Denunciation, disaster and an anonymous donor: Alison Teal's case is heating up

Good morning members — and welcome to Thursday’s Tribune.

Alison Teal has now been suspended from the Green Party for eight months. From the “golden girl” of the Sheffield tree protests to — in the eyes of some members at least — a pariah unwelcome in the party is quite a journey in less than six years. The disciplinary case against her shows no signs of being dealt with any time soon and, unsurprisingly, her legal bills are stacking up. Now, there are rumours that a wealthy donor is anonymously backing her fight.

Editor’s note: Journalism is as much about getting out and meeting people as it is about writing. As a case in point, today’s story came from a chance conversation I had just last weekend. The reporter’s job used to be about generating contacts, meeting people for coffee and yes, going to the pub and eavesdropping on people sat next to you at the bar. But, as newspapers have shrunk and working from home has taken over, lots of that old-fashioned journalism has been lost. The Tribune is trying to bring it back. If you want to see that too, please join today.

Mini-briefing

📱 How far would you go to get the last word? For Sheffield woman Katie Bell, it’s straight to jail. Driven by an inexplicable passion for mocking the dead (The Tribune’s Dan Hayes remembers her being nasty in comments from his time at The Star), Bell, of Stradbroke Road, narrowly escaped a prison sentence for online trolling two years ago but refused to shake her nasty habit. Now she’s been sentenced to 15 months for harassing a grieving widow online.

🚨 South Yorkshire Police say the recent rise in reports of gun crime “cannot be tolerated” and promise to “seek to flood the area with specialist officers” every time a gunshot is reported. Last Sunday, a 42-year-old man was left with “life-changing” injuries after he was shot in Burngreave. In the past week, police have been called to investigate two other gun-related crimes in Aston and Thrybergh, both villages near Rotherham. And no one has yet been charged with the murder of Abdullah Hassan, 25, who was shot dead in the Gleadless Valley in April.

👶 To commemorate the 75th birthday of the NHS, The Star spoke to Melloney Poole, who became one of the first babies born in an NHS hospital after her mother drove herself there while in labour. It was, she recalls, hugely important to her father that she was born in a local hospital as “in those days only those that were born in Yorkshire could play cricket” for the regional team. Melloney is now chairwoman of an NHS trust in Portsmouth and abandoned her original dream of becoming a nurse because she “kept on fainting at the sight of blood”.

Things to do

🍻 In preparation for his forthcoming exhibition Frank & Joy — A Love Story, this weekend (Friday, 7 to Sunday, 9 July), Sheffield artist Pete McKee has organised a pub crawl around four of the best boozers in the city (Fagan’s, The Bath Hotel, The Greystones and The Brothers Arms). The first 200 people who get their cards stamped at all four will receive a limited edition beer glass, featuring McKee’s iconic cartoon The Snog. Each pub will also have a different Pete McKee beer mat available, all of which can be joined together to reveal an image by the artist, and Kelham Island Brewery has produced a special Frank & Joy beer for the event, which will be available at all four pub crawl venues across the weekend.

💎 Goldsmiths North contemporary jewellery and silverware fair returns this weekend (7-9 July), bringing over 50 independent makers from across Europe, including lots of local talent, to the magnificent surroundings of Sheffield’s Cutlers’ Hall. One of those who will be exhibiting is silversmith Brett Payne, the man behind the Cutting Edge sculpture at the train station. The fair is open from 10am-5pm Friday-Saturday, and from 10am-4pm on Sunday. Admission is £10.

💃 Established in 2000, Chance to Dance is a one day festival involving 30 different groups performing across four open stages in the city centre. This Saturday, 8 July, you can try your hand at everything from salsa to bhangra and ballroom to modern jive at the Peace Gardens, Tudor Square, Barker’s Pool and the Winter Garden. Dancing begins at 11am on all stages before ending with a “mass dance” at the Peace Gardens at 4pm. For the full programme click here.

Denunciation, disaster and an anonymous donor: Alison Teal's case is heating up

By Dan Hayes, additional reporting by Victoria Munro

Here’s what the Green Party used to say about Alison Teal, their former councillor in Nether Edge & Sharrow. During the tree felling scandal in 2017, Teal was arrested for blocking a shredder, and became a big name in the environmental scene. “Alison is a hero — not a criminal,” posted her party’s official Twitter account. “Our full support to Alison — arrested while defending her community, the environment & standing up for democracy!” It added: “100% behind you Alison 💚”.

If a week is a long time in politics, six years must be a century. Scroll through the Green Party’s Twitter feed now, and you will not find reference to Alison Teal, and certainly no mention that she has been selected to contest the Sheffield Central constituency in the next general election. So what happened?

Teal finds herself in an unusual position. After a majority of local members chose her to run in the forthcoming election, she was suspended by party leaders in November (a story broken by The Tribune last year). Surprisingly, her case has yet to be resolved. What’s new since we last reported on Teal? Not much, and yet a whole lot.

Last Monday, Teal was told by the Greens that her “no-fault suspension” has been extended, meaning no decision has been made on her case in the past eight months. For a party that is starting to gear up for an election, and hoping to capitalise on strong local support (there are 14 Green councillors), this does not bode well. Teal was initially suspended in November amid accusations that she posted transphobic tweets, and has been unable to attend Green meetings — or campaign in May’s elections, which saw the loss of her old council seat in Nether Edge & Sharrow — until her complaint is heard.

Teal, frustrated with the “tremendous inertia” around her case, is planning for a range of outcomes. She has enlisted a lawyer and is ready, depending on what happens in her hearing, to issue a statement of case. A meeting with the party is in the offing later this month. “The aim is to get to a stage where it doesn’t have to go to court, where the party understands the situation of discrimination it is currently caught up in,” Teal says over the phone.