic, more sustainable and more equitable economy.

Constitution
Until now the NCAFC has been organised by open meetings with no formal leadership or committee and,due to those meeting happening there, been dominated extensively by activists from London and the South East. Those of us in Scotland, for example, have had no real opportunity to influence the direction of the ostensibly national campaign. Some at conference thought this should basically continue, meetings should move around the country, but remain open to anyone who wanted to attend. Others thought an elected national committee would be more representative and democratic. I side with that latter camp. Open meetings are great if anyone really can attend, but there’s more needed for that than just a right. Transporting people all over the country on a regular basis would cost hundreds of pounds, money that could be better spent actually fighting cuts and building a national demonstration than organising our own internal meetings.

The proposal we adopted for an elected national committee elected by STV and with guaranteed gender balance (at least 5 of the 14 nationally elected block must be self-defining female), plus self-organised regional committees and liberation caucuses, ensures a degree of continuity while also allowing a spread of geographical representation and preventing any one faction from dominating the campaign.

The election itself was, however, somewhat less than ideal. By the time we had agreed a structure people had almost to leave. That left us with just half an hour for nominations, hustings and voting. We also didn’t have software to hand for STV and had to resort to an online calculator with a very poor interface which took a long time to enter the data (this is why you never admit to knowing how electoral systems work).

Fortunately, five women were elected normally, so there was no need to use the gender balancing mechanism and, though still far from proportional, we have some geographic diversity with 7 London, 1 Edinburgh, 1 Aberdeen, 1 Liverpool, 1 Northern Ireland and 3 Birmingham activists elected. Unfortunately Workers’ Power, disagreeing with the process by which the conference was called and the committee agreed, boycotted the election; despite that, however, we have AWL, SBL, Green and self-defined libertarian communists on the committee, so no faction should be too dominant. Bizarrely, NUS NEC member and NCAFC founder Michael Chessum didn’t make it onto the committee, but hopefully he can still get a place through the London regional committee.

Future Action
Going forward, regional conferences and liberation caucuses will have to be set up. There is already a London committee and a women’s causus. There is also the Northern Ireland Student Assembly (NISA) and we’re in the process of forming the Scottish Campaign Against Fees and Cuts. It remains to be seen how those two regional bodies will formally relate to NCAFC, but I hope that whether they also affiliate to EAN, or any other UK wide body, they can work with NCAFC.

The constitution was approved by a relatively small conference of people (around 90) and can undoubtedly be improved. There should be another conference in the Autumn, prior to any national demonstration, to evaluate our structures and make improvements. New elections should be held then and regularly thereafter, maybe 3-4 times per year.

On June 30th we will see the biggest coordinated strike action in this country in years. It’s a opportunity for us to connect the struggle of workers with that of the student movement and NCAFC will be working to build solidarity action and support over the next few weeks. We need to work with school students to support the NUT action and walkouts from pupils.

We agreed to protests at party conferences this Autumn, including Labour. There was unanimous (I think) support for demonstrating at governing party conferences (including the SNP and Welsh Labour) and most activists were in favour of a demonstration at the UK Labour conference too. Despite the membership of some very good people and their connection to the labour movement, Labour are passing on cuts on councils across the country and support cuts nationally. They cannot be absolved of their complicity. There will, though, be no single line or message for Labour conference, some will want to lobby them to oppose cuts, some to protest the whole system; it is best not to try to force a single message, we need to campaign together where we agree and accept we will have differences in our preferred tactics.

There will be a national demonstration in Autumn. We need to try to persuade NUS to support that demonstration, but we will take the lead and move forward with or without their support. When that happens we need to broaden our message, against all cuts and in solidarity with the broader trade union movement; we can’t just fight the same battle as last year, but neither should we accept that the fight over fees is lost. La lutte continue.

Finally, we need to organise for NUS conference next year. We need delegates elected across the country and need to make a much better job at reaching out and including FE. We need to decide whether to target specific positions on the NEC and if so which ones. I think it’s better to focus on winning one or two sabbs than spreading ourselves too thin. We may not be able to realistically challenge for president. Liam will be hard, if not impossible, to beat mid-term, but if we can win at least one VP position we will be in a much better position to build for the year after.

