Green Party conference

Warning: this post might only be of interest to Green Party members.

The preparations are underway for Green Party conference in September (3rd - 6th). That means it's the opportunity for members to do things like book fringes, nominate for the national executive elections, and take part in the prioritisation and amendment of motions.

The deadline for fringe requests is the 15th July and the deadline for GPEx nominations (the national executive) is 14:00 on the 24th. My dream is that every post is contested, so if you're thinking about going for it - do! Every uncontested post is a little bit less democratic accountability.

You can check out the motions at the members website - 21 policy motions (including subjects like health care, Afghanistan, public ownership, and co-operatives) and 7 organisational motions.

I'd like to encourage members to take part in the prioritisation ballot here which helps determine the order that motions are heard in (and which motions may fall off the end of the agenda). The deadline for this is the 15th July.

You can vote for three of each and whilst I haven't quite decided which policy motions I'm going to favour I do know which organisational ones I'm voting for - as I have my name next to them as a kind of bookmark.

There are two motions proposed by other people that I'm supporting, and I shall prioritise one of them;

D53 Amendments to decisions made by membership ballot: This motion amends the current Standing Orders for the Conduct of Conference to ensure that in general amendments to the Constitution and Philosophical Basis introduced by a referendum of the whole membership can only be made by a further referendum.

D55 GPEx standing orders: This motion is intended to obligate GPEX to advertise its meetings, publish its minutes in good time, and adequately explain its structure to the Party membership.

Then there are the two motions I wrote, both of which I'm going to prioritise;

D51 Block of three on GPEx: This motion removes the posts of management co-ordinator and publications co-ordinator, replacing them with a block of three executive members to be elected on one ballot paper (as with committee posts). Their tasks and responsibilities will be determined by GPEx as a whole to fit the needs of current circumstances.

D52 Joint lists: This motion removes the constitutional bar on joint election lists with those outside of the Green Party in proportional representation (PR) elections. The current section of the constitution was written before there were PR elections in the UK and so was not designed to consider such a possibility.

Oh the excitement!