Green Party leader Zack Polanksi’s full speech from the Autumn conference at the Brighton Centre, at 13:30 on Friday 2 October 2026. Check against delivery.
What a year.
More members than ever. Record numbers of councillors – now well over a thousand.
The first Green breakthrough on the Sennedd.
And I don’t think anyone’s gonna forget our first ever Westminster by-election win.
London turned Green. With the amazing Zoe and Liam, and all our new council leaders winning historic victories.
And it wasn’t just london. Every corner of this country greens elected. Cities. Towns. Villages.
More knocks on doors, leaflets on mats – crosses next to OUR names.
And yes, we did elections in greater numbers than ever before.
But more than that – we’ve changed this country.
You did this. We made this happen.
Thank you.
You know, it hasn’t always been like this.
This party has existed since 1973. People have always told us ‘you can’t win’ – and in fairness back then that was true.
It took us decades of hard work to get here. I know I’m standing here on the shoulders of giants who have spent so many years building this movement.
Those very first council wins against the odds. Then we got MEPs elected. And then that first, historic breakthrough in this very city when in 2010, elected to Westminster, was our very own Caroline Lucas.
And from Caroline to Natalie to Jonathan to Sian to Carla and Adrian….
I took over as leader of a party that was already transformed, already growing. But this year has been, well it’s been wild.
When I was elected leader I said I wanted to bring the Green message to new people. To shift perceptions about who we are. To show that we care what’s happening in people’s lives. I looked at a country crying out for change – where people feel like they’re running every day just to stay in the same place.
A country where struggling has become the norm.
How many people across this country are timing their day so they’re in the shop when those yellow reduced stickers come out?
For some people, that’s the only way food shopping is affordable.
How many people have started waking up half an hour earlier so they can walk to work instead of spending the money on the bus fare?
And how many people are cutting down on the things that used to make it all worth it – weekends away, a meal out – because the cost of the bare essentials takes up more and more of their wages every single month?
A woman recently said to me, I’m not making ends meet month by month. I’m making ends meet prayer by prayer.
I said I would make clear that this party will always stand up for people like that woman. Tax the very richest. Bring our public services back into public hands. And end Rip Off Britain.
That’s the message that helped us win record numbers of votes. Because we are sure about who we stand up for.
And crucially, we’re sure who we’re standing up against.
Even when there are rooms full of people who disagree with us, and often there are!
We will go into the lion’s den and stand for our principles. Or as the young people tell me, stand on business!
And even when times are hard, even when we’re under attack – we always remember why we’re here.
I am always guided by three questions. How do we make life more affordable? How do we back the caring majority over a tiny wealthy elite? And how do we protect our planet for generations to come?
Now, I’ve been knocking on lots of doors lately for some reason!
Particularly in an area I’ve known for a long time. Lived there, worked there, seen it change.
Some of the changes are really visible. Luxury high-rises springing up on spots that used to be green space for council estates. Porches out the front of what used to be family homes – stuck all over with lock boxes for airbnb keys.
But some of these changes are subtler. Many of the doors I’m knocking on look the same as they did ten or twenty years ago.
But behind those doors something has shifted.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s council homes, or terraced houses – I hear one thing again and again. Mums answer the door, and tell me ‘I’ve still got my kids living at home with me.’
Nineteen year olds who can’t afford student housing, so they’re living with their parents and commuting to uni. But they’re missing lectures because they can’t afford the train in and out. Missing out on living with strangers who could have become friends for life.
Or there’s the twenty five year olds who can’t find a job, no matter how many tens or hundreds of applications they send. Who can’t imagine ever being able to afford to rent even a room of their own – never mind having a whole place of their own.
That feels like an impossible dream.
Or – thirty, thirty-five year olds. Moving back to their parents place with their partners in tow. Sometimes their kids too. Maybe it’s temporary at first. Just a few months back at home, saving up a bit, hoping to scrape together a deposit. But times get tougher and those months quickly turn to years.
We are seeing a dramatic shift in the way we live our lives, playing out behind those front doors.
Its impacts run deep.
For young people with their lives on hold.
