Scottish Parliament Election 2026 / Alex Armitage
Scottish Greens
Politics is changing. In Shetland and across the country, folk are seeing the Greens as a movement that represents hope for the future. This is our breakthrough election.
Since the Covid pandemic, folk have suffered a brutal cost of living crisis, which shows no sign of abating. Public services are also hard up: The NHS feeling the strain, schools struggling to provide support for learning, swimming pools closing. Yet at precisely the same time, corporations are taking more control, with money and power being concentrated into fewer hands.
This is a political choice. Politicians’ decisions have favoured the interests of corporations over the interests of us.
Nowhere is there a more visual representation of this than in the hills of central Shetland, where idle wind turbines enrich wealthy shareholders through constraint payments, paid for by the energy bills of ordinary hard-working, hard-up folk. It’s an insulting and dystopian illustration of our rigged economy.
Renewable energy should be the means of our liberation from the volatility of the international energy markets and climate breakdown, yet in Shetland, wind turbines have become symbols of enclosure and engines of inequality.
Corporations have a stranglehold on so many aspects of our society and their insatiable thirst for more power will continue. The Greens will stand in their way.
Our Green election campaign isn’t about me – and whilst we’re throwing everything at this election, it’s not just about this election either.
Shetland Greens’ political project is to build a long-lasting, powerful and coherent movement of Shetland folk that will secure a better future for our community. Our movement is founded on the principles of justice, sustainability and solidarity with fellow humans and species with whom we share this planet.
From a practical perspective, the next parliament will most likely be another case of “the Green tail wagging the yellow dog”.
Another minority SNP government is the most likely outcome of this election, and Greens will once again be poised to wield outsized influence.
Flat ferry fares for the North Boat, the £2 bus fare cap, doubling of the Scottish Child Payment and fare-free bus travel for under 22s are all policies which have been delivered through budget negotiations between the Scottish Government and the Greens.
If I’m elected as a Green MSP, Shetland will have an unwhipped voice in the Scottish Parliament. I’ll use my influence to protect Shetland’s locally owned fishing fleet from corporate interests, pushing for moratoria on salmon farming and offshore wind farms around Shetland.
I’ll campaign to stop the expansion of corporate-owned wind farms, enabling communities to develop locally owned renewable energy projects if they wish to.
I’ll push for proper investment in our NHS and evidence-based reform of our education system so that schools can properly cater to the diversity of our bairns.
I’ll continue to work on improving public transport and I’ll support crofters, farmers and fishers to provide better habitats for nature to thrive, and to produce the one thing that none of us can live without: food.
Contact Information
Telephone: 07708554375
Email: alexjarmitage@gmail.com
Facebook: Alexander J Armitage
Instagram: @alexjarmitage/
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