Nationally, the big three parties all lost. Labour lost a lot of seats, the Lib Dem surge lost them seats, and the Tories frittered away what had been a massive poll lead, and didn’t get enough seats for a majority. The only parties who won in terms of the voting were us Greens, getting our first MP, the Northern Ireland Alliance Party, who also got their first MP, and Plaid Cymru, who picked up a seat.

In the local elections, Labour were the big winners.The big three parties all benefited from the locals being held alongside the general, and Labour was the party which, as a result, gained seats. In fact, in some wards in London, this led to paper candidates tripling their vote, and shooting past parties who campaigned hard to double theirs.

For some good analysis of the national picture, take a look at Jim Jepps’ blog

Anyway, we now have a Lib-Con coalition. On the upside there are some signs that the deal has reigned in some of the Tories’ pro-rich policies, and we’ve got nice-looking things like the new Freedom Bill, which will revoke most, if not all, of Labour’s attacks on civil liberties. On the downside, are the savage cuts they’ll be making to public services. If you’re a Lib Dem member or voter who is unhappy about this new alliance, The Greens will happily offer you a new political home.

One more piece of post-election analysis that’s worth pointing to is from The Jubilee Centre, who reminds Christians why we’ve no need to panic about how bad the new government might turn out,
and that we still have a duty to pray for the the new government.

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Firstly, there’s the Vote for Policies site, which allows you to find out which party reflects your views on a range of policy issues. The Green Party is the most popular party on this measure (at 26.47% as I write this), so it’s a shame that the actual election result is very unlikely to reflect that.

Then there’s the Green Party’s make your own election video, based on our party election broadcast:

If you’re a Christian wondering whether or not you should bother with the election, then here’s 10 reasons for Christians to vote and a whole host of resources aimed at Catholics explaining why bother to vote.

There are a whole host of websites offering summaries and analysis of the different parties’ policies on various issues. However, I really don’t have the time to try to compile a useful list of them, so you’ll just have to go hunting.

And, finally, something amusing I stumbled across this morning is that, according to this article, the Tories apparently think that promising to give us “the power to plant trees” gives them some kind of credibility on environmental issues.

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In fact, even the Tories’ core activists appear to be having doubts. There are quite a few Tory activists who want to see Nigel Farage take Tom Bercow’s seat in Buckingham (see, for example, the comments here). Apparently they think that he’s “too new Labour” which, given that new Labour is virtually indistinguishable from the Tories in policy terms, doesn’t bode well for David Cameron’s future.

Labour are, likewise, in disarray – knowing that they are on course to lose the next General Election, and fighting each other, rather than fighting to change their collective fortune.

This means that smaller parties like the Greens, have a massive opportunity for breakthrough. Green membership is growing, our share of the vote went up by more than anybody else’s in the European Elections – and did so across the country, and we managed to quadruple our share of the vote in the Norwich North By-Election. In fact, we are more popular amongst those thinking of switching their vote than the Tories.

The best example of how much difference having highly motivated activists on the ground makes is Barack Obama’s presidential election campaign. The most important factor in his win over John McCain was the massive emphasis he placed on having activists on the ground. Every other aspect of his campaign was built around his ground game.

If we can get those who voted for us to become members and activists, , if we can equip them to be effective campaigners in towns and cities across the country, and if we can direct their efforts to the wards and constituencies where they will have the greatest effect, then we have a good chance of becoming and remaining a major player in British politics and getting much of our policy agenda enacted.

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Of the six national parties with enough support to obtain Euro MPs, there are two that I consider to be particularly in conflict with Christian values. The first is the BNP – who are both racist and fascist. Their whole ethos is direct conflict with the core of the gospel. The second is UKIP. Whilst their central policy is an issue which is morally neutral, the party seems to be dominated by those with a “little Englander” mentality.

Of the remaining four parties, the Green Party’s values seem to me to match Biblical values a bit more than the other parties. They also match my political instincts, which may well colour my judgement.

So what are the values which attracted me to the Green Party?

Ecological Wisdom

The first, and most distinctive, of these values is the party’s commitment to the environment. Whilst Labour and the Tories talk about this issue a lot and the Lib Dems have a few good environmental policies, the Greens are the only party which considers how we treat the Earth as an issue of first importance. This is particularly important as we live in an era where climate change is one of the biggest dangers to the future of human civilisation.

This commitment to the environment is very close to the Bible’s teaching about how we are to relate to the rest of creation – we are to be good stewards of it, and practise what is increasingly being called “creation care”.

Social Justice

The Greens are strongly committed to the cause of the poor, both in this country, and globally. Unlike Labour, whose current leadership has downplayed its socialist roots (which, incidentally, largely lie in Christian Socialism), the Greens still put the welfare of the poor as a matter of high priority.

This commitment is, of course, a major theme of the Bible. If you don’t think that God hates injustice and oppression of the poor, then you either haven’t read the Bible or haven’t understood it.

Long-Term Perspective

The Greens are the only major UK party whose policies plan for the long term. The big three parties are particularly guilty of not doing this. Their policies, when they actually have any, seem to be driven primarily by short-term factors – being geared towards the next election, or making a splash in the press. The Greens may not take as long-term a perspective as God does, but they certainly aren’t as short-sighted as the other parties.

Nonviolence

The Green Party is committed to non-violent solutions to conflicts. Whilst I believe that some wars (such as World War 2) are a necessary evil, I believe that this approach to conflict fits far better with what Jesus taught (turn the other cheek, bless those who curse you, etc.) than the pro-war stances that Labour, the Tories and, to a lesser extent, the Lib Dems have taken over the last couple of decades.

Grassroots Democracy

Unlike the big three parties, the Greens are run from the bottom up. There isn’t central vetting of the activities or decisions of local parties, which means there are more opportunities to get involved at a practical level, and that local candidates actually have roots in the communities they seek to represent. It also means that the leaders aren’t behaving like the rulers that Jesus condemned in Luke 22:25, and imposing their leadership on the membership.

Focus on Community

The Greens are big on the value of community when it comes to economics. The major parties all agree that particular economic indicators (particularly economic growth) are the main measure of a successful country. The Greens, however, take a wider view, considering non-economic factors to be equally important. Society is viewed from a holistic viewpoint and not primarily in terms of how much money it produces.

Overall Values

Whilst there are certainly factions within each of the big three parties that tend towards most of these values (the Compassionate Conservatives in the Tory Party, the grassroots socialists in the Labour Party, and the Social Democratic wing of the Lib Dems), I believe that the Green Party reflects the Biblical view the most. There are areas where Greens tend not to be as much inline with Biblical values, and other areas where they don’t particularly stand out. However, in the 21st Century Western world, it is my belief that the values I have outlined are particularly important. The major challenges of our era demand this kind of approach to politics in order to find solutions. And that’s why I chose to join the Green Party rather than any of the others.

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