I am delighted to have been re-elected to the European Parliament for the third time! The Green Party of England and Wales received 11.6% of the votes in my South East constituency in Thursday’s European elections, and I’d like to say a massive thank you to those who either voted or helped organise one of the world’s biggest exercises in democracy.
We received 271,506 votes in the South East, beating Labour, who received just 192,292, into fifth place. The best results came in Brighton and Hove, where we picked up 33% per cent of the vote – more than twice as many as Labour.
Also on Thursday, I was named ‘Politician of the Year’ in the Observer newspaper’s ‘Ethical Awards 2009’ for the third time, which was a real honour. So all in all it was a pretty good week! I’m hoping to be able to catch my breath now after a very intense few months, but the diary is already filling up…
It’s disappointing that a 50% increase in our vote in the South East did not translate into a second Green seat, but we’ve gone ahead of Labour in two Euro-regions and ahead of the Tories in two of England’s biggest cities – and ahead of everybody in Brighton and Norwich.
It’s been a long campaign, but now I’ll be getting on with the job: working for all South East residents to make sure they get the best from the EU. In my role as an MEP, I will be continuing to help shape the laws that are drawn up in Brussels to try to deliver a fairer, more sustainable South East, and a European ‘Green New Deal’ that could create 140,000 new jobs in the region.
