Jonathon Porritt

Sir Jonathon Espie Porritt, 2nd Baronet, CBE (born 6 July 1950) is a British environmentalist and writer. He is known for his advocacy of the Green Party of England and Wales. Porritt frequently contributes to magazines, newspapers and books, and appears on radio and television.

Jonathon Porritt was born in London, the son of Arthur Porritt, Baron Porritt, 11th Governor-General of New Zealand and his second wife, Kathleen Peck. Lord Porritt, who served as a senior officer in the Royal Army Medical Corps during World War II, was also the bronze medalist in the 1924 Summer Olympics "Chariots of Fire" 100 metres race. As well as receiving a life peerage, Lord Porritt had previously been awarded a baronetcy in 1963. Jonathon Porritt therefore became the 2nd Baronet on Lord Porritt's death on 1 January 1994.

Porritt was educated at Wellesley House School, Broadstairs, Kent; Eton College; and Magdalen College, University of Oxford, where he earned a first-class degree in modern languages.

Porritt started training as a barrister, but switched to teaching English at St Clement Danes Grammar School (later Burlington Danes School) in Shepherd's Bush, West London, in 1974. He taught there from 1974 to 1984, serving as Head of English from 1980 to 1984. In 1985 he married Sarah Staniforth CBE, daughter of Malcolm Arthur Staniforth.

In the 1970s and early 1980s, Porritt was a prominent member of the Ecology Party (now the Green Party of England and Wales). Porritt served as chair of The Ecology Party from 1979 to 1980, and from 1982 to 1984. He presided over changes that made the party much more prominent in elections, himself standing as a parliamentary candidate in general elections in 1979 and 1983. In 1979, he achieved 2.8% of the vote in St Marylebone, and in 1983, he achieved 2.1% in Kensington, receiving attention from national media. Under his stewardship, membership grew from a few hundred to around 3,000.

In 1984, Porritt published his first book, Seeing Green: Politics of Ecology Explained. It was written while he was policy director of the Ecology Party. As of 1999, it was still described as "the best general guide to the politics of ecology by an 'insider'". Reviewed nearly 30 years after its publication, it stands up as "prophetic in many respects", although somewhat off in the timing of its predictions, perhaps in part because Porritt did not anticipate the rise of indebtedness. Writing before the rise of the internet, Porritt even predicted the development of an "information-rich, knowledge-poor" age.

The Greens achieved 15% of the European Parliamentary vote in 1989, but were able to win only 1.2% of the vote in the 1992 general election, in which environmental issues were largely ignored. During this time, Porritt became a strong public advocate of change in the Green Party. Along with Sara Parkin, he advocated for a more professional organisation with identifiable leaders, a change that was eventually approved.

In 1992, Porritt backed the election of Cynog Dafis, who was elected to Parliament as the joint Plaid Cymru-Green MP for Ceredigion. However, in 1994, the regional council of the Green Party suspended Porritt for supporting Dafis, and demanded that Dafis stop identifying himself as Green.