The Green Party will launch its 2010 general election manifesto this morning (April 15). The launch will take place at the Hilton Brighton Metropole Hotel, starting at 10.30.
Darren Johnson, the party's national spokesperson on trade and industry and its candidate for Lewisham Deptford, will chair the event. The party's manifesto will be introduced by Caroline Lucas MEP, party leader and candidate tipped by bookies and pollsters alike to win the Brighton Pavilion constituency, and Cllr Adrian Ramsay, deputy leader and candidate in the party's Norwich South target seat.
The party’s manifesto will include tax changes to reduce inequality. It will also include a government investment programme to create around a million new jobs and training places across a wide range of economic sectors including jobs for carers, midwives, plumbers, builders, engineers and public transport workers.
The Greens will say that a determined effort to prevent cuts to public services will result in swifter recovery from the recession, large-scale job-creation and long-term economic stability. The manifesto will spell out a package of savings from scrapping projects like Trident, ID cards and new roadbuilding, as well as raising higher taxes on the highest incomes, to pay for the investment programme.
Largest ever number of Green candidates in a UK general election
The Greens expect to field well over 300 candidates across the UK, the highest number ever, contesting around half of the seats.
The party is widely expected to make its breakthrough to the UK parliament in the 6 May election, having had representatives in the European and Scottish Parliaments and the London Assembly for a decade, and having trebled its number of local councillors during that time.