The Green Party; their track record, legacy and future.

DeVore

How do you think this period of the Green party will be recorded/remembered?

Many people are saying that your party will be "wiped out" at the next general election as a punishment for supporting a deeply unpopular FF government, what is your response to that?

What do you see as the future of the Green Party in the future?

Can you outline what you see as the successes for the GP in this period in government?

DeV.

gandalf

This is a question/comment from the user FoxT on the questions thread in Politics.

Hi, I am married with children, living in Cork, aged in my forties.

I believe the Green party has done a poor job in Government. It will be remembered for

- Ban on stag hunting & mink farming
- Irrational road tax regime
- Gormley's outburst regarding vehicles with commercial tax discs
- Poolbeg incinerator situation is out of control. Ireland needs an incinerator ( & I would have welcomed one at Ringaskiddy) - but NOT in a location where every truck load of rubbish has to be carted to it via Dublin city centre.

I want the GP to be successful - so that as a voter I have more choice. So far I am very disappointed.

My question is - How do you think the Green party can recover from this, to be seen as a viable party for which to vote?

johnnyskeleton

If the Green party lose a lot of seats in the next election, would you consider setting up or joining a new green party that went back to their core beliefs after the party's more recent stray into mainstream/FF policies?

Alternatively, do you think that the Green party has learned and evolved from being in government with FF and will likely mature as a political party in coming years?

oppenheimer1

I certainly think the greatest positive legacy the green party could leave would be the implementation of the ban on corporate donations to political parties. How come after almost 4 years in power, this key policy hasn't been implemented? Are the Green party serious about this, or will it be put on the back burner continually, until an election is called and the policy forgotten about.

Were the greens ever serious about this?


I see the above has mostly been answered in another thread, so I will add this. Will donations from trade unions be also banned under the proposed legislation?

PaulGogartyTD

oppenheimer1 wrote: »

I see the above has mostly been answered in another thread, so I will add this. Will donations from trade unions be also banned under the proposed legislation?

That is the intention. Goodnight.

Scofflaw

I think there's an element of confusion over the word 'corporate' in 'corporate donations'. It doesn't mean 'business' - instead, it usually means any group of individuals where the group has a separate legal status from the individuals forming it. Informally, it can refer to any group of individual members that is united for a common purpose. The most common use of 'corporate' is obviously in respect of companies, but universities, for example, are also usually "bodies corporate" - indeed, any long-standing body will usually at some point have incorporated itself formally, although, interestingly, some major political parties have never done so, and operate as corporate bodies de facto rather than de juro.

Essentially, if the group can open a bank account in the name of the group, rather than the account being simply in the name of one of the members, then you're looking at some form of corporate body in the sense I take it the donations ban is intended to include - presumably, the meaning is that used by SIPO in their guidelines on donations.

If you were to give a donation to a political party, your membership of a corporate body would probably only be relevant if the funds used were 'corporate' funds - that is, money held in common by the corporate body, paid into the common treasury, and so on. I'm not sure what would happen if a corporate body were to organise a fundraising event at which members pledged to give individual donations that did not go via the corporate body - technically, those would not be corporate donations, but in spirit they rather obviously are.

cordially,
Scofflaw

PaulGogartyTD

gandalf wrote: »

This is a question/comment from the user FoxT on the questions thread in Politics.

Hi, I am married with children, living in Cork, aged in my forties.

I believe the Green party has done a poor job in Government. It will be remembered for

- Ban on stag hunting & mink farming
- Irrational road tax regime
- Gormley's outburst regarding vehicles with commercial tax discs
- Poolbeg incinerator situation is out of control. Ireland needs an incinerator ( & I would have welcomed one at Ringaskiddy) - but NOT in a location where every truck load of rubbish has to be carted to it via Dublin city centre.

I want the GP to be successful - so that as a voter I have more choice. So far I am very disappointed.

My question is - How do you think the Green party can recover from this, to be seen as a viable party for which to vote?

The ban on stag hunting and the dogs bill were relatively small pieces of legislation blown way out of proportion thanks to paranaoid/populist/game playing politicians from FF/FG/Lab. Not to mention the well-funded RISE campaign.

As for Poolbeg, we have always been against incineration, seeing it as a last resort. The proposed plant is twice over capacity and will end up being fed and damaging recycling. John is being consistent with what he said he would do when in opposition. Trying to unravel decisions made by FF/FG/Labour takes time and he is constrained by contracts in place.

The commercial registration was a non-story. Nothing is happening to people who use vehicles for work who want to drop kids to school, go to mass or pop to the shops. There is a clampdown on people registering as commercial when they are not commercial to avoid paying tax. That's all.

Elsewhere I have alluded to a long list of achievements in Government as well as more on the way. When it is added up it is significant. So significant that Ogra FF seem to have taken many of what we claimed as Green achievements and put them on their website! They are entitled to do so, as they are Government achievements, but most of them were Green initiatives.

Look at the facts rather than the media slant. I have enough personal examples of things reported that didn't happen the way it was covered or didn't happen at all. A pity, because we have some great journalists/presenters and our standard is generally good; it downgrades the valuable work that many are doing in this field.

PaulGogartyTD

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

If the Green party lose a lot of seats in the next election, would you consider setting up or joining a new green party that went back to their core beliefs after the party's more recent stray into mainstream/FF policies?

Alternatively, do you think that the Green party has learned and evolved from being in government with FF and will likely mature as a political party in coming years?

No. I think the Green Party's core beliefs have not changed. It's just that we have learned to be pragmatic and focus on what is possible to achieve. You can hold onto your core beliefs while being pragmatric and attempting to change things. Otherwise no-one would have ever agreed on anything, ever.

As for learned and evolved, I think we have learned lots and some of the that was put into practice in the revision of the Programme for Government when we knew we were now an essential component to ensure Government survival. I am sure there are other things we have learned which won't become apparent until some distance is achieved on the current administration. I am inclined to say, from a political perspective, that now we have proven we are not anti everything, are pragmatic, can take tough decisions, we have more credibility as a party worth voting for. In the past we were considered a wasted vote. From this political perspective we would be well advised for longer term electoral success and seat growth not to enter Government again for a while. But because most of us got into politics to effect positive change, we mightn't be able to gradually build up as a force like the German greens and might be tempted to have some influence than no influence at all, but possibly a greater influence down the line.

PaulGogartyTD

DeVore wrote: »

How do you think this period of the Green party will be recorded/remembered?

Many people are saying that your party will be "wiped out" at the next general election as a punishment for supporting a deeply unpopular FF government, what is your response to that?

What do you see as the future of the Green Party in the future?

Can you outline what you see as the successes for the GP in this period in government?

DeV.

I think we will come out quite well over the longer period.

We may be "wiped out", that is the narrative and it's an easy one to say. But the party will not be wiped out and people are resolute that we stick to doing what we believe in, nothwithstanding the ever present temptations of politics to look after number one.

The successes over the period will be identified as Planning reform, Civil Partnership, Corporate Donations, Climate Change and protecting educational investment. But the media will focus on the animal welfare stuff first and foremost.