The Greens have adopted their candidates for the three Brighton and Hove seats in the general election on Thursday 8 June and agreed to seek an electoral alliance with other parties.
The selection of Caroline Lucas, Britain’s first and only Green MP, to stand again in Brighton Pavilion had already been announced.
She will be joined by Davy Jones in Brighton Kemptown. He contested the seat at the 2015 general election and came fourth with 3,187 votes.
In Hove the party’s candidate will be Phélim Mc Cafferty, the convenor of the Green group on Brighton and Hove City Council and a former deputy leader of the council.
The Greens said that they were writing to Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Women’s Equality Party and others to “ask for talks about electoral alliances”.
At a rally in Brighton yesterday (Saturday 22 April) Lib Dem Chris Bowers, who stood for the Lib Dems against Caroline Lucas in 2015, also said that his party would be asking its members about a possible deal.
After the last election Mr Bowers co-edited a book called The Alternative with Ms Lucas and the Labour MP Lisa Nandy. It explores the case for a “progressive alliance” to fight the Conservatives.
Ms Lucas said: “Britain is at a crossroads. This general election will dictate the future of our country for generations.
“Theresa May wants a mandate to force through an extreme Brexit, with consequences that could be devastating for our environment, our economy, our world-famous health service and our city.
“In Brighton, we voted overwhelmingly to remain part of the EU and every day my constituents in Brighton Pavilion tell me just how worried they are about Theresa May’s plans.
“I pledge to fight tooth and nail for the best possible outcome from the EU negotiations and for the right to vote on any Brexit deal. I will stand up for EU nationals, for defending our environment and for protecting our hard-won rights.
“I will continue to fight against the privatisation of our world-famous NHS and for more affordable housing, more renewable energy, more positive action on climate change and for air that we can breathe safely.
“And I will continue the fight to protect the future for our local young people, not least by supporting our city’s wonderful Save our Schools campaign and seeking to end crippling student debts.
“The vast majority of people I speak to here in Brighton have had enough of the way politics is going in our country. The times we live in demand the bigger, bolder, fairer vision that the Green Party offers nationally and that I offer here at home.
“I am so proud to serve as an MP in this wonderful city and I hope that on (Thursday) 8 June the people of Brighton Pavilion will allow me to continue.
“Many will know that the idea of local electoral alliances is close to my heart and that Brighton and Hove is a city where alliances could make a very real difference to the outcome of this election.
“The Green Party here will be inviting other parties to talk with us and I sincerely urge those parties to join positively in such talks.
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Brighton and Hove returned three MPs who do not support the Conservatives’ approach to Brexit or the dismantling of our public services and who do support voting reform to create a fairer, more just type of politics in the city and the country.”
Mr Jones said: “I am proud that I have been selected once again to represent the Green Party in Brighton Kemptown and to champion our different approach to politics, social justice and the environment.
“In 2015, Brighton Kemptown sadly sent a Conservative to Westminster. I would not like to see this happen again.
“I know that not all the other parties have yet selected their candidates for the constituency but I would like to open dialogue with any parties who share this view.
“Let us see if, this time around, we can truly make a difference and at the same time send Theresa May the message that her approach to politics, Brexit and public services is not welcome anywhere in our city.”
Councillor Mac Cafferty said: “I am delighted to stand in the general election as the Green Party candidate for Hove. It’s time for a positive and bold vision for Hove and for serious change.
“Under the watch of a Conservative government, homelessness in our city has doubled, the environment has been abandoned and we are facing a ‘hard Brexit’, with a non-existent opposition from Labour.
“The Greens are the only party to say loud and clear, ‘Brighton and Hove will not stand for this.’
“I want to secure a better future for our young people and our environment; to stand up for the many residents plunged into uncertainty by Brexit and the housing crisis.
“I will fight to protect our precious National Health Service and for an end to Tory cuts.
