Webchat with Green Party leader, Natalie Bennett, Weds March 4th, at 1pm

[JustineMumsnet]

I'm very pleased to say that the leader of the Green Party England and Wales, Natalie Bennett, will be joining us for a webchat this Wednesday, March 4, at 1pm.

The Greens have been under the spotlight over the last few months, with a surge in membership, and controversy about whether they should be included in the pre-election TV debates.

Now's your chance to ask Natalie about leadership structures, the record of the Green council in Brighton and Hove and Brighton Pavilion MP Caroline Lucas, whether there's a long-term movement towards smaller parties in national politics, Green policies on housing, benefits, health, the economy and the environment - and what it's like to be at the eye of a media storm. Plus anything else that takes your fancy of course.

Natalie was born in Australia and worked as a journalist there and in Thailand before settling in the UK in 1999. She worked for The Guardian, among other UK newspapers, before becoming Green Party leader in 2012. She's standing for Parliament in the 2015 General Election in the constituency of Holborn and St Pancras.

Well, I think it could be useful to the Green Party to see these views (lets say against the NZ model and favouring the Nordic model) put forward so strongly on MN (even though I expressed this view more mildly upthread when Natalie was in on Wednesday)
As Petula mentions I'd be someone hoping to look at this again from within the Green Party as a supporter and member, but as she also says obviously fair enough if it is a deal-breaker for some
And I think the thread as a whole, and Natalie's answers to MNers questions, actually covered a diverse range of issues very comprehensively

I bet if one of their policies was to ban all pornography it might be the one thing that would stop you voting Voyage

It would also have got far more media recognition.

Well I don't accept your characterisation of this thread VoD.

Once the guest has gone, it's more or less a free-for-all - the thread goes wherever the posters take it. You're basically complaining that those potential green voters who feel they can't vote green because of this one enormous line in the sand issue (the equivalent of Labour's Clause 4 for some former labour supporters, or UKIP's withdrawal from Europe) have continued to discuss the issue on this thread. If other people want to discuss other issues, they are free to do so, none of us are telling them not to - you are the only one on this thread who has said that people shouldn't discuss an issue here.

And it's not us who hijacked as you put it - you are the one who waded in with your abysmal mansplainy attitude to tell us that we were OTT to discuss something important to us because there were more important issues to discuss. I even invited people to discuss the issue on the other thread but you continued to stay on here telling us how unimportant it was and whingeing about us being rude because we didn't address you in the tone you feel is due to you. Never mind about the tone you addressed towards us.

Gah.

Lion in the sun
I don't think voyage was saying he supported misogyny at all, on balance my view is that he is similar to my way of thinking that we HAVE to vote for 1 parties view because that is the way the system works right now. The alternative is not to vote but what does that achieve?

If we could vote based purely on policies I think the majority of green party policies would be very popular. Greens would probably not be able to pass the sex and drug decriminalisation laws in the first 4 years anyway; they would be lucky to get a coalition this time round so they'd have that to contend with anyway, which gives breathing space for members to look at the policies in detail and debate at conference for the next manifesto.

Tactical voting does not work, we are told via media it is only ever a pendulum swing between a lab-con but I believe if we vote for the party whom our views are aligned with most that could change the political landscape.

Nope, VoyageofDad, my question was one of the last ones answered.

Would you be prepared to have this conversation with Natalie or Caroline face to face?

Perhaps we could all get out of our trenches now? I'd have thought things might have cooled down overnight. Perhaps other people might want a turn. Sorry to be blunt, have been up most of the night.

Line Runner
I think you may well be right - some very valuable opinions from a range of voters, potential voters and non voters views! I hope they do revisit this thread again and take on board the strong opinions of the posters here.

Yy to no more tactical voting. Let's see what happens when most people vote for what they want, not what they think will be clever. Here's hoping most British people are still decent sorts.

Gibbering, women defending their right to prioritise whatever the hell they like when choosing who to vote for does not stop anyone else posting whatever they want to. Nobody is being denied a "turn".

I understand that too pand0ra I was trying to find something that a lot more men than women would be in uproar about to aid his understanding in why women in particular are upset about legalising prostitution. I also understand that in 4 years it is unlikely to be the first thing to change, but a step towards super brothels and all that come with allowing trafficking to continue legally is not something that I'd be happy to be compliant in. If it is an active point on their manifesto it needs to be prominent in our minds as something they do intend to do something about relatively quickly.

