It’s only one poll. That’s the mantra when a poll arrives that is, to coin a phrase, a real mic drop. And that’s exactly how to describe today’s YouGov poll for Sky News.
Last week’s Gorton and Denton by-election win by the Greens was a sensational first. But in context, it’s as nothing compared with today’s poll that puts the Greens second on 21 per cent, ahead of Labour and the Tories on 16 per cent each, and just two points behind Reform on 23 per cent.
Just one poll. I keep telling myself it’s just one poll. Because if it’s in any way more significant than a one-off, the result of all the publicity after that by-election win, then – to be blunt – we really are screwed. And by “we” I don’t just mean JC readers. I mean all of us.
As it is, even if it is only a one-off, it’s still a damning indictment of how we – those of us in the political mainstream who believe politics and policy should be based on rational thought – have failed, miserably failed, both to tackle the core issues that the new-look Greens have made hay on, and to inculcate that sense that rational thought should be paramount. The poll has the Greens top in every age category for under-50s. Forty-nine per cent of 18-24-year-olds say they back the Greens, which is shocking in itself, but given how young people are usually more radical, less shocking than the 27 per cent of 25 to 49-year-olds. Politics has clearly failed.
I have my issues with this government. I had my issues with the last government. I’ve always regarded the Lib Dems as a waste of time and space. But they all operate within the parameters of the real world. I’ve been damning in these pages about Keir Starmer, David Lammy et al. But they are up there with Demosthenes in comparison with the new-look Greens under Zack Polanski.
This is the man, consider, who thinks we should replace Nato with an alliance with Brazil and Mexico, who thinks our defences are a waste of money as everything can be negotiated, who wants to legalise all drugs and make them available via the state, who thinks it should be illegal for anyone to rent out property…I could go on. Polanski believes – I use that word with some reluctance, since I don’t actually think he believes in anything except himself – in every bonkers economic populist idea ever conceived. We can, he says, “borrow” whatever money we need to pay for whatever level of public services we need and it won’t be a problem because it’s not a “real” debt burden as we would owe it to ourselves.
This is the same Zack Polanski who was a proselytising member of the Lib Dems until 2017 but swiftly left when his candidacy was blocked. In other words, when his political career there stalled he upped sticks and moved. As a Lib Dem, he espoused their relatively sane policies. But he saw a great opportunity in the Greens, did the necessary volte face, and here he now is leading the party to huge potential success.
But there is a darker side to this. The issue is not just that the Greens’ policies are barking – yet those very policies are why they are gaining support. That’s a huge issue for mainstream politics, which has failed to deliver the basics for people, so they are turning to parties which were once on the fringe.
But there is a darker issue for Jews, which is related to the ease with which Polanski can dump one set of supposed beliefs for another.
When Corbynites were kicked out of Labour, the new-look Greens provided a warm welcome. They have brought their racism with them. In a few days, for example, the party’s spring conference will debate a motion that would sit well at the conference of a neo-Nazi party, to make anti-Zionism a core principle of the party. Zionism, the motion says, should be “treated as any other form of racism” and the very idea of antisemitism, it says, “perpetuates biological racism” by “erasing” other Semitic peoples such as Arabs, Assyrians and Palestinians. Anyone who identifies as Zionist would be banned from membership. In other words, the vast majority of Jews would be constitutionally banned by the Greens. Reports suggest the motion is widely supported and will pass.
The fig leaf of Polanski being Jewish is used by supporters who argue that the party has no issue with Jews, only Zionists. But it’s clear from Polanski’s own behaviour that he is perfectly happy to be used as such a fig leaf, even if it means damning and betraying his own family.
His mother and sister have posted their support for pro-Israel groups and events in the UK. His mother supported a pro-Israel demonstration in Manchester and has criticised a Labour MP who compared Israel’s behaviour in Gaza to the Nazis. Last week he was interviewed by Iain Dale on LBC, who began by asking, “Do you think Zionism is racism?” Polanski responded with jumble of meaningless words. Dale replied: “Let’s just put this to bed: Zionism is not racism.” Polanski could say only, “It depends on what you mean by Zionism.”
Dale then brought up Polanski’s family: “If this motion went through your conference, your mother and your sister – who have been openly pro-Israel – would be cast as racist. You can’t possibly as leader of the Green Party want that to happen?”
Shamefully, Polanski could not bring himself to say that his mother and sister are not racist. He replied: “I am equivocating, actually, and I’m openly equivocating.” So Dale continued. What would he say to his mother if she called the programme to say she was a Zionist? Polanski replied: “What do you mean by Zionism?”
This is a man who will not even defend his own mother and sister if it’s awkward in an interview, so no one should be surprised that he is willing to be leader of a party so antisemitic it is contemplating a ban on any Jew who does not denounce Israel.
And it should come as no surprise, either, that Polanski will utter not a word of criticism of his deputy leader, Mothin Ali, who attended a rally at the weekend at which the Tehran regime was celebrated and defended, having posted on social media of his glee on October 7, 2023, having publicly backed the Houthis when the RAF was in action over Yemen, and having, according to Rabbi Zecharia Deutsch, the former student chaplain at Leeds University, “unleashed hate on my family…his social media posts had a really significant effect on the Leeds community”.
Not only has Polanski refused to criticise Ali, he has labelled criticism of the Green deputy leader’s presence at the rally as “blatant Islamophobia… Smearing a caring man of principle for standing up for peace."
It should also come as no surprise – indeed it’s entirely on brand – that the Greens should have appointed a new press officer, Abi Wilkinson, who has described Zionists as “demonic” and repeatedly denied that any Israeli woman was raped on October 7, 2023: “There is not a single identified victim. It wouldn’t justify this genocide if it was true, but there’s absolutely no evidence whatsoever that it is.” You’ll never guess for whom Wilkinson was previously working. Oh, OK, you did. Yes, Zarah Sultana MP.
The last word should go to Darren Johnson, the former Green leader on the London Assembly, who has left the party: “With the Greens’ descent into ludicrous left-populism ("Zionism is racism", "abolish landlords") people ask me why other longstanding Greens have remained. After years in the wilderness, you've got to remember how intoxicating winning can be, even if your new activists are batshit.”
To get more from opinion, click here to sign up for our free Editor's Picks newsletter.