Patrick Harvie to stand down as Scottish Green co-leader

Patrick Harvie is to stand down as co-leader of the Scottish Greens, he has announced.

The Glasgow MSP and former Scottish government minister will remain in place until the party holds a leadership contest in the summer.

He intends to seek re-election as an MSP at next year’s Scottish Parliament election.

Harvie is the longest-serving party chief at Holyrood, having been in the role for almost 17 years.

Along with his co-leader Lorna Slater, Harvie was the first Green minister in the UK after his party signed a power-sharing deal with the SNP in 2021.

He said it had been an “extraordinary privilege” to lead the Greens.

Harvie, who was first elected as a regional MSP for Glasgow in 2003, said: “At the start of devolution, few people regarded the Greens as a serious political force.

“But as we have grown, learned and developed we have become the most significant, sustained new movement in Scottish politics for generations.”

Harvie and Slater played key roles in high-profile policies on gender recognition reforms, climate change, rent controls and a bottle return deposit scheme.

The power-sharing deal, known as the Bute House Agreement, collapsed in 2023, leading to Humza Yousaf’s resignation as first minister.

Since leaving government, Harvie has criticised the government for rowing back on climate change targets and ending rent controls.

The Glasgow MSP was first selected as Scottish Green co-leader – then called co-convenor – in September 2008.

He was elected as co-leader with Slater in 2019.

Green leaders serve two-year terms, with an election due in the summer. Under party rules, one of the co-chiefs has to be a woman.

Harvie’s announcement comes ahead of the party’s spring conference in Stirling next week.