Amelia Helen Womack (born 12 January 1985) is a British

Green Party of England and Wales The Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW; cy, Plaid Werdd Cymru a Lloegr, kw, Party Gwer Pow an Sowson ha Kembra, often simply the Green Party or Greens) is a green, left-wing political party in England and Wales. Since October 2021, Carla ...

politician. She served as the party's Deputy Leader from 2014 to 2022. She is a co-chair of the

People's Assembly Against Austerity The People's Assembly Against Austerity (also known as The People's Assembly) is a political organisation based in the United Kingdom that was originally set up to end and reverse the country's government-instituted austerity programme. The Peopl ...

and co-founded Another Europe Is Possible. She served as Deputy Leader of the

alongside Shahrar Ali from 2014 to 2016. She was re-elected in September 2016, once again in September 2018 and then again in September 2020. Womack stood as her party's lead candidate in the

South Wales East South Wales East () is an electoral region of the Senedd, consisting of eight constituencies. The region elects 12 members, eight directly elected constituency members and four additional members. The electoral region was first used in 1999, w ...

region in the 2021 Senedd election; she was not elected. Womack also stood on a joint ticket with

Tamsin Omond Tamsin Omond (born 19 November 1984) is a British author, environmental activist and journalist. They have campaigned for the government of the United Kingdom to take action to avoid climate change. Early life and education Tamsin Omond was bo ...

in the 2021 Green Party leadership election, in which they finished in second place of five candidates vying for the party's leadership.

Education

Womack was born in Newport in

Monmouthshire Monmouthshire ( cy, Sir Fynwy) is a county in the south-east of Wales. The name derives from the historic county of the same name; the modern county covers the eastern three-fifths of the historic county. The largest town is Abergavenny, with ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

. She attended

Bassaleg School Bassaleg School ( cy, Ysgol Basaleg) is a comprehensive secondary school for pupils aged 11 to 18 years, situated in the suburb of Bassaleg on the western side of the city of Newport, South Wales. The present buildings of the school range in age ...

, a state comprehensive school in the

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area, which may include commercial and mixed-use, that is primarily a residential area. A suburb can exist either as part of a larger city/urban area or as a separate ...

Bassaleg Bassaleg ( cy, Basaleg) is a suburb on the west side of Newport, Wales. It is in the Graig electoral ward and community.Bassaleg is located two miles northwest of Newport city centre. Bassaleg is bounded by the A467 road (A4072) to the east, th ...

, from 1996 to 2003. She studied a

BSc A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...

Environmental Biology Environmental science is an interdisciplinary academic field that integrates physics, biology, and geography (including ecology, chemistry, plant science, zoology, mineralogy, oceanography, limnology, soil science, geology and physical geogra ...

Liverpool University , mottoeng = These days of peace foster learning , established = 1881 – University College Liverpool1884 – affiliated to the federal Victoria Universityhttp://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/2004/4 University of Manchester Act 200 ...

, and went on to complete an MSc in

environmental technology Environmental technology (envirotech) or green technology (greentech), also known as '' clean technology'' (''cleantech''), is the application of one or more of environmental science, green chemistry, environmental monitoring and electronic devi ...

Imperial College London Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom. Its history began with Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria, who developed his vision for a cu ...

in 2009, with a thesis entitled ''Who's afraid of environmental law? How the law of Ecocide can secure our environment for business resilience''.

Political career

Womack joined the

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation ...

around 2000. She stood as a Green candidate for

Herne Hill Herne Hill is a district in South London, approximately four miles from Charing Cross and bordered by Brixton, Camberwell, Dulwich, and Tulse Hill. It sits to the north and east of Brockwell Park and straddles the boundary between the borou ...

ward on

Lambeth Council Lambeth London Borough Council is the local authority for the London Borough of Lambeth in Greater London, England. It is a London borough council, and one of the 32 in the United Kingdom capital of London. The council meets at Lambeth Town Hall ...

, in the 2014 United Kingdom local elections, and for

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

in the

2014 European Parliament election The 2014 European Parliament election was held in the European Union, from 22 to 25 May 2014. It was the 8th parliamentary election since the first direct elections in 1979, and the first in which the European political parties fielded candid ...

, though she won neither seat. She was elected deputy leader of the Green Party in September 2014, delivering her first speech in the role at the party's conference on 6 September. Having been elected at the age of 29, Womack is the youngest deputy leader of any political party in the UK. She stood in the

Camberwell and Peckham Camberwell and Peckham is a List of United Kingdom Parliament constituencies, constituency represented in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, UK Parliament since its 1997 creation ...

constituency in the 2015 general election, finishing third with just over 10% of the vote. In September 2015, Womack announced her intention to stand for the

Wales Green Party The Wales Green Party ( cy, Plaid Werdd Cymru) is a semi-autonomous political party within the Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW). It covers Wales, and is the only regional party with semi-autonomous status within the GPEW. The Wales Green ...

in the 2016 National Assembly for Wales election. The Welsh Green Party announced in late October that she had been selected as the lead candidate for the regional

South Wales Central South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþaz ...