“It’s time to send a clear message to Westminster – our city will not endure more years of destructive, divisive Tory leadership.
“The Greens have been the only party locally to effectively challenge Labour and Conservatives on many issues from council cuts, to the privatisation of the NHS and air pollution.
“As a councillor in the Hove area for the past six years, I know what it means to stand up for our community.
“I am proud of what I have achieved for local people and passionate about our city. Building on my experience as Green group convenor, I will continue to do my best for the residents of Hove, ensuring they are represented at every level.
“As MP Caroline Lucas has shown in Brighton Pavilion, Greens are serious about challenging the government.
“A vote for the Greens is a vote for local, hard-working and accountable representatives prepared to punch above our weight.
“This election is an opportunity to have a Green voice for Hove in Parliament.”
So poor old Christopher Hawtree has sadly not been selected as Green Party candidate for Hove having done just as well as Davy Jones in Kemp Town last time (both having narrowly avoided losing their deposits). Please bring back Christopher as a candidate!
And didn’t Christopher have to resign his seat as a councillor to allow him to be a candidate in the GE? Will Prelim do the same?
Or are both Davy and Prelim just “no hopes” in a pact with Labour in return for the “no hopes” they are putting forward for Brighton Pavilion?
Personally I hope that Tom Bewick is selected for Labour in Kemptown, whilst I disagree with him passionately on Brexit, hands down he is better than the alternatives and I’m certain he would work hard for his constituency and the greater good of the constituency.
McCafferty is interesting in Hove, but I’ve been impressed by Kyle and of course there is a potential challenger from the Conservatives if he should be selected and chooses to stand.
Why the Conservatives have reinstalled Kirby as their choice in Kemptown escapes me…
You have a curious obsession with me.
The fact is that I did not want to be MP candidate again. (And there is no need for Phelim to stand down as Councillor as there is not a Council Election on the same day, unlike 2015. Both Graham Cox and I thought it would be graceless, and feeble, to stand for both positions.)
As it is, you seem to belong to the carriage-clock brigade which expects everybody to do the same thing throughout life, and then retire with that invariable, and weird, gift of a carriage clock to tick away the remaining hours. But life needn’t be like that. It can be a case of a variety of experiences.
Recently I was with Phelim and others at the burial of a good friend. It struck me, as I looked down, how deep a grave is. And, as we walked away, it was to reflect upon making as much of life as possible. Which does not appear to be Mr Wiley’s philosophy: he prefers to give precious time to laying down the law about the lives that others should lead. But at the graveside I recalled Laura Nyro who sang of hearing “it’s mighty cold down there… And when I die / There’ll be one child born / And a world to carry on.”
One wonders what St. Peter will make of the CV which Mr “Wiley” will flash at him (assuming he gets there). He certainly cannot claim typing a s skill.
Don’t listen to what Mr Wiley says; I think you are a smashing lad, and I am sure that your mam is very proud of you.
Further more, I’m always impressed by your choice of footwear.
Kind regards,
Joe Stains
Dear Christopher – my only “obsession” with you is in regard to your continual “obsession” with keeping library services in the Carnegie and as a result the amount of city spending that has being wasted based upon this “obsession” rather than being willing to consider a different solution might be better for the residents in terms of cost and services provided in the 21st century.
That you have published much misinformation about this subject causing intentional fear – for example that the entire library was going to close (with your Save Hove Library posters) when that was never the case.
Your continual mention of death and what is written on CVs makes me feel that you are indeed desperate to leave something to the next generation for you to be remembered by, as you seem to have achieved so little of value so far. I have no such qualms about my mortality and am very happy with what I have achieved.
This is especially now in my retirement when I can highlight the lies and misinformation posted on sites by many people on many different topics – especially by pompous and arrogant politicians and businessmen.