I do agree with you there lion , I also think voyage was coming across from that position too - turning UK into a large scale version of Amsterdam chills me to the bone and would the majority of us to be honest.

Still waiting for someone - anyone! - to expand on the Greens' proposals for education and childcare.

I'm beginning to think they haven't actually got as far as working it out (the housing debacle has helped me along that line ). Either that, or they know voters won't like their proposals so they're trying hard to avoid discussion on the subject.

This issue has the potential to wreck childcare for working families. It has the potential to force mothers to stay at home until their children reach school age (proposed as 7 years old).
They are beginning to sound like a party that no self respecting woman should vote for!

tanith why is it mothers that have to stay at home?

Men also can do this job.....

Having a child is a responsibility. If you want to continue with both parents working after having children, and pay someone else to look after them, than clearly you need to make sure you can pay for that option.

Changing the starting age for school doesn't really affect that equation.

VoD, about your post at 7:02

Aaaaaaaaaargh!!!!!

Feel free to discuss other policies.

Nobody is shutting you down or hijacking, you are simply not acknowledging this as an important issue.

If the Greens don't want to LISTEN to real women (as opposed to prostitutes most of whom were groomed at a young age and some services who see the results of this in their hospitals and police stations and want a quick fix, understandably, but that's what it is and it will never get to the root of the problem, not forgetting the libertarians whose concept of sexual liberty was the cause of the normalisation of 'child love' aka paedophilia in the 80s), that's fine, we won't vote for them.

That's all we're saying. I hope you see that we just can't do it, regardless of how worthy the other green policies are. And given that other parties have now adopted some fairly good environmental policies, right now, there's not much in it for us.

This is an issue at loggerheads with environmentalism anyway, because it is driven by money, self indulgence and power at the expense of respect, health and long term sustainability, exactly the same issues that have caused environmental destruction.

It is a fundamental policy flaw and to me and indicates a lack of coherence.

Icebeing, I agree that men can do this job and should be encouraged financially, as should Grandparents and family friends. However in Germany some women find themselves better off if they stay at home and end up feeling stuck. So the details are essential here.

Is it possible to vote for the SNP if you're not Scottish? They have some great policies.

Tanith, if it helps (may be patronising) their website says clearly that it is only the age for starting academic learning that's affected. It says people will be free to send their childen into school earlier, and they also want to build up early childcare again. If you want more than that you'll probably need to get in touch with them and ask.

Cottage, I haven't seen any other party take environmental issues seriously. Greening the edges is not enough, the whole socioeconomic model that brought us to this point needs overhauling. Why do you think environmentalism is driven by... all that? I've seen fairly damning links between big business and some big green but that doesn't slam the whole movement.

cottage it relies on them having a candidate in your constituency, and the SNP aren't going to have any candidates outside scotland

Of course Petula, Be good if they did though, that would put a spanner in the works!

cottage, I suspect the real problem is that the Green party aren't listening to the prostituted women who were, eg, groomed at a young age. Some of the organisations that parade themselves as "the authentic voice of sex workers" are in reality a mix of pimps and middle-class kinksters who do have a choice, but who don't give a shit about all the women who never had a choice.

Icebeing I suspect it will be mothers because of an increasingly misogynistic slant that seems to be coming from the Greens.

Of course it could be fathers: I work as a childminder with my husband. I'm well aware that men are perfectly capable of caring for children. However, this is a relatively new development. When my DH originally became a SAHP, he was very much a novelty. He is still unusual as a professional male childcarer.

The Greens seem to be looking back nostalgically. Does that include the role of the SAHM?

Gibbering The question I have already posted for the webchat asked for further clarification of the "free, voluntary" childcare that the Greens propose. I asked how existing professional childcare would fit in. Natalie chose to ignore it. I wonder why...

The thing I don't understand about the Greens is that there are some amazing women in the party, and there always have been. What is going on that all this stuff has happened despite them?

What I'm wondering is when are we going to have Nigel Farage on MN?

If MN has hosted Natalie, leader of the loony left party of druids and Trots, on to answer questions when are we going to hear from the leader of the loony right?

I'd like them to get on the Respect MP.

You know, the one who doesn't believe in women's right to bodily integrity.