Before I spoke, Murray Worth very eloquently laid out the way the neo liberalism that has underpinned global economic problems, and how neo-liberalism has manifested the same problems in many other countries..

I didn’t write anything down, because I was on a panel with two people whose views I was fairly interested in hearing. It has to be said, I felt a little like a fraud. I was handed a badge, which said Lisa Ansell – The Guardian. Which although accurate in that the Guardian occasionally publish my stuff, really led me to question my qualification to speak for anyone else. This is at the heart of some of the questions that I think we all need to be asking about what is happening now, and what will happen in the future

With a crammed room, Murray spoke eloquently about the way that neo liberalism has had to be fought across the globe. Several ideas which have been bothering me for a while, came to the surface. The way that Thatcherite economic policies have fractured the communities I grew up in, the low likelihood of successful immediate protest against welfare and local authority cuts, and way in which most of those immediately affected have already been demonised. He spoke about how the agenda of privatisation and corporate greed has taken over communities, and removed the space they have and the services they need. How directly relevant this was to our ability to fight the agenda we are seeing. How many lessons there are in other countries, and the sheer weight of evidence we have to guide this effort.

I thought about the way in which discussion of political ideology along a left/right axis stifles has strangled debate about how best to fight this toxic and very clear economic agenda. The way it appears to blind people to reality. About what it is that we are fighting, and what this fight isn’t. The way that voices get lost in the debate, and how easy it is to believe that one person is able to speak for entire groups of people. The impossible task of opposing an agenda, held by all our main political parties and many of the great powers across the world. The realistic chance of success at a time when our political mainstream is doing everything it can to co-opt opposition to the effect of these policies, into political capital for parties who share them.

Adrian Ramsay outlined the Green Party stance on opposition of the economic agenda which necessitates cuts, and I realised it was strange to hear a representative of a political party talk about challenging the economic consensus that has existed in parliament since the mid nineties. He spoke about rebuilding a new economy, an economy which defended people locally as well as nationally and offered Britain something sustainable. The task the Green Party has begun, is the same task that faces the anti-cuts movement. It is the willingness to act, to organise-even when what is ahead seems insurmountable and might fail which provides the key to fighting this economic consensus.

I opened by talking about solidarity, and the massive challenge that fighting this economic agenda brought. About the need to recognise that your own political ideology may not actually be shared by those fighting the cuts that affect them. About the moves so far to dress the fight against the cuts as a ‘left wing’ movement, with Labour as a moderate response and the SWP being seen as a radical response- and how effectively that has hindered the fight against the cuts at a national and local level.

It is becoming evident (and the report that came out from Hope not Hate, which I want to write about when I have time, came out just after I left) that traditional left wing views of what the working class ‘are’ are no more accurate than those peddled by our Conservative led government. That in order for a wider movement to be successful, it has to consider what and who any ‘movement’ is actually fighting for. I asked whether people wanting to ally with the anti-cuts movement would be able to show solidarity with the lifelong Tory voter.

The movements that claim to represent the working class, their traditional parties, and even to a lesser extent the Unions: are no longer their natural representatives (and we know that 30 years of neo-liberalism has fractured communities, demonised large sections of working class communities). The far right are being ever smarter about the threat they pose, Long term there is only one solution.

The people who the first round of cuts rely on being disenfranchised and unrepresented- have to begin to organise. Only by gluing together the fragments of what has been left by 30 years of neo liberalism can we even begin to have a hope of building something constructive in it’s wake. Us the time it will take for our ‘squeezed middle’ to realise the reality of this agenda, and it’s consequences- to put down the seeds of real organisation.

All traditional labour movements, union movements and political movements have come from grassroots. And in the year or so, before the challenging economic and political orthodoxy is seen as important by those with the privilege of a mainstream voice- we have the time to begin to put down the grassroots of organisation.

