THE GOOD

1. Four-day working week.
2. Free university tuition.
3. More cultural funding.
4. Strong action on the climate crisis.
5. More social housing.

Politicians love to talk about the “hard-working”, but what about lazy people who can’t really be bothered and want to take it easy? Earlier this week, the Green Party made a strong pitch to the slacker community – of which I am a proud member – by pledging a commitment to a four-day working week. And for those us beleaguered by Britain’s perpetual housing crisis, the manifesto is the strongest on offer, pledging to introduce rent controls, ban no-fault evictions and build 150,000 new social houses every year (for context, this is a lot: only 30,000 social homes were built between the years 2019 and 2023). The Greens also want to renationalise the railways, energy companies and water companies. As voters we must ask ourselves – do we dare to dream of a radical future where it’s possible to have a splash about in the sea without accidentally ingesting raw sewage?

More than any other party, the Greens seem committed to improving the lives of young people. The manifesto pledges to bring back maintenance grants and scrap university tuition fees altogether, as well as boost funding to schools by £8 billion.

This election cycle, the Greens have won a lot of support from voters who have been frustrated with the major parties’ position on Gaza. The manifesto pledges to end UK military cooperation with Israel, to restore UN funding to Palestinian refugees, and to support investigations into war crime allegations against Israel, as well as push for a ceasefire and the release of the hostages.

As you would expect, the manifesto has a strong focus on environmentalism. They have set the net zero target at 2040 (earlier than any other party), which they say they will achieve through a massive expansion of renewable power, as well as spending 1.5 per cent of national income on climate finance. They want to ban domestic flights in the UK and introduce a set of new taxes, targeting frequent fliers and any activity which produces carbon. This set of policy proposals comes far closer than any other party to meeting the climate crisis with the urgency it deserves.

To fund these policies, which won’t come cheap, the Greens want to raise up to £151bn a year by introducing a range of new taxes on the wealthy (penalising ordinary, hard-working families by levying one per cent a year on the assets of people with over £10 million and two per cent on the assets of people with over £1bn). It’s not just the super-wealthy who will have to pay more: they also plan to increase taxes for people who earn above £55k a year, although they say this will only amount to £6 a week, and £17 a week for those who earn about £65k. I don’t earn that much money so maybe I’m biased, but that seems like a reasonable sum to pay for dramatically improved public services and our best chance of mitigating the climate crisis. You have to ask yourself, what’s more important: your silly little Pret subscription or the continued existence of life on the planet? 

By this point, it’s practically inevitable that Labour are going to win a majority, but that doesn’t mean that voting for the Greens is a wasted vote: the more MPs they have, the more pressure they’ll be able to exert on Starmer. And if that sounds implausible, think how radically UKIP shifted the direction of the Conservative party without ever winning a single seat. 

THE BAD

1. Nuclear power is good...? Maybe?

I have seen some people criticise the manifesto for its commitment to reducing nuclear power (which, while risky in its own way, is a reliable source of zero-carbon energy). This might be a fair point, but still… a four day working week, though.

Read our cheat sheet on the Labour manifesto here.

Read our cheat sheet on the Liberal Democrat manifesto here.