ROBIN HARPER: I'm afraid the Green party I led has finally abandoned its core mission to save the planet

In the Perth by-election that followed the death of Sir Nicholas Fairbairn in 1995, I stood as a candidate for the Scottish Green Party. I’d done rather well in the European election of 1989, garnering almost ten per cent of the vote and narrowly missing a seat. Things didn’t go quite so well in Perth.I got 223 votes and came behind Screaming Lord Sutch, who managed to get 586 crosses after his name. The SNP’s Roseanna Cunningham stormed in on a wave of support with nearly 17,000 votes. It was a convincing victory and the Greens were nowhere.But, but, but… that night someone shoved me out onto the steps of Perth City Hall where a large crowd had assembled despite the late hour. ‘Say something,’ I was urged.I spoke. To this day I cannot remember what I said, but whatever it was, I had the crowd cheering and clapping and demanding more. I said something else. More rapturous applause.And again. This was heady stuff. Intoxicating. For the first time in my life, I discovered that playing with an excited crowd was a euphoric experience. Who wouldn’t want that kind of power?Later, of course, I realised it was a hollow experience indeed. What had I said? Did it matter? Somehow I had managed to hit a spot and whatever the dish I was serving, the crowd were hungry for more – even though they had just very definitely elected someone else to power.This crowd-stirring is what Zack Polanski has proven himself to be rather good at.Perhaps it doesn’t actually matter what he says, so long as the crowd bays for more. And more. Robin Harper led the Scottish Greens when the party's mission was to protect the environmentAnd let’s face it, the weary slog of survival in a world that is becoming increasingly challenging is not sexy stuff.There will be no great cheers over the discussion of taxes or defence. But taxes and defence are the difficult, dull but essential ingredients that make for our safety and the smooth running of our lives.Local councillors know this. They are the unsung heroes, the people who actually do have a big impact on our daily lives – sorting out our refuse collections, fixing the potholes (well they might, if they had the budgets to do it), keeping our schools, our parks, our everyday services going.Then there’s the business of national government. Bigger, with a major impact and, like steering a big ship, slower to turn around in order to set a new course, as Andy Burnham is discovering.But not necessarily sexy. There’s a lot of discontent around how successive governments handle the big issues that affect every waking moment of our days.Anger, too, of course. But there are so many issues and they are so complex that it’s simply not possible to rally the troops around every one.Much easier to concentrate on single issues. Palestine and the Jews, trans issues. That’s where the cheering and the clapping starts and the euphoria of successfully playing the crowds sets in.Zack Polanski knows this. He likes applause. He loves it. He soaks it up and it makes him even better at what he does.But when reality sets in and he discovers that some of the rapturous followers have decided their own agenda about what they want to cheer, he really does not know how to deal with it, how to steer the crowds back to where he would like them to be.Zack Polanski is no leader. He is a populist, and a dangerous one at that. He has no understanding of economics, and the confidence with which he speaks about finance is unnerving as it is so wrong. And where’s the environment in all of this?Once, most people understood what the Greens stood for – their aim was to save the planet from the worst excesses of human post-industrial behaviour.Where has that passion gone at a time when it has never been more needed or more relevant?Where is the understanding of how environmental issues must be managed alongside daily pragmatism?Why would a party with such an all-embracing core mission simply abandon it… if not for the applause.How do things stand in Scotland?On Tuesday, Ross Greer could not bring himself to criticise the position adopted at the conference of the Green Party of England and Wales which agreed that Zionism is racism. Instead, he publicly agreed with it.What Ross should be concentrating on is not stirring up more outrage but on how to establish a common point of view that would allow for creative discussions as to a way forward.Anti-Semitism is blatant in every country in Europe, including our own. When Hitler’s forces moved into France and the country was divided into semi-independent Vichy and German-controlled France there were more than 50 Jewish internment camps, which sent them on to extermination centres in Germany.The enthusiasm for this was distributed evenly between Vichy and German-controlled France.The nature of anti-Semitism seems to be ingrained just below the surface of European social cultures.Jews are as vulnerable now as they were in 1939 and we must be conscious of this and not let our policy-making be diverted from creating workable solutions to the problems on either side of the Israeli-Palestine border.We must defuse, not inflame, the seriously unstable situation we face. We should also be very concerned that young children in Scotland are being taught that Israelis are bad and Palestinians are good.The trans movement in Scotland is using the same tactic in preparing teaching materials that normalise the idea that children have a choice of gender. Zack Polanski was punished at the ballot box after his party adopted a controversial stance on Israel, declaring 'Zionism is racism' at conferenceI was a teacher for many years, and my passionate aim was to guide children in the art of thinking for themselves – evaluating all the available material and arguments and coming to a balanced conclusion.Very often the answer to a problem is not a right answer but the best answer in the circumstances. Children need to be educated to evaluate all available material and to be creative thinkers.The Greens – with Ross Greer at their head – prefer to indoctrinate and shut down discussion.My own voice within the party was stifled when I suggested there should be proper further debate about the trans legislation.The problem is that informed and balanced discussion might not yield the answers the Green Party demands. Only people who are afraid of the answers shut down debates.It’s time to stop playing politics for the cheers and applause, Ross, and realise, as I did so many years ago, that real politics is about serious decision-making and hard graft.The sad fact is, the party I loved and led has truly lost its way – in the name of naked populism.■ Robin Harper is a former Scottish Greens co-leader, and the UK's first Green party parliamentarian