And for parents. They are finding themselves back in the pressure cooker of family life just as they’d thought they were going to get a bit of space.
But the consequences? They affect all of us.
Young families are being forced to choose between moving out of the cities they love or giving up on ever having kids. Take London – where more than 90 primary schools have shut down since 2019 because there aren’t enough children to fill them, teachers seeing kids they love being priced out of the city.
It’s not just the private pain of those impossible choices. It’s what that pain and those choices add up to for this country.
We all know that building the life we want for ourselves and our kids, well it starts with having a home of our own.
That’s why I’m so proud of what Greens are delivering every single day across England and Wales.
Like Bristol Greens – breaking records on affordable homes. Stroud – one of the biggest council home builders in England. That’s what Greens deliver.
More Greens elected means more homes built. More people getting their foot on the housing ladder for the first time. More families having that incredible feeling of putting the key in the door of their own home.
And while our councils deliver in their communities, we fight for change at a national level. So in every corner of the country, at every stage of life, we can all have a place to call home.
That means green MPs fighting for an end to the leasehold trap – for the people I meet who are living in defective buildings and terrified for their safety. So that buying your first home is both a guarantee of security and a stepping stone to what comes next.
We need to stop governments using the blunt tool of interest rates to control inflation. I meet mortgage holders who are constantly worried about renewing. They tell me they crave certainty about the future.
And – for the families I’ve met stuck on waiting lists for years – desperately waiting for the government to build the homes they need. It’s time for a serious plan to build council homes at scale.
But the first vital step to ending the runaway cost of housing must be tackling the scandalous cost of private rent.
Our MP Carla Denyer has been fighting tooth and nail to get this government to do something about the affordability crisis in private renting.
Because for too long, landlords have been able to hike prices way beyond wages. Leaving renters forced to meet the cost to keep a roof over their heads. Cutting back and back and back on everything else.
It’s not just renters who lose out – it’s taxpayers too. Over the next year, more than a third of the money that the DWP will spend on housing benefits will go to private landlords. Subsidising extortionate rents.
That’s £13.4 billion pounds that could be spent building new council homes. Repairing our creaking housing stock. Bringing homes lost through right to buy back into public hands.
That’s why today I’m calling on this government to put in place a three year emergency brake on private rents.
No rent rises above CPI, wage growth or 2% – whichever is lower. No sudden hikes. No evictions under the guise of rent rises. No more uncertainty, no more fear.
That emergency brake would give renters vital breathing space.
Let wages begin to catch up with the rents that have outstripped them for far too long.
And in the long term, we’ll put in place a national Fair Rents Guarantee – to keep rents affordable for everyone, for ever.
It doesn’t just mean cheaper homes. It doesn’t just mean government savings.
It will mean that people can stay in the places they love, close to their family and friends.
It will mean young people can take those first amazing, exhilarating steps into independence – and have full lives waiting for them on the other side.
Young families able to live round the corner from the in-laws – not crammed into their spare room.
But we know that Labour won’t take this simple, common sense measure unless we force them to.
Right now, government ministers go on TV and talk down rent controls against the evidence.
To see Jonathan Reynolds on Question Time say that no economists support rent controls is absurd.
It shows that they don’t want to take on the powerful vested interests of developers and big landlords.
Their half measure reforms just don’t go far enough. I’ve knocked on enough doors in the last few weeks to know for certain that housing pressures are at extreme levels –
that’s why our plan is so needed.
So let me say this so simply to this government. Slogans without action, half-measure legislation, outdated economic management – it’s just not good enough.
It’s not going to cut it.
Only by voting Green can voters be sure that they will back a real plan for shaking up the housing market.
Only by voting Green can they put an end to the rental rip-off and guarantee affordable rents.
And only by voting Green can they choose a future where houses don’t sit empty as mere investment assets – but as the safe place to rest our heads at night that we all need.
Home, though, doesn’t stop at the bricks and mortar around us. It’s so much bigger than that.
Right now we’re living in a tense, volatile world aren’t we?