Not build a movement that can mobilise 200’000 on March 26th this year for sure- but in the little things, in our own communities- using the technologies and techniques we see elsewhere- we could begin to do this. A movement which can build on the work done by the Student movement, the Unions and everyone else fighting. Reclaiming the things that can help communities stay together. This is not glamorous, this is not likely to lead to you name being in the paper- the legwork.

Treat this as a long term issue- not one which will be solved by a couple of hundred thousands coming out on the streets on a nominated day and unsuccessful if policies are not stopped the next day. About the wider economic implications of what is happening, and the opportunity of having another year or so before it really becomes apparent to everyone that something needs to be done.

I spoke about Benefits Uncut – a project I am working on with several other people.

The aim of benefits uncut is to a) provide practical help that is needed. To give out benefits and debt advice training materials from one point. To use that website to give people the opportunity to talk to each other, and to organise offline- creating support in their communities. Informal networks of debt/benefit advisors and support to organise over direct actions. A way in which activists can link with people in communities affected and share their skills. Not support which relies on grant applications- or charities and public sector funding. Begin to try and glue back together the fragments of communities left by neo-liberalism from the ground up, and for those outside those communities to be able to link to them. Not just preach at, or on behalf of them..

Use the techniques of the False Economy website- to create a portal of information/research/ and news which challenges the vile dogma which dominates our air waves. And to start making the links in our own communities, which help us prepare to represent ourselves. Organise ourselves. In the hope that as any anti-cuts movement builds up pace, it will have to represent the interests of those affected- not just those who claim to represent us when they want votes.

I hope that our site can work in conjunction with the network of other anti-cuts sites, benefits advice sites, community and voluntary group sites- so that it can be part of people beginning to organise. Not representative of everyone- not with a select few at the helm speaking for everyone.

So that when the time comes mechanisms are there so voices can be heard- not just the voices of the traditional organisations who claim to fight for us. Not those who self appoint. Initially using that organisation to put things in place which allow people to withstand some of the effects of this- to support each other. On the understanding that this type of organisation, however unglamourous and unimportant it seems can provide the basis of real mobilisation later on. In the same way a party at the beginning of its emergence onto the national scene, has to build outside a Westminster where it has only one representative- any anti-cuts movement is going to have to do the same.

To treat differences in belief and ideology as expected, when the economic threat to so many is so real and immediate. And to hope that as has always happened with grassroots movements, by organising to fight the wider economic inequality- a new political ideology will emerge. The ideologies which have so clearly failed, given their lack of support amongst those who they claim to represent change to reflect the things they misunderstood.

By creating real solidarity instead of repeating a word that we have learned. This is not the only short term or long term solution to what is happening, but this is the only way that any long term solution is going to actually be something that people want- and which is any different to what we have now. Any movement built on idealised versions of what working class communities are, is as likely to be successful as social policy based on equally inaccurate and far less generous assumptions from our coalition government.

The question and answer session that followed was interesting. Councillors discussed the inherent difficulties of making decisions about whether to mitigate the effect of the cuts in a real way, or to take a stand which may actually hurt people on the ground. A doctor spoke to me afterwards about the letters he wrote in support of a patient whose ESA had been stopped as his own form of direct action. There were many there that I wish I had had chance to speak more to- but I had to leave early the next day due to a train strike. I might go again next year, if they will all low a card carrying Labour party member to attend (I still haven’t given up that party membership…call it an error of judgement).

This post originally appeared at Lisa’s own blog, lisaansell.posterous.com.

The first big debate of the afternoon was between Bright Green co-editor Alasdair Thompson, and regular contributor, and Norwich Councillor, Rupert Read. Rupert was proposing reforms to the monetary system, banning banks from creating credit. Claiming support from Mervyn King, he told us that ideas that had been radical were now becoming mainstream. Ali denied the central banker had supported the idea, but rather included it in a list of ideas that should be discussed, and pointed out that those who do support such ideas include Hayek, Friedman, and others on the far right of the economic spectrum. The motion – which proposed radical changes to the monetary system along the lines of the campaign group “positive money” – fell narrowly.

