Dear readers — you asked, The Dispatch delivered. When we surveyed our readers recently, many of you told us you wanted more stories about north Birmingham. In particular, you wanted us to spend more time in Erdington to hear from people in this often misunderstood area. Take, for example, a Telegraph article that was published in March, written by a London journalist who visited Erdington while "on a quest to understand why a sense of belonging appears to be waning" in Britain. Judith Woods' article made Erdington sound scary, alienating and – shock horror — devoid of a Marks and Spencer. Our reporter, Dan Cave's experience was a little different. That's today's story. (Editor's note: please do send in any tip offs for more stories on Erdington to editor@birminghamdispatch.co.uk).
Now, your Brum in Brief.
Brum in Brief
💎 Jewellery Quarter traders have been spooked by the potential sale of workshop freeholds that belong to Birmingham City Council (BCC). The BBC has reported that a series of workshops on Vyse Street are to be sold by the council, after zero consultation with locals. Many in the jewellery industry worry that the sales will push out craftspeople whose margins are too low to afford raised rents. BCC has denied that the sale of these assets will threaten the jewellery industry, and is committed to the preservation of the quarter. The council plans to sell the freehold on Vyse Street for £750k.
🇬🇧 Shakeel Afsar, co-leader of the Independent Candidate Alliance in Birmingham, alongside Akhmed Yakoob, has spoken out against Runcorn Reform MP Sarah Pochin on GB News. Pochin made controversial comments about the racial breakdown in British advertising. Afsar took to GB News to debate host Nana Akua, about Pochin’s comments. According to the Birmingham Mail, Afsar told Akua that she was: “part of the problem.” Going on to say, “there's a really popular film called Django Unchained and I would really suggest you go watch it. It gives you an example of people, from within our own communities, who sell themselves just to brownnose their way through society.” Afsar has previously drawn attention for organising anti-LGBT protests outside Birmingham primary schools.
🎩 Liberal Democrat councillors in Dudley call for Eton-branded academy scheme to be scrapped. (Birmingham Mail).
🗑️ Agency staff covering for striking binworkers consider their own industrial action. (The Independent).
🏚️ The company Freehold Managers Ltd, which is responsible for Birmingham’s Centenary Plaza, has been fined £50k by Birmingham City Council for failing fire safety measures. (Express and Star).
❗The Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, has intevened to call for information over a racially aggravated rape in Walsall, (BBC).
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Had Telegraph journalist Judith Woods read Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness before she pitched up in Erdington earlier this year? There’s an uncanny throughline between the Victorian writer’s caricature representations of Congolese natives and Woods’ 21st Century descriptions of Erdington locals.
Where Conrad wrote of encountering wild-limbed, incomprehensible savages, Woods’ first experience of B23 is coloured with foreignness and violent portent: a man with “pale, meaty fists”, and an “Eastern European accent” towers over her, effing and jeffing with rage.
Any threat of violence is an awful thing, but Wood’s widely read Erdington profile — in which she finds community spirit ailing, with residents terrified of crime and migrants — leans heavily on racialised reporting. She details the African and Polish shops but misses the bookies and well-attended pubs. There’s a league table of where Erdington migrants come from, but it ignores that the suburb is whiter-than-average for the second city. National talking points on immigration and politics are hashed into local concerns. One is left with the sense that systemic problems in Britain are the result of diverse areas like Erdington.
Indeed, north Birmingham suburbs like Erdington have become a hotspot for this type of right-wing media adventuring. Within the city, we know there’s an unofficial north/southdivide — sometimes we, at The Dispatch, can unwittingly perpetuate it. If we reported from north Birmingham more regularly, would the Woodses and MP-come-YouTubers like Robert Jenrick (who popped up in Handsworth earlier this year, moaning about litter) come searching for evidence of a broken public realm which they can then politically instrumentalise? Or would the more complex truth of places like Erdington be revealed?
So The Dispatch headed north too, although it took less journeying time from our central Birmingham HQ than Woods’ jaunt from London. First impressions of Erdington? The high street appears a bit threadbare. But this isn’t exactly a localised issue, even if it’s unfortunately experienced that way. Betting shops, empty units and vape shops dominate. Locals tell me it’s a shame the Co-op closed down. A tatty-looking beauty salon, offering, of all things, penis filler is impossible to miss. There’s other examples that could be used to buttress the kind of narrative that Judith Woods was pushing about Erdington: I spot shoplifting in action and people are milling about clearly in the grips of addiction. But that’s only one part of the story.