With fewer places of refuge than ever before. Youth centres, community spaces, pubs – cornerstones of our neighbourhoods are no longer there in the same way.
And when we don’t have those physical spaces, toxic online worlds explode onto our streets.
Some leaders stand by and watch while others pour fuel on the fire.
Look at the the cruel anti-migrant laws carving up communities, shaking the ground from beneath people who have made their life here.
Or the despicable sight of masked men intimidating people who have just arrived here.
And can I just say to those brave people in the RNLI who go out in stormy seas, who had to turn off the trackers on their lifeboats for fear of being targeted – you are the very best of us. Thank you.
And when it comes to communities – I’m so inspired by our deputy leaders Rachel and Mothin.
Rachel for standing up for refugees in her community in the face of horrifying hate and abuse.
Mothin for stepping out in the face of violent unrest to protect his neighbours in Leeds.
Thank you Rachel, thank you Mothin.
Then there’s the trans community, still legislated and discriminated against. Harassed out of toilets, policed in public places, scared to go about their daily lives.
I’m so proud of our MPs Sian and Carla, our Sennedd member Anthony Slaughter, for standing up for trans people in the corridors of power while other parties turn their backs.
The Green Party, we will always stand with our LGBTIQA+ communities. With migrants, with disabled people – with everyone who is under attack.
Because that’s what Greens do.
Gaza
We do it because it is right.
And speaking of what is right.
Just a few days ago, the foreign secretary stood on a stage like this and said something many of us will feel vindicated by.
That those who have been raising their voices against the atrocities in Gaza were right.
And yet as he spoke, metres away, principled people were being hauled away by the police. Their crime? Holding up signs.
The sight of pensioners being put in handcuffs and bundled into police vans for holding up cardboard signs has been a stain on this country’s reputation for far too long.
But those scenes are the awful symptom of a rot that runs much deeper. To a government so determined to crush dissent that it labels those with views it doesn’t want to hear as terrorists. Terrorists.
And hundreds of Labour MPs who were willing to troop through the voting lobbies to approve it.
You know something? Our MPs didn’t troop through the yes lobby. Our MPs were cowed by fear or malicious attacks in the press. They stood up for the principles we hold so dear.
Free speech.
Civil liberties.
The right to dissent which has won us our most precious freedoms.
And Greens, we stand with one voice now as we say:
Drop the charges.
End the Genocide.
Deproscribe Palestine Action.
Politics is about priorities, isn’t it? So let me be plain about ours.
If you’re at the sharp end of intimidation and violence – we’re with you.
If you wake up in the morning praying for an economic miracle – we’ve got a plan to help you.
And if you fight for justice and peace for everyone across the world – we have got your back.
And when it comes to priorities – there’s one that sits at the heart of all we do.
Something changed this summer, didn’t it?
A few months ago, I walked across charred ground in Oxfordshire with burnt wood crunching under my feet.
Just days before, that space in the woods had housed a thriving local business. Around it, birds had sung in the trees while local people walked their dogs in the fields.
Wildfires wiped it out.
Whether you were sweltering in your flat in London, desperately trying to keep your kids cool.
Or waking up in the middle of the night in Manchester, smelling smoke and panicking that you’d left the hob on. Then checking the news to realise the hills were burning miles away.
Across the world, the ravages of the climate crisis have been taking lives and destroying livelihoods for years. But this summer, the destruction reached our shores like never before.
So many things shocked me this summer. But what shocked me the most? The silence.
Yes, the eerie quiet of that Oxfordshire clearing.
But even more chilling – the silence from our government. From the people whose first duty is to keep us safe.
In the face of government inaction, it was Greens who stepped in – with our MP Hannah Spencer putting forward a law to protect workers from extreme temperatures.
And it was only after we demanded the Prime Minister call a COBR meeting that he finally did – but what was the outcome?
A ban on disposable barbecues.
And then, just weeks later – reports that the same governmnt is set to give the go-ahead to dangerous new oil and gas drilling in the North Sea.
It’s not acceptable.
This summer’s fires should have been the final nail in the coffin for new oil and gas.