Next was a discussion about whether we should actively campaign now for a citizens’ (or ‘basic’) income. Citizens’ Income is a proposed system where benefits would be paid as one lump sum to every citizen, and then taxed back progressively from people as they earn – ensuring that no one lived in cash poverty. The motion was supported by Clive Lord, and Bright Green regular Alex Wood, and effectively opposed by Caroline Lucas MP and Darren Johnson AM. Despite two prominent opponents arguing that the policy is currently unaffordable, Alex won the day, by arguing for higher taxes on the wealthiest. For me, you can tell a party is truly democratic when its most prominent members can be defeated by those using the quality of their argument alone.

Lucas slams cuts and privitisation

Caroline Lucas has addressed Green Party spring conference today by slamming the government over spending cuts and privatisation. Calling the Green Party “the true opposition to the Conservatives”, she highlighted the complicity of the Liberal Democrats with the government’s cuts, and the previous Labour government’s support for the same policies.

Comparing public spending cuts to “Victorian doctors who think they will cure their patients through blood letting and leeches”, she slammed the coalition’s cuts as “destroying the fabric of our society”. But the speech recognised that the economic program of this Government, like the Labour Government before it, is about more than cuts. Pledging to fight privatisation that would take all power from communities, Caroline argued that corporations should now be subject to Freedom of Information legislation. She went on to pledge solidarity for the people of the Middle East, and highlight Cameron’s arms trade tour – “For a moment, I genuinely thought that he was in Tahrir Square to express solidarity with the people of the Middle East.” “but now it turns out that he was leading a delegation of arms dealers”…

You can read the full text of the speech below:

1. WELCOME

Thank you for that introduction, and thank you to Cardiff Green Party for the wonderfully warm welcome we’ve all received, and for putting together such an excellent conference.

Of course, there’s no better time for our party’s Spring Conference to be here in Wales.

A year ago, when we gathered together in Hove, I said I would throw caution to the winds, stick my neck out and predict victory in the General Election – our first seat in Parliament.

And if anyone here took out a bet based on my advice, I hope they plan to share their winnings!

Today I want to do the same. To predict that 2011 will also see a historic first.

Greens elected to the Welsh Assembly.

I’ve seen first-hand the commitment and self-belief of the team here in Wales.

And I believe that every one of our candidates has the ability and the integrity to provide that blend of fearless opposition and positive alternatives that we as Greens offer.

My ur amser wedi doord – porb look: The time has come – Good Luck.

I know you’ll do us proud.

2. WHY THE GREENS?

And when – not if, but when – there are Greens in the Assembly, then the battle really begins.

In these difficult times, with a government hell-bent on cutting public services, our communities need politicians who will put them first - not the bankers, not the party donors, but the people they are supposed to serve.

Greens will do that.

We don’t go into politics because we want to climb the greasy pole to the Cabinet, ending up with a seat in the House of Lords, or directorships of merchant banks.

We get involved because we want to put something back into our local communities.

We don’t depend on big business or the unions to fund our work.

So we have the independence to do what’s right.

And when the decisions are hard, as they are now, that matters more than ever.

Principled . Independent. On your side.

That’s what people want from politicians. That’s what we can offer in the May elections.

This week, I’ve been visiting just some of our local election target seats around the country.

And in the last few days I’ve been to Sheffield, York, Leeds, Huddersfield, Lancaster, Cambridge, Totnes and Bristol – and I can report that, miraculously, the trains ran on time throughout!

And I want to tell you that what I saw on those visits was so inspiring.

Green councillors making a real difference to their communities – rolling out home insulation schemes, introducing Green Travel Plans, promoting local businesses and creating more jobs – and crucially, doing all they can to defend the poorest and most vulnerable from the savagery of this government’s cuts.

Because our policies have never been more urgently needed.

We were the Party who went into the last election with a costed plan to tackle the deficit without decimating public services and destroying jobs.

