Green Party members encouraged to cancel party conference tickets and campaign for Zack Polanski instead

The Green Party has sent out an email to all party members encouraging them to skip party conference and campaign for Zack Polanski in the Holborn and St Pancras by-election instead.

The party has told members that they can cancel their tickets to annual party conference so they can go out and campaign ahead of the crunch vote on 8 October.

The email says: “We need hundreds of you, on the streets, everyday, including Saturday 3rd & Sunday 4th October.”

The Green Party’s annual conference will take place in Brighton from 2 to 4 October.

The message goes on to say: “It isn’t just about Zack, although he has given this party so much and we owe it to him to work as hard for him as he has for us.

“But more crucially this is about what our job is. Our job is to get Greens elected.”

The party has offered to refund members who have already bought their conference passes.

At the bottom of the email, it says: “Cancel your plans!”.

One Green party member who received the email said they felt the tone of the message was “really poor”. 

Commenting on the email, a Green Party spokesperson said: “Many of our members are torn between wanting to be at conference and wanting to contribute to getting our next Green MP elected in Holborn and St Pancras. This is a suggestion of how they can do that, including accessing full voting rights through attending online.
 

“Unlike Labour, we cannot put down a three-line whip to Cabinet ministers to go and campaign in London, we’re a people-powered movement. Every day, our members and supporters are giving up their time to knock on doors and talk to voters because they know we can win.
 

“Meanwhile our conference plans are in full swing – it will still be the most democratic of all the political parties and the most well-attended we have ever held.”

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward