This time five years ago, on the
eve of the last General Election, my friends and I were joining a crowd
gathering in Sheffield city centre at a Liberal Democrat rally to hear Nick
Clegg speak. We were postgraduate students, learning how to be librarians,
worried about graduating into a recession and trying to get jobs in a squeezed
sector. We knew that Labour had made a mess of things, but we couldn't
contemplate life under a Conservative government. Clegg, the leader of the Lib
Dems and local MP for Sheffield Hallam, a constituency full of students, stood
there and promised us a rosier future if we gave him our votes. There was a
buzz in the air, a sense of the real possibility for change, as we cheered our
approval.
You don't need me to tell you how
this story ends.
Feeling deeply betrayed by the
party I had supported since turning eighteen and becoming eligible to vote, I had
to look elsewhere to find someone who could genuinely represent me and the
things I care about. Someone who I could trust not to let me down in a pursuit
of power at whatever the cost. The Green Party seemed the most obvious choice,
so I looked up their policies, and began to follow their actions...and I
realised that I had found the candidates for my next vote.
The Green tagline is "for
the common good", and this sums up why I believe in them. The other parties
try to categorise us and I find this immensely alienating. I don't see "British people" and "immigrants"... why should you matter more
because you just happened to be born in a certain area of this ball of rock and
water that we all share? I don't see "hard-working families" and
everyone else... why should you be less important if you're single, child-free
or unable to work? I see people - human beings - who are all residents of this
planet (which we need to look after because without it, where will we be?). We
have a duty to each other, and to help out those less fortunate than ourselves;
it’s called compassion, and it has been tragically lacking in the coalition
government, who seem more concerned with pitting one section of the population
against another.
The Greens believe in trying to
make the world a safer place rather than ploughing money into horrific and
dangerous weapons that we'd never bring ourselves to use. They believe in
looking after the earth, making sure it will continue to support future life,
not just taking what resources we want right now. They believe in ensuring that
everyone has somewhere to sleep, enough to eat, and opportunities to make their
way in life, without treading on others along the way. To me this all sounds
simple and obvious. But the other parties don't seem to want these things.
The Green Party are actually
representative of our country. I look at the other parties and I don't see
myself, or my friends, or the people I encounter at work. Amongst the Green
candidates I see women, I see faces which aren't white, and I hear regional
accents coming from people who weren't educated at Eton and Oxbridge. These are
not people who have selected politics as a career choice; they are people like
you and me, who have experienced the challenges, trials, highlights and
milestones of everyday life, and who want to make a positive difference.
You can call me an idealist, or a
nutter (you won’t be the first), or tell me that I’m wasting my vote and should
give it to Labour to keep the Tories out, but I know that I am voting for what
I believe in, trying to make the world a better place. And imagine - just
imagine - what could happen tomorrow if everyone else did the same…
