Inside Labour’s plan to stop the Green surge

Labour has drawn up a dossier of Green activists blocking environmental schemes across the country in a bid to see off the threat of losing voters on the left, i can reveal.

In a sign of how worried the party is about the rise of support for the Greens in parts of the country, Labour has collated a list of major environmental projects, including plans for solar farms and major wind developments, that have been blocked or opposed by the Green Party.

The dossier, seen by i, includes examples where the Greens opposed three proposals for solar farms in mid-Suffolk, including one in Somersham where the party voted with the Conservatives to block the plans.

The list also includes Greens seeing off plans to develop a solar farm in Hastings in East Sussex, despite the party committing to generating 75GW of power a year from solar farms.

Also contained is an example where the party opposed the development of a 26-turbine wind farm off the Aberdeenshire coast and several cases of the Green councillors opposing low traffic neighbourhoods and liveable streets, which aim to create green spaces and lower car use.

According to one senior Labour source, Labour activists in areas with a strong Green support have been told to take a more “eco-warrior” approach to campaigning in a bid to prevent the party being outflanked from the Left.

It has meant in some areas of the country, Labour will tweak their messaging, which has focused on energy security which has been used to attract voters who backed the Tories in 2019.

“We’ve now acknowledged that we could be losing votes to the left, and in some seats that can make a big difference,” the source said.

The news comes as the Greens made significant gains in parts of the country in last week’s local elctions, particularly in Bristol where Labour’s Shadow Culture Secretary Thangham Debbonaire is facing the very real prospect of losing her Bristol West seat to the party.

The Greens secured their highest ever number of elected councillors in the 2024 local elections, and became the largest party in Bristol Council, albeit falling short of an overall majority, while it became the biggest party in Hastings Council and made major gains in Suffolk, Lewes and the Forest of Dean.

Labour peer Lord Mandelson described the Green Party as a “dustbin” for “disgruntled hard leftists”.

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Speaking on the Times’s How To Win An Election podcast, the architect of New Labour said: “The Green Party is becoming a dustbin, a bit of a repository, not only for climate activists, but for disgruntled hard-leftists leaving the Labour Party and some fairly unpleasant hardline Free Palestine activists as well. They’re all turning to the Greens.

“And I think whilst in the first instance, the Greens look sort of bigger and emboldened, I think this is going to change the complexion of the Green Party. And I think they will rue the day when they threw open their doors to all these people.”

A Green party spokesperson said: “Greens are the first to say that we need to scale up renewable energy and that is exactly what we are pushing for all over the country.

“Sometimes certain applications are a bad idea, for example a solar farm proposed on a nature reserve when there are far more appropriate places for the development. We are also pressing for solar PV to be mandatory on all appropriate new building roofs.

“It is also important to balance our need to transition to renewable energy with our need for wild spaces and land to grow food. This isn’t Nimbyism; it’s about Green councillors weighing up each situation and making the best decision for the people and the area they represent.

“The good news is, recent research by Exeter University concluded that England could produce 13 times more renewable energy than it does now, while using less than 3% of its land. This shows we can have our cake and eat it.”