Polanski opens Green conference with call for rent cap

Zack Polanski opened the Green Party conference on 2 October 2026 by calling for a three-year cap on private rent increases.

The BBC said Polanski was set to make the proposal in his opening address BBC. The BBC said he described it as a three-year "emergency brake" on private rent increases.

The Guardian described the plan as a triple lock-style guarantee aimed at easing young adults' housing costs The Guardian. Separate video coverage which the BBC associated with the conference said Polanski called for a 'national fair rent guarantee' BBC. The wording is short. The policy intent is clear.

As background, the party said in May 2024 that Polanski had been selected as its candidate for the Holborn and St Pancras byelection Green Party. That announcement also named Geraldine Coggins as the party's candidate for Greater Manchester Mayor, ahead of an election scheduled for 30 July.

The party said Coggins had announced a 10-year plan for 20,000 genuinely affordable homes in Greater Manchester. The plan would create a publicly owned provider called Homes for Greater Manchester to deliver them.

The broader context here is how a conference opener is used. Leaders use the first speech to fix a single retail offer in the minds of delegates, media and voters. Polanski has chosen rents. It is concise. It can be repeated on the doorstep. It speaks to tenure rather than to planning law. For an expert audience, the interest lies less in the slogan than in the mechanism that would sit behind it.

In my view, the choice of language deserves close reading. "Emergency brake" implies a time-limited intervention, not a permanent system of control. Triple lock-style implies a rule-based formula, not ministerial discretion year to year. The phrase 'national fair rent guarantee' implies consistency of standard. Each phrase does different political work. Together they present the state as stabiliser. Specialists will want to know how the cap would be defined, how it would apply to new lets and renewals, and how it would interact with existing tenancy and enforcement powers.

Looking at what this means for the party's housing pitch, the conference message sits alongside the local delivery message outlined for Greater Manchester. The mayoral plan is about supply through a publicly owned vehicle. The conference proposal is about cost in the existing private rented stock. One promises homes built. The other promises rents restrained. Strategists will test whether the two cohere as a single offer. Voters who rent will test whether the promise is credible without reducing availability. Other parties will test the costs and the administrative burden. The answers given after the speech will matter as much as the lines in it.