Green Party MP wants to make sure it is 'not vulnerable to extremists'

A Green Party MP has said her party needs to make sure it is not "vulnerable to capture by extremists and racists" after members voted for a motion that claimed Zionism was racism.

The motion put forward by activists, which became formal policy after it was approved at the Green's conference earlier this month, has divided senior party figures and been criticised by Jewish groups.

Westminster leader Ellie Chowns told the BBC it was a "significant and damaging policy" and she would work to reform the Green Party.

It comes after ex-leader Caroline Lucas said it was not being protected from entryism - where people sign up to a party to try to change it.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today Programme on Saturday, Chowns said: "I don't know if there are extremists and racists in my party. But I want to make sure that my party isn't vulnerable to capture by extremists and racists."

The MP described Zionism as a "contested concept" and said the motion did not represent the views of the large majority of Green Party members, "nor of people in the country".

Chowns said the motion would be a "distraction from the very important work" the party has been doing campaigning for Palestinian rights.

She added: "I think it is clear that if we have policy, such significant and damaging policy, made by a vote of just 0.4% of our members, that something isn't working in our structures and our policy-making process."

Members of the Green Party of England and Wales endorsed the policy motion by 1,022 votes to 813.

There are 230,000 members of the Green party overall and not everyone attended the conference.

The policy also backs a "single democratic Palestinian state in all of historic Palestine", which includes modern-day Israel.

It defines Zionism as an ideology supporting "an ethnonationalist Jewish state".

The Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council, which criticised the motion, said: "Zionism is anti-racism, creating a refuge for Jews in their ancient homeland after millennia of persecution outside it."

Appearing on BBC Radio 4 programme Any Questions on Friday, Lucas said she was not putting any blame on the party's current leader, Zack Polanski, who she said had done "great things" for the party.

"Our constitution was written decades ago, well before we had MPs, before we had mayors, before we had anything like the number of that we have today," the ex-leader said.

Lucas, who was for years the face of the Greens as its first and sole MP until 2024, added the party needed to be made "a welcoming place for Jewish people."

A Green Party spokesperson said: "Green Party membership has increased since Zack Polanksi announced his leadership bid in May 2025. Unlike other political parties, our members can bring and set policy.

"This is one motion alongside dozens of others that was discussed at our biggest-ever party conference. Every motion submitted to conference undergoes debate and no single interest group drives policy. "

Polanski, who is Jewish, previously told the BBC he would not have voted for the motion and instead would have voted for an amended version.

However, he said the "substantial part of the motion", that "the displacement and genocide of the Palestinian people is clearly underpinned by a racist ideology" was "obvious".

Israel has repeatedly denied its actions in Gaza amount to genocide.

Ashok Kumar, a Green Party member and part of the Greens for Palestine group, voted for the motion and told the BBC last week it was about "Palestinian liberation."

He said he didn't feel the vote was harming the image of the Green Party, and that a growing number of people see this as a core issue.

"They see the violence that's (been) occurring over the last three years," he told BBC Politics Live. "So, I think the Zionist position is actually the marginal position.

Following Polanksi's by-election defeat in Holborn and St Pancras this week, the leader of the Jewish Greens Vivien Lichtenstein said he should resign.

She added it was a "big mistake" for him to have dodged a debate about a party conference motion that declared Zionism a form of racism.

Polanski did not stay at conference to vote on the motion or amendments. He left early to campaign for the north London by-election, which Labour won on Thursday with Greens coming second.

Following his defeat, Polanski told BBC Breakfast he would "absolutely" stay on as leader and he "of course" had not questioned that.

He lost out to Labour candidate Sagal Abdi-Wali - who secured 45% of the vote to his 33% - but the Green vote share was up by 22 percentage points on the 2024 general election.