PA MediaScottish Green Party co-leader Patrick Harvie has warned party members not to let the fight to succeed him descend into “factionalism and toxicity”.
Harvie announced earlier this month he is to quit the post of co-leader after almost 17 years in the role.
However, he said the contest to find his replacement must be a “positive, collaborative debate”.
Harvie, who was making his final conference speech as Scottish Green co-leader, told supporters that this is “what our party deserves as we debate our own future”.
Amid reports that some Green activists are concerned about the party’s MSPs “hoarding power”, Harvie used his address to the conference in Stirling to hit out at the “small minority of members have taken to anonymous leaks, smears, insults”.
He said this undermined the work done by Greens and was “damaging our whole party and our reputation by doing so”.
Harvie, who hopes to return as an MSP again after the 2026 Holyrood election, made a direct appeal to party members to call out any such behaviour in the upcoming leadership contest.
He said: “I want to appeal to everyone, let’s make sure that the next few months see a positive campaign that lifts our party up, one that lives up to the best of our values, not one that descends to the factionalism and toxicity that characterises too much of political debate.”
He insisted that the “vast majority of our members and our voters have had more than enough of that”.
Harvie added: “I’m asking everyone in our party to call it out when they see it, and show those who behave that way that it’s not welcome in this party.”
Having joined the Scottish Greens back in 2001, he reflected on how the party had grown over the years, saying it had grown from having only “narrowly escaped being bankrupted by a photocopier contract” to being part of the Scottish Government after achieving their best ever Holyrood results in 2021.
He highlighted Green policies such as the introduction of free bus travel for young people and improved rights for tenants as he insisted that “Scotland is a fairer, better, and greener place” because of his party.
Harvie insisted: “Green politics must be about making a difference in the real world, because the challenges, and crises, that we exist to face are far too urgent.
“Not just during my time in a leadership role, but throughout the two and a half decades of the devolution era, that’s what we’ve built.”
He said the Greens were now a “political force in Scotland that’s capable of making the country a better place”, adding that with time in government they could also “now point to a track record of doing it and not just talking about it”.
Looking ahead he said the task for the party is to “take Green politics forward, to achieve more positive change in people’s lives”.
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