LOCAL councillor Andrew Cooper is chasing a Euro seat.

The Kirklees Green councillor has been selected by Yorkshire and Humber Green Party as lead candidate in the 2014 European Elections.

His selection for one of the six regional seats follows a vote of party members from across the region.

Clr Cooper, of Brockholes, has been a Green Party councillor on Kirklees Council since 1999 and has been re-elected four times.

There are now five Greens elected to Kirklees Council.

Clr Cooper’s proudest achievement has been establishing the UKs first universally free insulation scheme which insulated over 50,000 homes in Kirklees. In 2008, in recognition of his work promoting sustainable energy, he was named as one of the UK’s top 100 environmentalists.

He is also the national chairman of the Association of Green Councillors which has more than 130 councillors from around the country and is the Green party’s national spokesman on energy and climate change.

He said: “I am pleased to have been selected by the Green Party to contest these elections in 2014.

“If elected, I would seek to ensure more European funds are levered into our region to promote jobs and economic security.

“We want to ensure that more people are able to work in the expanding green technologies sector.

“This will help not just employment but people’s fuel bills through improved energy efficiency.”

In the last European elections the Greens only narrowly missed gaining an MEP seat by 1.3% in the Yorkshire and Humber region.

Since then support for the BNP and the Liberal Democrats has waned, giving the Greens a real chance of electing their first MEP in the region.

In Yorkshire, the Green Party now has 15 councillors on six councils – Sheffield, Kirklees, Bradford, Leeds, Scarborough and York.