In contrast, Labour, Lib Dems and Tories all wanted to make big cuts in public services.

Like mediaeval physicians, they seem to think that the more blood they shed, the better the country will feel.

Well, I’ve got news for them: we’ve moved on a bit since the days of leeches and blood-letting.

And that’s why our message is that

• Cuts that hurt the poorest hardest are morally wrong
• That it is unacceptable that banks like Barclays make over £11 bn profit, but pay only 1% tax

• These cuts are not inevitable – they are driven by ideology, not economic necessity, and as Greens, we will fight them every step of the way.

I’ve had people come to my surgeries in Brighton who are terrified that they are going to be made homeless because of cuts to housing benefit.

People concerned about cuts even to the mobility element of the Disability Living Allowance – how dare they take away such a lifeline from people in need

Cuts to legal aid, so people can’t stand up and fight for justice.

And that’s why when this Tory-led government has the gall to call these cuts “fair”, they rightly lose any shred of credibility they might ever have had.

But these cuts are not only socially devastating.

They are economically illiterate.

The way to tackle the deficit is not to throw out of work half a million public sector workers, with a knock-on effect of a similar number in the private sector.

The way to tackle the deficit is to create jobs, to keep people’s taxes coming into the Revenue, to keep them in work.

And one of the fastest job creation schemes imaginable would be our programme for a Green New Deal – a massive investment in renewables and energy efficiency, better home insulation for hundreds of thousands of households, tackling fuel poverty, and helping to create a million new jobs.

And if the government is still worrying about how to pay for it, let’s point them in a few directions:

• A Robin Hood Tax on international financial transactions would generate £20bn a year even if it was only introduced in the UK alone
• Cracking down on the tax evasion and tax avoidance of the wealthiest could raise £10bn in the first year – but this government is sacking workers at HMRC
• Scrapping Trident replacement could save us £100 bn over 30 years
• And a further windfall tax on bankers bonuses and bank profits would ensure that those who created this crisis pay for it

3. LOCAL GOVERNMENT

This is the kind of thinking we offer in local government too.

Unlike Labour, we never wanted these cuts.

But we also know that waste does go on in some Councils.

Every penny saved from mal-administration, or needlessly wasting money by ripping out cycle lanes, as the Tories plan to do in Brighton and Hove, is money that could keep libraries open, or fund the vital Connexions service, or pay for proper fire brigade cover.

Greens genuinely believe in power being in the hands of local communities.

Parishes and wards, estates, even individual streets.

It’s right in principle and it’s more efficient too.

Now there are probably people in this hall today who will be elected to their local council for the first time in May. Who may even be the only Green councillor.

At times, representing your community will feel like a lonely battle.

Many of us have had that experience at local level.

Believe me, I’ve also felt it on many occasions at Westminster, standing in the House of Commons, one Green surrounded by 649 MPs from other parties.

It can be hard. Frustrating.

But never forget that one voice can make all the difference.

And I’m confident that more Green councillors will be those voices, putting social and environmental justice at the heart of their communities.

4. LAST SIX MONTHS

It’s traditional in conference speeches to look back at the last six months.

But events are changing so rapidly on the ground in the Middle East, that even the last six days have offered extraordinary moments both of tremendous hope, and of near-despair.

We have seen people in their hundreds of thousands risk their lives for democracy and the rule of law.

And I’m sure all of us have felt the same awe in the face of their courage.

The courage of the protesters in Tarhir Square, facing the stones, clubs and bullets of the pro-Mubharak thugs.

And the extraordinary courage of so many ordinary people in Libya, armed only in their belief in democracy and human rights.

Contrast that to the actions of our own Prime Minister, David Cameron.

I have to confess that when I first saw him on TV in Tahrir Square earlier this week, I genuinely thought for a moment that he was really there to express solidarity with the pro-democracy movement in Egypt. And I thought great, good on him.

And then the horrifying reality: he was there, in the Middle East, at a time of such violence and chaos, with a delegation of arms traders, to sell more arms.

