Dear readers — did you know Birmingham City Council is having a fire sale? The city has been ordered to raise £1bn by 2027 in the wake of going bankrupt two years ago — and one way they’re doing it is via selling off local authority assets. Behind that clinical word — ‘assets’ — are community centres, libraries and a host of other buildings that house key services. Matty Edwards, who has reported our story today, finds both Brum locals and councillors are concerned about the speed with which these sales are being waved through. And, of course, they’re happening in part because of the enormity of that £750m equal pay bill deficit — which turned out to be inflated to the tune of £500m. So why does Birmingham need to sell so much? We’ve got more on that below, but first: your Brum in brief.
Your Brum in brief
🚒 Another Digbeth warehouse went up in flames this week, just one month after a similar fire on Bradford Street. This time, the blaze was at 12 Rea Street South, and led to a number of evacuations from neighbouring businesses including Islamic Relief and Muther’s Studio. Over 50 firefighters were in attendance and smoke could be seen from miles away. The Dispatch can reveal that 12 Rea Street South is currently owned by Mohammed Rashid, Mohammed Nazeer, Amjad Hussain and Fazeelat Begum of 103-115 Bordesley Green. Nazeer and Rashid are the previous directors of a furniture manufacturing company, dissolved in 2015, with Nazeer going on to run a wood manufacturing business from Rea Street until 2020. The West Midlands Fire Service say they believe the fire began "accidentally".
❓ The Dispatch have received reports that Labour councillor for Allens Cross, Jack Deakin turned up at Birmingham City Council buildings after a long absence. Constituents have expressed concern about Deakin’s absence, and many are unhappy that very few surgeries have been held for local residents since his election in 2022. Many Birmingham councillors have complained that Deakin’s attendance at the council house has been kept at the absolute minimum required for him to continue to draw a stipend and not trigger a by-election. Perhaps his absence is due to the fact Deakin allegedly isn't living in Birmingham, and supposedly hasn't been since at least 2023 — sources tell us that he has moved to Leeds. So why hasn't Labour done anything about the absentee councillors? Local authority insiders speculated to us the party don't want to force an Allens Cross by-election — because they're afraid such a contest would be won by Reform UK.
💸 Lawyer and aspirant politician Akhmed Yakoob and his accountant Nabeel Afzal have been charged with money laundering after a National Crime Agency investigation. The alleged offences date from February 18th, 2020 and January 8th, 2021. They are due to appear at Westminster Magistrates on the 17th of June. Yakoob has become an outspoken voice in Birmingham and previously contested the Ladywood seat at the general election, and ran for the West Midlands mayoralty. This year he launched the Independent Candidates Alliance, which he describes as a "grassroots political movement".
Today, Matty Edwards is inside the auction rooms where Birmingham's public assets are quietly being sold off to help meet a £1bn bill. But concerns are being raised about the process.
In the space of an hour, the auctioneer’s gavel was struck six times. During that period, nearly £3m of assets owned by Birmingham City Council were flogged off, including a former youth centre in Sutton Coldfield, an educational centre in Moseley and an empty pub in Northfield.
This auction last week was one of a flurry that’s happened since the start of last year. Collectively, they’ve seen around £16m of Birmingham’s public assets sold to private bidders, part of the emergency measures imposed to get the council’s finances in order after it declared effective bankruptcy in 2023. And yet this is just a fraction of the sales required if the council is to raise the whopping £1bn that government-appointed commissioners say must be found by 2027 in order to balance the books.
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While the bin strikes dominate the news headlines, the council is selling off assets worth millions, under a temporary arrangement with the government allowing the authority to raise cash. After ordering the council in 2023 to find £750m, in January, the commissioners then ordered an extra £250m of assets to be sold by March 2027, with little justification.
There are concerns about a lack of transparency in the process. Meanwhile community groups are scrambling to take over youth centres and libraries, amid cuts to those vital services.
The latest public update on the council’s “asset disposals programme” is in the commissioners’ second report in January. It says that between April and December of 2024, the council had generated a total of £259.9m from asset sales, with a further £27.6m exchanged and £81.9m under offer.
The commissioners had set a target of £500m to be raised in the financial year 2024/25, meaning that another £130.6m was still to be identified by April. The commissioners have instructed that a further £250m of sales are then to be found in both 2025/26 and 2026/27, amounting to £1bn in total.
The commissioners say the most notable of the major disposals so far is the sale of the former ‘Wheels’ site at Bordesley Park, which went to the owners of Birmingham City FC for £50m; and two blocks of empty homes at the Perry Barr estate, originally built to house Commonwealth Games athletes, bought by financial services firm, Legal and General. What the commissioners’ report doesn’t mention is that the council had received an offer of £30m more for the Bordesley Park site two years earlier, or that the council’s handling of the Perry Barr estate is set to cost taxpayers £300m.
Assets that the council deems to be surplus to requirements are approved by the cabinet property sub-committee. The committee has waived through the disposal of roughly 100 assets in the last year. The public parts of these meetings can last just minutes because most discussions are held in private to protect commercial confidentiality. Councillors are consulted if the building or land is in their ward, and sometimes raise objections, but these are rarely discussed by the committee.
