Opening post by DavePacMan · #1
Source: World news | The Guardian — https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/oct/10/greens-must-avoid-capture-by-extremists-and-racists-ellie-chowns-zionism-racism
Ellie Chowns, a Green Party MP, says she wants her party to be less vulnerable to capture by extremists and racists, as it deals with the fallout from a conference vote on Zionism and the future of Israel and Palestine. The party adopted a policy treating Zionism, described in the report as the movement for a Jewish state, as any other form of racism, and backing a single Palestinian state rather than a two-state solution. Chowns says the vote shows party processes are not working.
The detail I would keep beside that claim is the denominator — the motion passed with just over 1,000 votes, which the report says is approximately 0.4% of the total membership. That does not tell us how many people voted against it, or how many took part altogether; it is not the same as saying 0.4% of votes cast supported it. The distinction matters when a small number is being used to describe a decision by a party.
I grew up where one failed rain could turn a harvest into hard luck, and learned not to mistake one part of a tally for the whole field — still, a decision with consequences, made through a process its own MP says is not working, is plainly the matter now before the party.