More guns, more tanks, more armoured vehicles, stun grenades, tear gas, riot-control equipment.

I know that ethical foreign policy has gone out of fashion, but frankly the blatant opportunism of this visit is morally obscene.

But perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised.

After all, this is a government whose defence equipment minister, Peter Luff, unequivocally stated back in June, and I quote:

“There will be a very, very, very heavy ministerial commitment to arms sales. There is a sense that in the past we were rather embarrassed about exporting defence products. There is no such embarrassment in this government.”

Clearly not.

But as we Greens know, there certainly should be.

And that’s why it’s been longstanding Green Party policy to call for an immediate and properly enforced ban on selling arms to those who torture, lock up political opponents, and use violence against peaceful protestors.

And that’s why a UN asset freeze and total arms embargo should be just the first step, along with a commitment to investigate and punish all crimes under international law, with referral to the International Criminal Court as necessary.

6. LIBERAL DEMOCRATS

And here at home, in a very different context of course, we’ve seen the courage of communities up and down the country as they try to fight the government’s savage cuts.

Not only savage because of their scale, but also because of the apparent satisfaction with which the coalition government is imposing them.

Voluntary groups starved of support, dedicated public service workers sacked, and vital services closed.

But people are mobilising to resist these cuts.

Individuals, local communities, charities and unions, all working to point out the folly of what is being done to our economy and to our society.

Groups coming together not only to save their own library, their own wood, their own hospital from the threat of privatisation or closure, but coming together to protect all the libraries, all the woods, and all the hospitals.

And it is our role to give voice to this movement in the political sphere.

Our role – because the traditional parties have shown themselves fundamentally out of tune with the people they claim to represent.

Take the Liberal Democrats.

Only a short year ago, they claimed to represent those millions who knew that education is a public benefit and should not be given only to those prepared to shoulder enormous debts.

They pledged not to increase tuition fees.

A few short months later, and such pledges are in tatters.

Now the Libdems are being punished. And rightly so.

Nick Clegg and his colleagues have one ray of hope that they are clinging to as they slide below 10% in the polls.

They believe that they will be proved right on the cuts.

That the economy will turn around, that people will feel good and forget, and that they will be re-elected in four years time, all sins forgiven.

They couldn’t be more wrong.

They still can’t understand why their voters have deserted them.

It’s not just because of the state of the economy.

It’s not even on the question of how best to fund higher education in the UK.

It’s about trust.

Millions of people trusted the Liberal Democrats.

They voted for them in the belief that they stood for decency, for public services, and for constitutional reform.

And the Liberal Democrats have betrayed that trust all down the line.

That’s why the voters have deserted them.

And that’s why it doesn’t matter what happens to the economy.

The Liberal Democrats will never be trusted in that way again.

Nor do they deserve to be.

7. LABOUR

And what of Labour?

On health, education, climate change and welfare Labour candidates were happy to sign up to all kinds of positive statements during the election campaign, even when their party had done nothing in these areas during the 13 years they’d been in power, and where the Labour Party manifesto was saying something completely different.

So what kind of opposition to this Tory-led government can they offer now?

The truth is that Labour is fatally compromised by having introduced many of the very policies the coalition is now pursuing to their logical conclusion:

• The trebling of tuition fees will leave students with an enormous debt burden, but who first introduced tuition fees? Labour
• Selling off the Royal Mail is likely to lead to the closure of hundreds more of our local post offices, but who first proposed it? Labour
• The government’s health reforms are likely to lead to the privatisation of the NHS, but who first introduced the market into the health service? Labour

To hear Ed Miliband speak about healthcare, you’d think he’d need a trip to the doctors himself.

For there was never a clearer case of amnesia.

It was his party, the Labour Party, and his colleagues in cabinet, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, who introduced the private sector into the NHS.

They were even warned that, once that door was open, they would find the private healthcare providers hard to control.

And so it has come to pass.

That’s why we need principled opposition more than ever. You can’t mobilise popular opposition if you yourself are rightly not to be trusted.

