“Stop reading this. Go campaign in Holborn and St Pancras,” a sign declared at this year’s Green Party conference.
It’s rare for political parties to tell attendees to leave their annual get-togethers. It’s even rarer for it to come from the party leader.
But the banner was proudly draped across a stall set aside for Zack Polanski’s Bold Politics podcast this weekend.
The sign sums up a tension simmering beneath a party already rowing over potentially adopting a motion to declare “Zionism is racism”.
The Green Party leader is running to be the next MP for Keir Starmer’s old seat in Holborn and St Pancras, a Labour stronghold.
The trouble is, the by-election is a week away – and, according to Green sources, the last weekend of door-knocking is usually when they manage to win over more voters.
Polanski’s team tried to get the conference delayed so members could focus on winning over north-west London constituents, but party executives refused.
A party spokesperson has since blamed the Labour government for deliberately timing the by-election so that it would overshadow their conference.
Labour did not reply when approached for comment – the party seems to have adopted an approach of not even acknowledging their left-wing rivals.
Its statement in response to Polanski’s keynote address did not even mention the Greens or the leader’s name, instead focusing on Burnham’s achievements.
Either way, Polanski clearly followed his own advice to focus on campaigning.
He arrived at conference on Thursday night and left an hour after his speech on Friday, mid-afternoon, even though the conference runs until 4.30pm on Sunday.
Asked about the conflicting events, campaigners looked nervous but insisted to HuffPost UK there was no “divide”.
They claimed there would be plenty of people door-knocking and more than enough members at their “best-ever attended conference”.
Still, it was hard to escape the feeling that the Greens were already laying the groundwork for a significant loss in the crunch by-election.
Labour prime minister Andy Burnham’s popularity is soaring and his party’s candidate Sagal Abdi-Wali is the frontrunner in the race.
Polanski – currently a London Assembly member but with a major public profile – has taken a big risk in contesting the seat. He has a lot to lose.
Polanski told the Guardian that he does not need to win the by-election to stay as Green leader, describing it as a “50/50” contest.
He said the election had ramifications for politics across the UK but “not for my leadership”.
Spokespeople told reporters that the fact there is even a chance the Greens could take the seat of a former prime minister shows “how incredibly successful Zack’s leadership has been”.
To an extent, they are right: Polanski has overseen a huge increase in membership for the Green party, surging from 68,500 members to 230,000 in June.
They also stand by their August predict that they would secure between 30 to 50 MPs if a general election were held today.
However, POLITICO’s poll of polls puts the party in fourth place on 11% – the lowest score since last October, shortly after Polanski took over the leadership.
There are now concerns that he has peaked after polling in second place behind Reform back in March, when the party soared to 18%.
Even a senior party figure admitted HuffPost UK that Burnham is very popular among their own supporters.
They said: “He’s never shafted the left, to be honest. I think we’ll give him a fair hearing until the Budget. But people really, really like him – unlike Starmer!”
Polanski also used his keynote speech not to hint at replacing Labour, as he did last year, but to frame the Greens as a pressure group to move the government leftwards.
“Vote Green and watch Labour move,” he told the party faithful.
But in autumn 2025, Polanski said: “We’re here to replace Labour.”
Party sources later told reporters that the party leader’s speech was still focused on the gap between “what Labour says and how it doesn’t actually act”.
“It’s a change of emphasis rather than the fact that we think we can’t replace the Labour Party,” they insisted.
Asked about the possibility of ever forming a coalition with the Labour Party on Friday, officials seemed unclear about their plan now Burnham is in power.
“It would be up to members after the general election,” they said, dodging the question.
It’s a much weaker position than the one previously adopted by Polanski, when he ruled out doing a deal with a Starmer-led Labour Party.
But it shows how the Greens are in no-man’s land right now, as they struggle to retain their progressive base in the Burnham era.
The question is, will next week’s crunch vote give them a much-needed boost by electing Polanski – or relegate them to the sidelines once more?
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