PEOPLE Party as the party of environmental concern. Party co-founder Tony Whittaker noted in an interview with Derek Wall '… voters did not connect PEOPLE with ecology. What I wanted was something that the media could look up in their files so that, when they wanted a spokesman of the issue of ecology, they could find the Ecology Party and pick up the phone. It was as brutal and basic as that. PEOPLE didn't communicate what we had hoped it would communicate'. Derek Wall, in his history of the Green Party, contends that the new political movement focused initially on the theme
Groen (political party) in 1982. It remained separate of the social movement. Prominent members of the movement Agalev, such as founder Versteylen chose not to join the political party Agalev. In the municipal elections of 1982 the party performed particularly well winning more than 10% in several municipalities. In its first periods in parliament the party functioned as a protest party forcing the other parties to take more action against environmental pollution and Third World poverty. The party campaigned on specific environmental issues, such as local anti-nuclear energy protests. The party won two additional seats in the 1985 elections, two additional seats in