Urban farmer attacks swearing assistant mayor

The founder of an urban farm initiative has hit out at the assistant mayor of Bristol for allegedly swearing at him and “failing to support” a bid for Green Capital funding.

Steve Glover, who runs The Severn Project out of farms in Temple Gate and Whitchurch, said he felt used by the council when he heard the news that they had not been awarded funding as part of the Green Capital.

“I was astonished, disappointed and insulted by the decision (not to award funding),” he said. “We were used as part of the bid to get the Green Capital in the first place.”

The Severn Project teaches agricultural and business skills to vulnerable people in the city. It supplies salad crops to around 100 restaurants and businesses in Bristol. The project found out earlier this month that an application for Green Capital funding had been turned down.

He has released a text conversation with Gus Hoyt, the assistant mayor, which he says is “symptomatic” of the failure of “some elements of the council” to support the initiative. Glover claims the text exchange with the assistant mayor sums up the “lack of respect and lack of support” for the project.

Glover alleges that Hoyt told him to “f**k off” and go and “court the Lib Dems” when he asked if there had been any progress securing additional land to expand the project.

Glover said he made the conversation public “because a lot of people were surprised at us not getting Green Capital finding”.

“This conversation with Gus reflects the ineptitude of elements of the local authority…It seems they are so far from the reality of the situation in Bristol. We have 47 per cent food inflation and people are going hungry. We don’t do this as a fashion statement… we do it to grow food and we should be supported.”

“That isn’t just so I can pay myself more money – I’m still living on £8,000 a year. It’s so we can help Bristol get away from the food crisis that we are in and, one of the reasons why we are in it, is because these guys don’t support us… They won’t go there (to the Severn Project farm in Whitchurch,) they won’t ask if we need support but they give money to a project making music out of falling fruit.

“If I started going round to my customers telling them to f**k off I wouldn’t have a business. I can’t indulge myself in that kind of behaviour. Why should he indulge himself in that kind of behaviour when we are generating social outcomes that Bristol desperately needs – employment, training, food supplies. What we are doing is tangible, instant and real – we need these things.”

Hoyt did not respond to a request for an interview this morning, but told the Bristol Post that he viewed Glover “very much as a friend and this was a private conversation between friends”.

Glover said he will be attending a council cabinet meeting on Tuesday to appeal against the decision not to award the project a Green capital grant.

As reported by Bristol24/7 last week, cabinet is set to recommend more than 30 bids for a share of the £1.35million Strategic Grants pot announced earlier this year.

Applicants were invited to apply for grants of between £25,000 and £50,000 which would support the city’s aims as green capital and could be shared as “role model” projects with other European cities.

Projects including one to create music from fruit falling from a tree are set to receive tens of thousands of pounds in funds to celebrate Bristol’s year as European Green Capital.