That’s why so much of the responsibility of opposition to the current government has fallen to us – and we will rise to that challenge.

8. RADICAL THINKING

Opposition must also be free to think radically.

Take the growing role of private firms in providing public services.

Yes, we want to limit their role.

But we also to make sure that, where private firms are used, they operate under just the same controls and safeguards as for the public sector.

The starting-point for that is that we must be entitled to know what they are up to.

Their policies and operating methods.

Whether they are sticking to the rules on discrimination or procurement.

Already, there are institutions that we depend on every bit as much as we do on some of our public sector services.

Banks. Telecom firms. Water companies. Train and bus companies.

We need proper scrutiny of them as well. But at the moment, they can hide behind the excuse of commercial confidentiality.

And with the government’s plans to put out to tender almost every single public service, and this is about to get even worse.

Forget cosy words about localism or choice.

However much local people like local services that work well, they will have no choice in the matter.

Private companies will be able to challenge any service they would like to run and bid to take it over

And there will be nothing that local people, or their elected representatives, can do about it.

Greens will oppose those plans.

And we will also try to hold private companies to greater account.

That’s why I am proposing that the current Freedom of Information Act be amended to extend its coverage to the private sector.

If companies want to take on the role of public services, it is only right that they should take on the responsibilities that go with it.

And that includes being open about their activities.

We can avoid businesses being swamped with requests by using the Office of the Information Commissioner to lay down the classes of information that private companies must reveal – particularly those providing services to the public.

The effect of this change would be to help provide the accountability we so desperately need as more and more services move out of the public realm.

Imagine if we’d had FOI covering the banks in the run-up to the financial crash.

Then, it wouldn’t have only been a few city insiders in the Bank of England or the treasury keeping an eye on them, but academics, think tanks and ordinary people, all able to look at their appetite for risk or their lending policies.

Instead we had secrecy, a cosy relationship between the financial sector and the regulators.

As a consequence, we have the sharpest recession since the war, with millions facing redundancy and swingeing cuts in public services.

9. SOCIETY

But this isn’t only about economics. It’s about society too.

These cuts will harm society. No question about it.

And cutting away at the heart of our society – at the most vulnerable people – is just plain wrong. Morally wrong.

Because this is not a government that governs for all the people.

It governs for an elite. It governs for itself.

Look at how it demonises.

David Cameron now seems to tour the country finding new groups to portray as outsiders, or enemies within.

He preaches to Muslims about being good citizens on the same day that the so-called English Defence League are taking their rhetoric of hate and intimidation onto our streets.

Or prisoners. David Cameron says he feels ‘physically sick’ – yes, physically sick – at the idea of prisoners having the vote.

He finds that the views of the European Court of Human Rights – set up largely by Britain to promote our values of tolerance and respect – make him physically sick.

That allowing people in prison to retain their right to vote – and in doing so, perhaps help to encourage them to return to the mainstream of society – makes him sick.

I’m proud to be one of just 22 MPs who voted to uphold human rights and to challenge Britain’s flouting of European law.

Or protesters. When the police are caught sending undercover officers to spy on legitimate protest groups, where is David Cameron? Silent.

This is Cameron’s Britain. If you are healthy and wealthy, all will be well for you.

If you went to the right schools, know the right people and give to the right causes, then life will be golden.

But if you are vulnerable, if you need help from others, if you struggle to get by in an increasingly complex and difficult world, then life under the Tories is about to become even more painful.

10. POLITICAL RENEWAL

So we have our job cut out for us as the true opposition to the Conservatives.

The greatest barrier to our fulfilling this role is, of course, the state of our politics and the lack of genuine reform.

The depth of resistance by the establishment to proposals even for the modest change to the Alternative Vote shows us what we’re up against.

In increasingly desperate arguments, the Prime Minister’s latest objection is that we can’t possibly introduce AV because it’s apparently too complicated for people to understand.

Well if it really is that difficult for the government to count 1, 2, 3 in order, then it probably raises more questions about their economic competence than it does about the intelligence of the British public.

