There are signs, however, that the party’s thinking on fiscal policy is becoming more nuanced. Verdant, a thinktank linked to the party, with ex-leader Caroline Lucas as a director, was launched earlier this year. Its co-founder, James Meadway, an economist and former adviser to ex-shadow chancellor John McDonnell, told The Observer: “The hard reality is that the debt acts as a constraint, and the MMT stuff suggesting you can just wander away and ignore it I think is a nonstarter. The Greens will have to be a lot more creative in thinking through how, for instance, the debt management office operates. Why are we issuing certain kinds of gilt as a government? And are there ways to get this to work more efficiently, and cheaper?”
