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Zack Polanski’s ‘socialism’ response is really resonating with people

Since being elected to the Green Party leadership, Zack Polanski has impressed people who want a left-wing alternative to Labour. Most recently, his response to a supposed “jibe” has gone down particularly well:


‘Socialist’ party

Polanski has been making an effort to speak to anyone who’ll speak to him (including the Canary).

Recently, Polanski appeared on Pod Save the UK with hosts Nish Kumar and Coco Khan. In the clip in question, Khan notes that Zarah Sultana said she’s in a ‘socialist party’ when asked what the difference between Your Party and the Green Party is. As Sultana and Polanski clearly get along well, we’re sure she wasn’t gunning for the man, and Polanski didn’t come out fighting. Offering a thoughtful response, he said:

Do we shout that we’re a socialist party regularly? No, because I think most people don’t know what that means, and you switch people off. So instead, I talk about lowering bills, about the public ownership of public services, and taxes on multimillionaires and billionaires. These are all socialist policies, and they’re all embedded and deep within the Green Party.

Polanski also addressed what he thinks are the three key issues people have with the Green Party, which are:

  1. Voters don’t care enough about the environment to vote for them.
  2. The Greens are all middle class.
  3. The Greens aren’t very diverse.

He addressed this, saying:

We will always care about the environment. That’s never going away. But you can’t be an environmentalist without tackling inequality. The Green Party, incidentally, used to be called the People Party. I think those roots are still there, which is ultimately that we’re about grassroots power and community organising.

In terms of being diverse and working class, I think it’s a myth from years ago. Actually, when I look at the elected councillors we’ve got, they’re more and more diverse, and more and more from working class places.

Are we as diverse and working class as I want us to be? No, there’s still loads of work to do. But politics isn’t as diverse and working class as I want it to be.

And so the solution there is not just to sit outside the party and go, oh, when you’re perfect, then I’ll join. The solution is to join the party, get involved with the organising, and help get us to an even better place.

People have been sharing the clip above and praising Polanski for his clear talking:


As we’ve noted elsewhere, Polanski’s willingness and ability to go against the grain of British politics is a welcome change:

Of course, this isn’t to say he doesn’t receive criticism from the left on certain topics:

As the man himself has said, though, if you’re not happy with him or his politics, get involved with a left-wing political party and make your voice heard.

Featured image via Pod Save the UK (YouTube) 

By Willem Moore

This post was originally published on Canary.