(

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...

) list as well as for the Cardiff Central constituency. Womack's re-election as Deputy Leader of the Green Party of England and Wales was announced at the party conference in early September 2016. She served a second two-year term. Through her work as an End

Ecocide Ecocide is human impact on the environment causing mass destruction to that environment. Ten nations have codified ecocide as a crime. Activities that might constitute ecocide in these nations include substantially damaging or destroying ecos ...

Campaigner, she has worked with

Vivienne Westwood Dame Vivienne Isabel Westwood (née Swire; born 8 April 1941) is an English fashion designer and businesswoman, largely responsible for bringing modern punk and new wave fashions into the mainstream. Westwood came to public notice when she m ...

to promote the change in environmental law and attempt to secure the one million votes required for a

European Citizens' Initiative The European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) is a European Union (EU) mechanism aimed at increasing direct democracy by enabling "EU citizens to participate directly in the development of EU policies", introduced with the Treaty of Lisbon in 2007. The ...

. In August 2016, she criticised Byron Hamburgers after they worked with the Home Office to call their London workers to a fake Health and Safety briefing, whereat immigration officials present at the venue arrested several employees, deporting 35 for immigration offences. Womack was quoted as saying "It’s about the family and friends of people who are left behind as well. You don’t need to be pro-migration to realise that employing people, having them pay tax and contribute to the company for years and then turn them over to authorities without any responsibility for the chaos caused is the wrong thing to do". In March 2017, Womack reported the ''

Daily Mail The ''Daily Mail'' is a British daily middle-market tabloid newspaper and news websitePeter Wilb"Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail: The man who hates liberal Britain", ''New Statesman'', 19 December 2013 (online version: 2 January 2014) publish ...

'' newspaper to the

Independent Press Standards Organisation The Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) is the regulator of the newspaper and magazine industry in the UK. It was established on 8 September 2014 after the windup of the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), which had been the main ind ...

over a front page photo of

Theresa May Theresa Mary May, Lady May (; née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2016 to 2019. She previously served in David Cameron's cab ...

and

Nicola Sturgeon Nicola Ferguson Sturgeon (born 19 July 1970) is a Scottish politician serving as First Minister of Scotland and Leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) since 2014. She is the first woman to hold either position. She has been a member of ...

with the caption "Never mind Brexit, who won Legs-it". In her submission she said: "This headline and the further derogatory comments inside the paper would not have even been considered, let alone published, if the two politicians in question had been men". Womack was again re-elected Deputy Leader of the Green Party of England and Wales in September 2018. She is currently serving a two-year term. In January 2019 she apologised for

tweeting Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

a picture accused of being

antisemitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

. In February 2019, it was announced that Womack would be the

candidate in the 2019 Newport West by-election, a position she had nominally been selected for in November 2018. The by-election was held on 4 April 2019 and Womack finished in sixth place in a field of 11 candidates, with 924 votes (3.9% of the total votes cast). In August 2019, Womack was again nominated by the Wales Green Party as the candidate for Newport West in a prospective snap general election. Womack stood in the 2019 general election. She again came in sixth place, but this time out of a field of six candidates. She achieved a smaller share of the vote compared to the

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

, receiving 2.1% of the total votes cast. In June 2020, Womack announced her intention to stand again as deputy leader. On 9 September 2020, it was announced that she had been re-elected by party members for a fourth term. Womack stood as her party's lead candidate in the

region in the 2021 Senedd election. In August 2021, Womack announced her candidacy on a joint ticket with

for the 2021 Green Party of England and Wales leadership election. Their joint leadership ticket lost the leadership election to the joint ticket of

Adrian Ramsay Adrian Philip Ramsay (born 1981) is a British politician and co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales alongside Carla Denyer. He was previously the deputy leader of the Green Party of England and Wales from 2008 to 2012. He served as ...

and

Carla Denyer Carla Suzanne Denyer (born 1985) is a British politician who has served as co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales since 2021. She has been a city councillor in Bristol since 2015 (initially for Clifton East ward, and since the 2016 ...

, coming in second place out of five candidates. In March 2022, Womack announced that she would not be standing in the

2022 Green Party of England and Wales deputy leadership election The 2022 Green Party of England and Wales Party deputy leadership election was held between 1 July and 7 September 2022 to determine the next deputy leader of the Green Party of England and Wales. Voting took place from 1 to 30 August 2022. On ...

Electoral history

2021 Senedd election

2019 general election

2019 by-election

2016 Welsh Assembly election

2015 general election

2014 European elections

2014 Lambeth London Borough Council election The 2014 Lambeth Council election was held on 22 May 2014 to elect members of Lambeth Council in Greater London, England. This was on the same day as other local elections. The election saw the Labour Party further increase its majority on the ...

References

External links

Profile page
on the Green Party of England and Wales official website * {{DEFAULTSORT:Womack, Amelia 1985 births Living people Green Party of England and Wales parliamentary candidates Alumni of Imperial College London Alumni of the University of Liverpool British abortion-rights activists British environmentalists People educated at Bassaleg School People from Newport, Wales