NEVILLE FARMER

Neville Farmer came to Kidderminster with his family when he was six years old. His father, Anthony MacKenzie Farmer taught physical education, mountain leadership and dance at Shenstone College in Bromsgrove and his mother, Beth, worked at Carpet Trades on what is now the Crossley car park.

Neville studied at Franche County Primary under headmistress, Miss Gill and, being one of the lucky few allowed a real education under the rule of the carpet barons, at King Charles 1 Grammar School for Boys under headmaster, Kingsley Raw. He was in the first year to move to the Chester Road site when Wyre Forest’s grammar schools merged.

Despite this, and his father’s devotion to the Conservative Party, Neville’s first political act was standing on street corners gathering signatures against the education minister’s agreement to prevent comprehensive education for all children in Kidderminster under its local Tory MP and carpet King, Sir Tatton Brinton. The minister was Sir Tatton’s friend, Margaret Thatcher, but it was a friendship which meant little when she became Prime Minister and encouraged policies which saw 20,000 people in Wyre Forest lose their carpet jobs. Of course, because she had denied them a proper education, many of them could do nothing else.

Neville started his working life slitting sheet steel, driving cranes and loading trucks at John Tainton’s Steelstockholdings off the Stourport Road in the freezing winter of 1978/9 but he left to seek more stimulating work in London. For eight years he worked as a telesales rep, collator, journalist and editor at Michael Hesletine’s Haymarket Publishing before become a freelance journalist. He edited and contributed to a wide range of magazines on subjects as diverse as boating, gardening, hi-fi, wines and music. He worked as a broadcaster on BBC Radio London, a producer for a number of small record companies, web-author for Peter Gabriel and eventually as a TV producer. His credits include the award winning Globe Trekker series, The World Music Awards, Planet Food, Paranormal Egypt, Adventure Golf, Live From Abbey Road and a series of short films for The Sundance Channel in New York.

Neville Farmer became involved with politics more seriously after the 9/11 attacks, where he saw with horror the ease with which governments rushed to surrender basic rights for the sake of so-called Homeland Security. He joined the Liberal Democrats as the only party with real clout that opposed the Iraq War from the start and who never kowtowed to the Bush administration.

Since joining the party, he has helped develop policy on health, world water supplies, homelessness and transport. He has spoken at most federal conferences, including to 2000 at the Liverpool conference last year on the importance of healthcare for children. 

He is a devoted internationalist, a believer in small government and large personal responsiblity, a defender of human rights and bursting with ideas to make Wyre Forest a better, happier and safer place to live.

Neville Farmer is biased – he wants your vote and wants you to forget the idea that we have to be governed by control freaks like Gordon Brown or those, like David Cameron, who believe they have a divine right to rule.

However, he wants to hear your views and ideas to improve our world, so please feel free to join in….