Ancestral land owners, gangster pop stars and everything in between
An editor’s edition from Kate
Kate Knowles
Kate is a reporter from Birmingham who set up The Dispatch in 2023. She has written extensively about politics in the West Midlands and has investigated the region’s housing and hospitality sectors.
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Birmingham
50 years after they formed in Handsworth, reggae legends Steel Pulse are coming home
Lead singer David Hinds on the music of 'the masses' and the lesson he learnt from Bob Marley
Leaked recordings and scheming councillors: did Labour councillors engage in a ‘campaign of abuse’?
Shabina Bano claims she was the victim of bullying, harassment and misogyny by her former Birmingham Labour colleagues
An Irish hospitality tycoon promised to transform one of Birmingham’s most important buildings — three years later, and it’s falling apart
The clock is ticking on the Methodist Central Hall
A shock letter & a silent councillor: what really happened at Baby Aid Birmingham
And what it says about our city leaders
Want to get your child into a King Edward grammar school? The fight is fierce
'All they were interested in was their child passing the test, they didn’t care how it was done, they just wanted to pay for it'
Cancel culture on campus? Inside the fight for freedom of speech at the University of Birmingham
Two students may not be allowed to graduate because they participated in pro-Palestine protests
A tower block fire exposes Birmingham’s council housing problem
‘You just think of Grenfell. The first thing you think is you’re not going to get out of here alive’
No justice, no peace? Why hasn’t there been a public inquiry into the 1974 Birmingham bombings?
50 years after the Birmingham bombings, and no one is any closer to getting to the truth. The story of why, and how, a public inquiry hasn’t happened
The many lives of the Bull Ring
From Middle Age merchants to viral cosmetics, Birmingham’s major shopping centre is having its latest glow-up
What’s bothering Birmingham’s classical music fans?
‘If it ain’t woke, don’t fix it'
A spaceship lands in Digbeth
Big industries are moving into the ‘creative quarter’. Do they come in peace?
Shysters, buffoons and w***ers?
A cast of characters competes to win round voters in Sutton Coldfield
The eccentric entrepreneur, a family feud and a ‘mass exodus’: The rise and fall of the Custard Factory
We hear from the Digbeth business owners who have had enough of their London landlord