I was really looking forward to you standing again as the Green Party, but as you now seem to be quite happy to stop putting yourself forward to serve the community, but instead to act as a loyal sycophantic Green Party activist focussing on library services then so be it. Just don’t expect me to stop be sceptical about your support for keeping your beloved Carnegie.
I’ll be very interested to see how well Davey and Phelim perform in June in their aspirations for climbing the political greasy pole. Perhaps they will do better than Jason and Alex in their attempts to become MEPs.
You contradict yourself. You say that I have done little of value – and then want me to do more of that. I cannot judge what you have done as you hide behind a pseudonym.
Your allegation that I have promulgated “misinformation” about Hove Library means that the subject of the Council’s Sally McMahon should be ventilated rather more. She got the job as Head of Libraries after being, er, Head of Security at the Pavilion. She tried to close down the Carnegie in 2003 by saying that it could not meet the DDA requirements. Of course, it could – and duly did so. In 2015 she inflated the maintenance costs and reduced those of shrinking it into the Museum “hub” (a word which always sets off alarm bells).
There is rather more to be said about this. Meanwhile, I do not understand what you mean about “the 21st Century”. Time is a continuum, it does not fall into such constructs. And so it speeds on, we are almost a fifth of the way through it. A child born as type this has a chance – climate change willing – of greeting the 22nd Century.
“Man tills the earth and lies beneath.”
Snore…so your pathetic defense to the accusation of promulgating misinformation is to accuse someone else!
The rest of your diatribe is the typical of the pomposity that I referenced earlier. If you don’t know how the world has changed from when the Carnegie was built to now you must be living in a different world to normal people who accept that technology has changed what libraries have to deliver.
I was definitely wrong when I said I was upset you weren’t standing as the Green candidate – your comments above show why you really are not suited to be either a councillor or a Member of Parliament.
Again you make assertions without looking at the facts. Survey after survey shows that more than 80% of people put good book stock as the main reason to go to a Library.
Yes Christopher- all very interesting – but this has absolutely nothing to do with the subject of this article or my comments about the GE Green candidates being no-hopers. Please can you learn to stay on topic; and discuss the points raised.
WRT to book stocks – very interesting – what has this got to do with modernising library services?Please can you provide the source and detailed results of this survey, and explain why this could not have been achieved if library services had moved to the museum site. Yet again, you just can’t seem to be able to stay on topic!
I was replying to your – shall we say – trumpery assertion about the Library and myself. True, that was not the subject of the article, but it was you that made it so. As such, you have made your bed of nails and evidently must lie (as it were) upon it.
Each incarnation of the Library Plan has carried this survey, which makes it depressing that it is not carried through. And let us not forget the terrible scandal of Sally McMahon ordering great books to be put in a skip outside Jubilee, whence they were saved by a builder who ferried them in his van – several trips – to Oxfam in Hove. Labour’s Tony Miller – now dead – did apologise to me for this, but it was too late.
Had the Library been shrunk into the Museum in 2015, there would have been fewer books. And the fact is that where books are, readers follow. Meanwhile, there are no daily newspapers in the Carnegie: this is increasingly regarded by residents as a plot to reduce the number of people going there, and so it goes.
Meanwhile, I still chuckle at Labour’s last minute, 2015 proposal to put a cinema in the Carnegie basement, which is three feet high. As I remarked at the time, the first film shown there could have been Being John Malkovich.
And so, to return to the Hove constituency. By your insistence upon dwelling on it, I think one can say that it is an interestingly volatile one. It’s all down to the legwork, but, having done a lot of that, I’d say ukip will drop (2015 candidate was palpably embarrassed by his ever-muttering supporters), LibDems can only rise (after losing their deposit in 2015), and – say so myself – Greens came third. Tusc was all mouth – a lot of it – and no trousers: came a low last.
I should not be surprised if Labour puts its main effort into Hove. Caroline’s majority is very good, and none of the self-appointed Kemp Town candidates for Labour has anything like the calibre of Simon Burgess or Nancy Platts, who have declined it.
