2026-10-22
ONE MONTH TO GO: Here's WHAT AT STAKE IN VICTORIA
By Ellen Sandell, Leader of the Victorian Greens
We are four weeks out from one of the most consequential elections in Victorian history and the tide is turning Green!
In the last few weeks we have had multiple successive polls in Victoria showing the Greens on between 16 and 18% statewide, the highest ever polling for the Greens on record! We are only 6-8 points behind Labor (on 24), which is hugely significant.
For under-35s, we’re out-polling every single other party.
The other good news is in these polls we are seeing a slight trend away from One Nation: they’re down 3% in the latest polling averages.
The Greens are on the march in the lead up to the state election, where Victoria is at a crossroads. We've had 12 years of Labor, and yet it feels like we're only going backwards.
Housing, healthcare and groceries all cost more, and our public services are starting to crumble. We’re seeing Labor demolish public housing, and new gas drilling opened up in the middle of a climate crisis.
Why is this? It’s because for years, Labor and the Liberals have put their own power, their own interests, and the interests of their corporate mates, ahead of people and the planet.
Labor and the Liberals have both sold off the services we all rely on, so corporations profit, while we pay more and get less.
Public housing has been sold off to private developers. "Public" hospitals are run by multinational corporations. Schools and roads are crumbling, while Labor finds billions of taxpayer money for private toll roads, prisons and luxury upgrades to corporate boxes at the Grand Prix.
When teachers and health workers have to fight so hard just for decent pay, and parents have to bake cakes to fund school maintenance, these aren't isolated issues. They’re symptoms of a bigger problem: where successive Governments have drunk the kool-aid of neoliberalism so deeply that they’ve given up on providing good quality public services for everyone and instead support a system that allows big corporations and the very wealthy to hoard power and money at the expense of everyone else.
Labor and the Liberals often tell us that there’s not enough money to fix the problems we’re facing. That we have to settle for less. But that’s simply not true.
The political system isn’t failing by accident - but because of active choices governments have made.
The good news? We can make different choices!
This election, the Victorian Greens are putting forward a bigger argument about what and who government should be for. The policies that we’re putting forward aren’t just a list of ideas. They’re a critique of neoliberalism, and a vision for how things can be different and where we go from here.
The government can build homes. They can fund publicly-owned renewable energy, and fund public schools and healthcare properly. They can make public transport free and accessible and more frequent. They can intervene to bring down the price of essentials like food. All this is possible if we decide to make the big end of town should pay their fair share of tax, and invest that money in universal public services for the good of everyone, and stop giving tax handouts to big corporations.
That’s the vision the Victorian Greens are putting forward - backed by a new advertising strategy that centres ordinary Victorians voices, and an organising effort that’s bigger than any that’s ever been run by the Greens in a state election.
This is the biggest Victorian Greens campaign we have ever run.
Earlier this month we ran our biggest doorknock in history in Northcote, with more than 230 people gathering on a sunny Saturday morning to speak to voters all across the electorate. We have now knocked more than 21,000 doors in Northcote, and have had more than 6,000 conversations with Voters - making it the biggest field campaign for a State Election in Victorian Greens history.
In that same week we had over 400 people attend our sell-out campaign launch. The energy was electric! Our people power is gaining momentum like never before.
Knock Every Door was the biggest single day of doorknocking the Greens have ever run, with more than 230 doorknockers heading out to speak to voters all across the electorate. We have now knocked on more than 21,000 doors in Northcote, and have had more than 6,000 conversations with voters - making it the biggest field campaign for a State Election in Victorian Greens history.
And now, the polling shows we’re on track to win more seats than any state Greens party has ever won before.
In 2022, we doubled our Party Room and elected our first regional MP.
The seat of Northcote came down to just 184 votes - less than half a percent.
In Pascoe Vale and Footscray, we came within five per cent.
Back then, we thought then that the political map was changing. But in 2026 we are are seeing that hunger for change like never before, and we’re in with a shot of winning seats from both Labor and the Liberals - in some cases seats that Labor have held for over 100 years.
We know polling will move around over the next 8 weeks. But the overall story is the Greens are growing - and the major parties are dying.
And in November, we could double our numbers or better. And if we do, we can keep the Liberals and One Nation from having enough numbers to control ou Parliament, sack thousands of workers, rip up Treaty and cancel all the climate action we’ve worked for.
But our success will also mean a fundamental re-shaping of Victorian politics away from Labor’s neoliberal sell-off of public assets, underfunding of services and slashing of the environment - and towards something bolder, more hopeful, and that delivers for everyone.
The two party system is crumbling and people are looking for something different.
People are looking for a real, positive, unashamedly bold and progressive alternative, and that’s what the Greens are providing.
We already know what we can achieve when we elect Greens to our Parliament. Using our power we’ve already helped pass Treaty and ban fracking. We’ve forced the Government to adopt an empty homes tax and regulations on Airbnb, $15 million for bike lanes and $60m for climate action, and to fix our anti-corruption watchdog (thanks to our dear late colleague Dr Tim Read whose tireless work made that happen).
That’s the power we can wield when we organise. And when we organise we WIN!
It’s time for real change. This election, the Greens aren’t asking Victorians to settle for a slightly better version of the same old rigged system.
We want to replace the system with something better.
The Greens believe that government can own things and build things and that we have a responsibility to make people’s lives better - AND to look after the planet we all rely on for the next generation of Victorians.
Instead of government telling people to expect less, government should rise to the occasion and actually provide what people need to live a dignified life.
So over the next 7 weeks, Here in Victoria we’re going to be digging deep. People are already putting in the extra doorknock shift, checking in on their local campaign on what else they need support with.
We know history is made by those who show up. And this November the Victorian Greens are here to make history.
There’s no doubt the status quo of Labor is failing in Victoria, but there are two pathways forward.
There is a politics that takes people’s anger and tells them to turn it against their neighbours. That’s the politics of the Liberals and One Nation.
Or there is the politics that is honest about why things are the way they are, and actually puts forward bold, positive solutions to make things better.
That’s what the Greens are offering at next month’s Victorian state election.
If you’d like to help make sure we deliver the biggest Greens Party Room in Australian history, right now the only thing holding us back is money. With more money, polling shows we are in with a genuine chance of winning up to 16 seats, which would be huge! You can donate to the Victorian Greens campaign here.
If you are in Victoria, you can join us at our all in doorknock with David Shoebridge and Gabrielle De Vietri on 1 November.