A former aide to Caroline Lucas and a prominent councillor in England’s largest Green council group will run on another joint ticket to lead the party after the departure of its co-leaders Siân Berry and Jonathan Bartley. Carla Denyer, the party’s candidate for Bristol West, where the Greens achieved one of their highest swings at the last general election, will stand with former deputy leader Adrian Ramsay for the leadership, which is being contested by two other joint tickets. Berry announced her resignation last month, citing conflict within the party over transgender rights and said it had been a “failure of leadership” on her part that the party was sending “mixed messages”. She and Bartley, who said he wanted to pursue campaigns outside the party system, have led the party together since 2018. Caroline Lucas and Bartley were joint leaders from 2016 to 2018. Ramsay was deputy leader under Lucas until 2012, co-organising the Brighton Pavilion campaign that led to her being elected as the first Green MP in 2010, and has been a councillor in Norwich, a city where the party became the largest Green councillor group in England at the time with 15 seats. Denyer, a former windfarm engineer, ran against Labour’s Thangam Debbonaire in Bristol West and won a 12% swing to the Greens, though Debbonaire still holds one of the highest majorities in the country. Announcing their candidacy, Ramsay said: “The time for action on the climate is running out. It’s clear this government doesn’t understand the urgency of the climate emergency. We need a strong Green party to secure change.
“I’m coming back into politics because it’s evident to me that getting more Greens elected into positions of power is our best way of securing change. Greens are currently in administration in 14 councils, leading the charge for action from Lancaster to Brighton and Hove. But that’s not enough. We’re committed to making the Green party a real electoral force across every corner of England and Wales.” Denyer said the political climate was “dominated by reckless nationalism and culture wars, or a type of vacuous idea-free politics obsessed with image over substance. The perfect antidote is more elected Greens. We’re committed to being the duo who secure a second Green MP to join Caroline Lucas in Westminster and our first Green in the Senedd.” The pair will face other joint tickets in the battle for the leadership. Tamsin Omond, a co-founder of Extinction Rebellion who identifies as trans and non-binary, will stand with Amelia Womack, the current deputy leader. Martin Hemingway and Tina Rothery, longstanding environmental activists based in the north of England, make up the other pair. The Green party made record advances in this spring’s local elections, with a net gain of 91 council seats in the local elections, taking its national total to a record 444. Voting will take place in September. This article was amended on 17 August 2021. An earlier version incorrectly stated that Carla Denyer was the leader of Bristol’s Green councillor group.