Left-wing Green Party members lose leader Nicole Geluk-Le Gros

The Green Left Network is a group of Green Party members that “works to promote an explicitly anti-capitalist” vision for the Green Party, according to its website. Photo / RNZ

A left-wing group within the Green Party often seen as being at odds with the current leadership has had a leadership change of its own.

The Green Left Network (GLN), a group of Green members that “works to promote an explicitly anti-capitalist” vision for the Green Party, according to its website, has lost one of its co-convenors, Nicole Geluk-Le Gros, following the Network’s online AGM last week.

Geluk-Le Gros was ejected from her co-convenor position on the GLN’s executive under a process known as Re-open Nominations or “RON”.

This occurs when a person is trying to reapply for their position and at least a quarter of voting members vote to “reopen nominations” to other members, rather than endorse that person’s reappointment. It is the same process by which party co-leader James Shaw lost the party co-leadership last year, before regaining it.

This leaves Daniel Jackson as the sole co-convenor. There will now be a Special General Meeting to find a new co-convenor.

Only about 30 people registered to attend the AGM, the Herald understands, although not all may have attended on the day. The Herald understands there were six RON votes cast. The GLN has a membership of about 250.

Party insiders say the RON-ing of Geluk-Le Gros was perhaps a reflection of unhappiness within the GLN at the strength with which some members opposed the current direction of the party, including Shaw’s co-leadership.

The GLN had no official position on Shaw’s co-leadership during the RON incident but was widely seen to be opposed to Shaw. The GLN was also seen as a backer of former Green MP and member Elizabeth Kerekere, who resigned from the party after a protracted falling-out.

As the more public-facing co-convenor, Geluk-Le Gros may have borne the brunt of dissatisfaction with those positions.

However, there could be a wider issue at play, which is a shift within the party away from networks like the GLN towards what are known as “lived experience networks”.

These are groups organised around people’s lived experience as part of the rainbow or disabled communities, for example.

A recent constitutional change in the party gave lived experience groups more power within the Green Party’s organisational structure - power that is not given to networks that organise along more ideological lines.

Lived experience networks have representation on the party’s Members Assemblies, which are an important part of how the party organises itself following the constitutional restructure.

Party members with limited time for party matters tend to prioritise their engagement with lived experience groups because they have more power.

Even relatively new networks like the De-Growth Greens Network - a group within the party who believe that “degrowth”, the idea that shrinking output is necessary to meet the party’s climate commitments - have struggled to attract and retain members in a way they might not have previously.

Likewise, the Union Greens Network is also said to be struggling to maintain high levels of engagement.