CAROLINE Lucas has announced her intention to run for the leadership of the Green party.

The Brighton Pavilion MP has pledged to use the position, if elected by party members, to push for a progressive alliance of other parties to create a Government in support of electoral reform in 2020.

But Brighton and Hove City Council Labour leader Warren Morgan questioned her party's track record of cooperating with like-minded parties, claiming the Green mindset remained to "wreak havoc".

Ms Lucas MP told The Argus that despite her plan to return to the party's leadership - a position she previously held from 2008 to 2012 - her priority remained serving her Brighton constituents.

She said she would be able to better serve the city if she had a "bigger platform" to challenge the Government.

If elected, she wants to use the position to work with other parties to push for reform and "crack open the political system".

She said she sensed that in Brighton in particular there was "real appetite and thirst" for "a more plural, less tribal politics".

She added the EU referendum, in which she has campaigned alongside Labour and Liberal Democrats, had shown parties could work together.

She said: "The question is whether it would be possible to have locally driven, one-off agreement in certain constituencies which could enable us to ensure that at the next election there was a majority of MPs elected for whom proportional representation was an absolute priority.

"The overwhelming sense in Brighton is that people want parties to work together.

"I’m not naïve about the challenges in that, but I think in certain circumstances it's possible and effective."

But council leader Warren Morgan dismissed the notion of a progressive alliance as "a myth" and pointed to a lack of Green support for Labour which hurt the party in Welsh Assembly and Norfolk County Council elections and a failure to back Sadiq Khan for the London mayoralty.

He said: "This proves they have no interest in working with Labour.

"Their record on the council over the past 12 months has proved that they are more intent on causing havoc."

Ms Lucas intends to run for the leadership as a job share with the party's work and pensions spokesman Jonathan Bartley.

The rock music loving broadcaster has previously worked for Conservative John Major.

Talking of her decision to stand, she said: “There is just a general sense when I go around the city and people putting PSs on the end of emails saying would you consider standing again, there was just the sense that the people in Brighton liked the idea of their local MP having a national role.”

Nominees have until June 30 to enter the leadership contest, a month-long ballot will open on July 24 with a new leader to be announced at September's party conference.

Simon Kirby, MP for Brighton Kemptown, said: “I am sure most local people would rather their MP was busy getting on with the job in hand, working hard for everyone and not worrying about pacts or re-election chances four years down the line.”