Dawn Furness - Independent Candidate #DFGE24

Aim: I am standing as an Independent Candidate for the constituency of Cramlington and Killingworth in the 4 July 2024 General Election.

Independent Candidate in GE24

I want to raise issues of Women's Rights, Safeguarding & the Green New Deal, and the impact on humanity of Climate Change, Nuclear Weapons and AI. 

To do this, I need to cover the electoral deposit, the design and printing of 50,000 flyers, posters, boards & other promo materials and transport.

I estimate it will cost about £5,000 to stand, any money raised beyond this will go towards my legal campaign - details below.

Political Track Record

I stood as a Green Party candidate for the 2015, 2017 & 2019 General Elections and was the MEP candidate in 2019 EU elections, after we had already decided (through the 2016 referendum) to leave the European Union.

I have sat on the Green Party International Committee and attended international conferences as a Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW) delegate.
In 2019 I was elected to the Green Party Executive (GPEx the management board of the national Party). I have served as Co-Chair of the national women's caucus (Green Party Women), the regional Co-Ordinator of the North-East Greens.

I have developed and scrutinised numerous policy motions for the national conference.

Green Party Abuse & Safeguarding Violations

Many people are asking me why I am no longer standing for the Greens. In April 2020, I raised a formal whistleblowing complaint of institutional sexism and massive safeguarding breeches (David Challenor Documentary). The party took no action. In Sep 2020, I raised concerns that a convicted paedophile had been given access to the communication channels of Young Greens and LGBTIQA+ Greens. 

On 2 Dec 2020, I was recalled from my elected position on the National Executive, without due process and right of reply and suspended from the Green Party. After more than a year of a corrupt internal investigations, I was expelled.

Green Party Legal Action 

After commencing litigation, the Green Party reduced my 'sentence' to a two year suspension, with a further two years barring standing for ANY elected position within the party. They did this in the hope I would desist. Not only have I NOT dessisted, in March 2023 I won the BARBRI International Legal Scholarship and am now qualifying as a Solicitor.

I cannot in good conscience endorse any party with such gross safeguarding breeches and one that does not recognise Sex as a protected characteristic under the UK's equality legislation. Myself and many colleagues have been trying to resolve the bullying and violence towards women within the party for the sake of climate change for the last 6 years, but have found our positions untenable.

Campaign Spending + Legal costs

The legal threshold for campaign spend in my constituency of Cramlington and Killingworth is £11,300 according to Northumberland County Council Electoral Returning Officer (ERO).

Further info on national spending limits is here:
Electoral Commission Spending Guidelines
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Legal Action against the Green Party

Climate Change is happening at an unprecedented rate. I devoted 11 years to a political party that expelled me after whistleblowing on safeguarding & Women's sex-based rights.

I am taking the Green Party to court for Institutional Sexism, and Discrimination on the grounds of Sex and on the basis of my Gender Critical beliefs. 

The core of my case is that the Green Party has a disciplinary system has been weaponised to systematically purge Gender Critical women from the party, using false allegations of transphobia against women who assert their sex-based rights under the Equality Act 2010.

In order to fight climate change we need a coordinated, cohesive, global political response. We can't do that in an organisation that intimidates and bullies women simply for holding basic and scientifically non-controversial views about what it means to be a woman.  

I have been the subject of this treatment.  My claim states that I have been physically assaulted, suspended and expelled as part of this campaign; that as chair of Green Party Women, I watched as Party officials disenfranchised women from party policies and procedures; and that the hierarchy of the Party, including its leaders, not only tolerated but actively pursued these efforts against women.

Acts of Discrimination

Among the aspects of the Green Party’s institutional discrimination that I will be litigating are:

• That Green Party policies on how women are defined and treated within the Party were put in place by David and Aimee Challenor and were left in place after David Challenor was imprisoned for 22 years for child sex offences.
• That Green Party officers indicated support for David Challenor after his conviction, and members who challenged those expressions of support were disciplined.  Even those who – like me - expressed solidarity with those challenging support for David Challenor were disciplined.
• That the Report into the Challenors’ involvement in the party identified serious safeguarding risks, which have still not been addressed.
• When women members of the Green Party (including me) attempted to pass democratic motions seeking to overturn the policies that the Challenors had brought about, those motions were illegitimately and undemocratically defeated by the Party leadership.
• That women who expressed gender critical beliefs (or who were even suspected of holding those beliefs) were blacklisted and excluded from Party platforms.
• That Officers made concerted attempts to ensure that women who stood for election to internal roles had their results suppressed in favour of males who had received fewer votes.
• That women who tried to meet to discuss the role of women in the party had their meetings sabotaged by Party officers to the extent that the women had to meet in secret.
• That the leadership of Green Party Women were denied access to its membership database, to prevent women from democratically meeting and organising.
• That I was physically assaulted twice, and when this was reported to officers, their only reaction was to laugh.
• As the unsuccessful Parliamentary Candidate for the Green Party in 2019, male officers in the party cheered and celebrated my loss to the Conservative candidate, while watching the result being announced on TV, shouting the word “TERF” at the TV screen at Party HQ.
• Members - including me - who expressed gender critical beliefs were disciplined and suspended, often in processes that took years, denying us any democratic role while those processes were ongoing.

There is much more besides.

As with all claims in litigation – and particularly in discrimination law – I could lose this case.   The scale of the case is significant and as Claimant, the burden of proof is on me.  And if I lose, I may be liable for the Party’s costs.  This is a huge personal risk for me, but I am willing to take that risk given what is at stake: restoring democracy to political climate justice in the UK.  

Please help me.