And, if I may, all my sympathies to the saintly Mrs. Wiley should you find a rare interval away from the keyboard to exchange residual pleasantries with her.
Christopher – so you still can not answer direct questions – especially those asking you to provide the data behind your supposed facts. Even now you are totally avoiding the point and going back to the last GE where you go back to your “pinnacle of achievement” in having got more votes that the UKIP candidate – wow!
Thanks you for your concerns about Mrs Wiley – is Mrs Hawtree suitably impressed with the way you spend your time trying to protect your beloved Carnegie? Was she equally impressed in you getting more votes than UKIP even though you only just avoided losing your deposit?
I cannot understand this. Well over my head.
I’m pleased to see the Green candidates have now been announced. The Greens are all ears and welcome discussions with other progressive parties. However, should the Greens end up being the only Party willing to enter discussion (along with the Lib Dems who seem open to talking) and if Labour aren’t interested in any sort of political alliance, then i feel confident that the Green candidates will do well. Even in Lewes yesterday there were so many Vote Green posters everywhere for their local elections on May 4th. Far more than any other Party! There comes a time when people look for real change. No other Party is willing to look after both people and the planet and they go hand-in-hand. Or rather i should say ‘they HAVE to go hand-in-hand’.
There has always been such potential in Lewes. And in Hastings.
Not to mention fracking concerns across Sussex.
All of which shows why Labour’s cllr Morgan was very foolish with his unpleasant Vote of No Confidence. I choked that afternoon to see two Labour councillors – Carden and Pissaridou – raise their hands against me after I had troubled to show meaningful support when their spouces died. That afternoon, etched in the mind, as I looked across the Hove Town Hall Chamber, convinced me politics is a shoddy thing.
Poor old “Gerald Wiley” will doubtless be spluttering, and even toppling from his saloon-bar stool, at news that Stockholm radio sent an intrepid reporter to make a piece about Hove’s Carnegie Library, with comments by residents. Here is is. Click on the link’s blue button for edification. Although naturally cosmopolitan, the Hove residents do speak in English. Meanwhile the Hove case has not only encouraged people in Swindon and Scotland but now Surrey.
http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=478&artikel=6678202
Well I’m actually amazed you can get a Swedish radio station to inquire about an ancient library in Hove. However I still don’t see what this has to do with the selection of Green GE candidates; your amazing political CV; or why we can’t have better, modern, library facilities in Hove.
I’d actually be more impressed if you had a video program (this is the 21st century granddad) in the UK where they asked you probing questions and you could repay with your typically strange answers quoting dead people that no one knows.
That you won’t provide data to backup your claims, nor seem able to tell us what Mrs Hawtree thinks about the amount of time you invest in supporting the Carnegie is much more revealing on the amount of misinformation you provide in support of it.
Perhaps you should spend a bit more of your undoubted spare time (what do you do for a living) supporting the causes of the Green Party rather than a supporting a building that s no longer fit for purpose.
What does “modern” mean? The absurd proposal was to squash the Library into… a building thirty years older than the Carnegie.
You turned the news report here into something about the Library and me. When the report is about the 2017 Election. But there you go, and with it you have brought revelations about the officer class.
And again you egostack. “Dead people no one knows.” I do not know to whom you refer but the successful dead are known by some, and if not, then swift life is a matter of following up things, if it be one’s will, for life is surely a matter of daily discovery rather than repetition. A well-stocked library fosters that spirit. As the Swedish broadcast shows, there is worldwide astonishment that Britain is trashing its libraries.
But they were not going to trash Hove Library – please stop spreading this misinformation – it does nothing to enhance the reputation of past Green Party councillors and potentialMPs.
if you don’t want a tory MP in Kemptown why are you fielding a candidate. if you hadn’t last time it would have had a labour MP. I judge by actions not by what is said by MPs and political parties and this just smacks of saying one thing and doing the complete opposite