The Rare and Unusual Varieties department of the Sea View Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association has today announced that a new variety of turnip has finally been grown that is fit to carry the Benjamin Arnold Guppy name - the Brassica Benjamina Guppicus. The new variety is slightly larger than other turnips, with incredibly dense foliage, and it boasts the unusual ability to throw itself over walls when angered. 

Two years of research have gone into the project, which cost in the region of a quarter of a million pounds. The development of this new variety was funded by the Sea View Environmental Preservation Fund, which has claimed that the turnip is close to becoming an endangered species in Sea View, in response to criticism from local residents that the environmental group, founded by Mrs Pat Guppy, is siphoning off local council funds for use in dubious personal projects that do nothing to improve the local area.

Grown in a mixture of porkpie pastry crumblings and peat in a Tesco's carrier bag, it has been appropriately nicknamed the 'BAG turnip' by locals. According to Mrs Phyllis Pennybetter, who is heading a local campaign to force an investigation into the environmental group’s use of council funds for the furthering of personal agendas, ‘the taste is rather like cardboard that’s been dipped in horse dung and it’s very unappealing to look at.’

‘The turnip is an important asset within the local community, just as my poor departed Benny was,’ Pat Guppy said, when faced with angry crowds who attempted to bar her entrance to her home at Hill View, on the slopes of Sea View, following the news announcement by the Sea View Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association. ‘We have already begun taking bookings from tour parties eager to view this fine new specimen,’ she continued, ‘and the Queen has promised to serve a ‘Benjamin’ the next time she has a candlelight soirée.’