We know that drilling for new fossil fuels won’t bring down bills. We know it won’t make us more secure. And we know that it locks us into a hotter, more dangerous climate.
And we say no.
No more fossil fuel extraction – and a clean energy revolution, now.
That means every single home transformed to highest energy efficiency. To keep us cool in summer, to keep us warm in winter – and to keep our bills down.
It means sticking to the plan to cut emissions from polluting vehicles. So our children can breathe clean air in the streets. And parents can breathe easier knowing their kids have a future to look forward to.
And it means a massive expansion of community energy. So our power is cheap, our power is clean – and our power is in our hands.
The question is – will Labour face down the fossil fuel giants?
Now, it won’t surprise you to hear that I’m not hopeful about Labour’s backbone.
But we know what we have to do.
A few weeks ago, we heard that the government had delayed giving the green-light to new oil and gas drilling at Rosebank and Jackdaw.
Why?
Because they’re worried about losing votes to the Greens.
That makes me hopeful.
That is the difference our party makes.
Vote Green, and watch Labour move.
Voting Green, between general elections, is the most powerful vote you can make. And here’s two reasons why.
First – more Greens in elected positions. Making the change our neighbours, our communities, really need.
Second – at General Elections, the government changes. But between general elections – we change the government.
Let me tell you what I mean.
A few weeks ago, our MP Adrian Ramsay led a vital debate in Parliament. He called on the government to release a buried report. Detailing the threats posed to our national security by the climate and nature crisis.
Last week?
The Government finally started talking about it.
Another example.
Our MP Ellie Chowns has demanded our government end its complicity in the genocide in Gaza and the illegal occupation of Palestine.
A few weeks ago, Ed Miliband took the first long overdue step in the right direction by banning trade with illegal settlements. Necessary, by the way, but not nearly sufficient.
The pattern is clear.
Vote Green and watch Labour move.
Through our sustained pressure – and our historic wins – we have held the worst instincts of the Labour government in check. And started to move them in the right direction.
But we can’t wait for them to get there on their own.
The UN secretary general says this is the crucial decade for climate action.
Bills are going up this winter and people don’t know if they’ll afford to pay.
And when billionaires are hoarding wealth and buying our democracy.
The time for real hope, and real change is now.
Conclusion
Since we were last together, a year ago, a lot has changed.
Back then I got asked ‘can you really do it?’ ‘Can you really break through?’
But now I get asked – isn’t your job done? Isn’t the government doing everything you wanted?
And in answering I always return to my three questions.
First: How do we make life more affordable?
Under Labour rents are set to rise, energy bills are spiking, people are shelling out more and more just to afford the basics.
But we Greens have a plan to bring bills down by nationalising water, making every home energy efficient, and putting an emergency brake on rents.
Second: How do we back the caring majority over a tiny wealthy elite?
Unlike Labour we will not hesitate in taxing extreme wealth. We will apply a windfall tax to obscene bank profits, and we will make sure the support of the welfare state is always there for those who need it.
And finally: how do we protect our planet for generations to come?
This is the whole reason we’re here.
Our differences with this Labour government could not be clearer. While they play politics with our planet – we stick to the science. While Andy Burnham barely whispers the word climate – we seek urgent action.
While they bend to the whims of fossil fuel giants – we take the only credible stand that exists:
Keep oil and gas in the ground.
And invest in the clean energy revolution of the future.
One of my political heroes is Tony Benn. He once said ‘Hope is the fuel of progress, and fear is the prison in which you put yourself.’
Over the last year, we’ve seen just how powerful hope with a plan can be. It’s fuelled our membership to record levels. Propelled our party to amazing electoral success.
But more importantly, it’s changed our country for the better.
But we in this room all know – we are just getting started.
And so when times get tough – when our opponents attack us, or smear us, or try to put obstacles in our way – we remember that fear will get us nowhere. Only being brave – being bold – will take us where we need to go.
And when I’m in need of hope – it’s you, in front of me, that’s all I need to think of. The movement that has brought us this far already – because only with real hope, and real change we are going to build the country and the world we can be so proud of.
Thank you. Let’s go!
ENDS
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