According to Politico, Zack Polanski is plotting a “sweeping review” to weed out the Green Party’s wackiest policies.

Among the policies on the chopping block are outlawing private landlords, slashing the motorway speed limit to 55 mph and abolishing the monarchy.

Dumping such unpopular pledges makes a lot of sense, even from a Green perspective. For example, the Royals, especially the King, are the greenest part of the British establishment, so why single them out for the chop?

However, Polanski was elected leader last year to take his party sharply to the Left. That shift has since proved successful: the Greens won their first by-election in February and are on track to make hundreds of gains in next month’s local elections. The latest YouGov projection for London shows the party breaking through in the capital. So why on earth would Polanski want to de-radicalise his party now?

The first thing to understand is that he is not a doctrinaire socialist, but rather a self-described “eco-populist”. And the crucial point about populism, whether it comes from the Left or the Right, is that it needs to be popular.

Consider the Green Party policy to cap the highest wages in every company at no more than 10 times the lowest wage. One could argue that this is every bit as crazy as getting rid of the Royal Family, but it’s a palpable hit with the public. YouGov polling shows that 65% of voters back the idea — including 58% of Reform voters and 54% of Conservative voters. So whatever the economic pros and cons, it’s an ideal issue on which to put oneself on the same side as the electorate. The same, however, does not apply to other Green policies like legalising crack cocaine, reducing the motorway speed limit and the party’s worrying equivocation on Britain’s Nato membership.

The paradox of Polanski’s leadership is that while his radicalism has taken his party to new heights, the scrutiny that comes with electoral success will require greater party discipline — especially on policy.

The German Green Party went through the same process in the Eighties and Nineties when their growing support gave them the opportunity to join regional and then federal coalition governments. The internal debate over the inevitable compromises of governing with the establishment parties led to a power struggle between the “Realo” and “Fundi” factions. The Realos won and the German Greens have since become part of the mainstream, joining coalitions not only with the centre-left Social Democrats, but also the conservative CDU and the free-market FDP.

Zack Polanski won’t want to go that far. But he has expressed his willingness to participate in a progressive coalition with Labour. He also used to be a Liberal Democrat. On current trends all three parties would have to team up to provide an alternative to a Reform-led government.

If Zack Polanski really is seeking to overhaul Green Party policy, it’s in preparation for the cross-party negotiations that could decide the next government. Yet, despite these high stakes (or perhaps because of them), Polanski is likely to face his own Fundis. These won’t necessarily be to his Left, but they will seek to defend the party’s bottom-up policy-making process — in which conference delegates have the final say. What Polanski is essentially telling his members is that he can’t take them with him into the negotiating chamber — and, therefore, he must now have the final say.

We’re about to see whether he gets it.

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Peter Franklin is Associate Editor of UnHerd. He was previously a policy advisor and speechwriter on environmental and social issues.

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