Meanwhile Lords reform is still held up. Parliament remains largely unchanged.

We saw a huge upswelling of public anger and frustration, but there remains a huge risk that the political elite will duck the issues and hope that anger goes away.

Maybe it will. But my fear is that it will deepen the pervasive and corrosive contempt towards politicians and politics as a whole.

This plays into the hands of the far right. It also benefits those who want a weakened state – big business, the media barons, the mega-rich.

They don’t want politics to reflect the will of the people.

Instead, they want a supine, discredited politics that allows them to wield their power undisturbed.

So the reform of politics must be one of our tasks. And that’s why I’ve been doing all I can to promote parliamentary modernisation and reform.

11. CLIMATE CHANGE

Now these may seem like details.

Certainly, compared to the real threats our country faces, MPs expenses or voting systems look a little petty.

But without reform, will the real issues ever be tackled?

After all, we’ve understood the dangers of climate change since the 1980s. Yet successive governments and Parliaments have done little or nothing.

By the time the rises in food and energy prices really bite, it will be too late.

Worse, part of our political inertia is because most of the suffering currently associated with climate change is happening elsewhere.

To echo Neville Chamberlain’s words, climate change is mostly affecting people in far-away countries of which we know very little.

Such attitudes are wrong.

And also they are a betrayal of the most fundamental duty of a government – to protect its citizens.

Climate change knows no borders.

And what happens elsewhere will come to affect us, all too soon unless we act now.

As Chamberlain’s successor, Winston Churchill, had he faced the threat of climate change would have said – action this day.

12. CONCLUSION

Friends, it is a great pleasure to return to Conference and reconnect with the lifeblood of the Party.

And the challenges we face are many.

And we see increasingly that they are linked.

And that they stem from the way the country is run by a political elite, hand in glove with the rich and powerful, be they individuals or corporations.

We see that the other parties are in their different ways unfit to change this.

And so we turn to the Greens as the only way we can work with others to challenge these wells-springs of inequality and injustice.

The actions of this government are now sending many more of our fellow citizens down the same road we have travelled.

Millions of people seeing that this government is for the few, not the many.

For the wealthy, not those in need.

They are seeing that the promises of our political elite are worthless.

That they will resist reform at every turn because it diminishes their power.

And that they will neglect the paramount interests of the country – to rebuild our society, to promote peace and justice in the world and to protect our climate – because these may get in the way of making money and preserving their ascendancy.

Those fellow citizens may be coming together to fight the consequences of the government’s policies – the cuts and the sell-offs. But soon they will come to see the causes.

That’s why the May elections are so important. It is the chance for us to reach out to our fellow citizens and turn their anger and frustration into support for the positive and principled alternative that we offer.

I know we can do this.

So I am confident that when we next meet, in September, it will be to welcome new councillors . And new assembly members.

There is a lot of work we need to do to make this happen.

But what will spur us on is the sight of the other parties, at local level, in the Assembly, and in Westminster.

Their self-interest. Their craven subjection to the power of the market.

Their determination to sacrifice public services to pay for the failings of the banks.

Their inability to respond to crises like international development or climate change.

We need better. The country needs better.

And they deserve politicians they can trust.

No-one else is providing the principled opposition to the three-party consensus.

This is our job. Our time.

Highlighting the difference between the short term jobs in open cast mining and the long term jobs in renewable energy; and the need to invest in public services to build long term stable economies, Mr Griffiths promised to fight for jobs in Wales.

Pledging his support for workers whose jobs are under threat from a Labour council in the Valleys – Rhondda Cynon Taf – Jake explained: “I cut my teeth fighting Thatcher, fighting the poll tax…The time has come to fight for Wales”.

Jake Griffiths is standing in the Welsh Assembly South Central Region – which includes Cardiff. Under the proportional voting system he needs to boost the party’s vote by 1% – a mark he looks set to surpass if recent polls are to be believed. this would make him Wales’ first Green Party Assembly member.