Ellie Chowns calls for Green Party reform after anti-Zionism vote

Green Party Westminster leader Ellie Chowns called on Saturday, 10 October, for the party to address weaknesses in its policy-making process after members at its England and Wales conference adopted an anti-Zionist motion. Speaking to BBC Radio 4, she said she wanted to ensure the party was not vulnerable to capture by extremists and racists, while stressing that she did not know whether any were in the party.

Her intervention shifts attention from the conference decision earlier this month to how the party makes policy. Chowns called the motion significant and damaging, and said a decision supported by 0.4% of members showed that something was not working in the party’s structures. The party reported that the motion passed by 1,022 votes to 813; the BBC put its total membership at 230,000.

What Ellie Chowns said about the conference vote

Chowns told the BBC she did not think the motion represented the views of the large majority of Green members or of people across the country. That is her assessment: the conference tally records how those who voted divided, rather than measuring the views of the full membership. She also said the row risked distracting from the party’s campaigning for Palestinian rights and described Zionism as a contested concept.

Asked about extremists and racists, Chowns said: ‘I don't know if there are extremists and racists in my party. But I want to make sure that my party isn't vulnerable to capture by extremists and racists.’ Her warning did not identify people who had joined the party for that purpose or establish that such a takeover had occurred.

The Independent reported Lucas’s suggestion of entryism, in which activists join a party to influence it. That remains an allegation about what may have happened, rather than an established account of who joined or why. The BBC reported that Lucas did not blame Polanski for the party’s wider structural problems.

What the Green Party’s anti-Zionism motion says

The Green Party announced on 4 October that its conference had adopted the motion. Its statement says the policy opposes Zionism, which the party defines as an ethnonationalist political project, and states that anti-Zionism should not be equated with antisemitism. It also backs Palestinian liberation, the right of return, boycott, divestment and sanctions, and a full arms embargo against Israel.

The party says the motion supports a single democratic state throughout historic Palestine. In its statement after the vote, a spokesperson said members had held a serious debate and conference had made its decision. The spokesperson described the Greens as an anti-racist party committed to equality and human rights for all. Those are the party’s stated positions, even as senior figures dispute the decision and its consequences.

The adopted policy itself was the earlier development, covered in the article on the Green Party’s conference vote. Chowns’s comments on Saturday concern the party’s response to that vote and the way future decisions are made.

How Jewish Greens described the disagreement

An October 2 briefing from Jewish Greens said the group was divided over the proposed motion and would not take a collective position on it. Of 108 responses to a question about Zionist identity, 81% said they did not identify as Zionist. The briefing also described a significant minority who did identify that way, showing why the group’s position cannot be reduced to a single view.

The group reported concerns among survey respondents about the motion’s potential effects on the party, alongside support for its wider pro-Palestinian position. Those responses describe the views of people who answered its survey. They do not establish the views of all Jewish Greens, nor do they resolve Chowns’s question about whether the party’s decision reflects its wider membership.

The question now facing the Greens is whether party leaders and members will change the structures Chowns criticised. Neither her interview nor the party’s statement sets out an agreed procedural change. For now, the conference vote stands as the party’s announced policy, and the scale of support or opposition beyond those who voted remains unmeasured in the cited reporting.