Dear readers — when we reported in May that Labour’s Allens Cross councillor, Jack Deakin, was barely attending meetings, we thought it was a one off. We thought Deakin, who was said to be suffering from ill health and had attended the bare minimum number of meetings required, was an exceptional case.
But now we have learnt that another Labour councillor, Akhlaq Ahmed — one of two representing Hall Green North — is raising similar concerns. Admittedly, Ahmed’s record is not quite as bad as Deakin’s (he has shown up to 6 out of 10 full council meetings since 2024) but he has missed half of the commitments he is meant to attend during the past three years. What’s more, residents report that their representative has gone awol, alleging he is ignoring their attempts to contact him. Naseem Khan recently posted to the Hall Green’s Residents Association Facebook page: “Over the last year I sent a dozen emails to [Ahemd]. Never even an acknowledgement, let alone a decent reply.” That’s today’s Big Story.
Also today, Dutch police have cast doubt on West Midlands Police claims about Maccabi Tel Aviv, the Cluedo inventors’ archive comes home to Birmingham, and we round up some recent plaudits for The Dispatch!
Catch up and coming up:
- Over the weekend Samuel published a retrospective on the cult folk horror film Penda’s Fen — drawing praise from its writer David Rudkin. Rudkin wrote into the Dispatch with this kind message: “One of my spies out in the dark there has been sent (by one of his spies ditto) the link to your piece on *Penda* in the 'Patch' (of what I remember as the newsvendor's cry at the old Navigation St tram terminal: 'Patch an' Mail...!') You did a good and accurate piece of work there. You didn't need me at all. I appreciate it immensely.”
Samuel McIlhagga
- Earlier this month, our colleagues in Sheffield published an explosive investigation into a London lawyer. Andrew Milne bought hundreds of freeholds on properties in the steel city — then sent out stern letters demanding homeowners buy them off him for as much as £25,000. We’ve heard Birmingham has a lot of freehold properties and are keen to hear if you’ve had a similar experience. Email us at editor@birminghamdispatch.co.uk
- The Dispatch has been getting noticed! Here’s a round-up of recognition we’ve received lately:
- First up, regular writer Dan Cave won Feature Writer of the Year at the newly reformed Midlands Media Awards, in part for his brilliant stories on class war in Stirchley and the end of greyhound racing in Perry Barr.
- LBC’s star anchor James O’Brien shouted us out on his The Whole Show for our work covering the flag phenomenon. “There's a rather splendid local newspaper called The Dispatch in Birmingham,” he says at about 11.34.36.
- BBC Radio 6’s Stuart Maconie shouted out our story about warring post-punk legends Au Pairs on his Freak Zone show — it’s about 21 minutes in.
Christmas is nigh and we’re feeling festive at The Dispatch. It’s been a fantastic, hectic year, so what better way to celebrate than bringing our community together in a beloved local bar and getting them to duke it out for a £100 cash prize?
That’s right; on 18 December, The Dispatch is going to be hosting its very own Christmas quiz! We’ll be taking over the Jewellery Quarter’s Temper and Brown, for an evening of testing your knowledge on everything from music, history, pop culture and — of course — Birmingham.
Tickets are £3 for The Dispatch's paying supporters (use your code) and £4 for free subscribers and non-members (who are extremely welcome to come along). Minimum teams of two and maximum six; the winners will receive £100 in cash. There will also be plenty of time for mingling after the main business of the evening has wrapped up.
Join us from 7.30pm on 18 December for some classic Christmas celebrations.
Photo of the week
Dan Cave winning Freelancer of the Year.
Big Story: The search for Hall Green’s AWOL councillor
Topline: Birmingham Labour appears to have another fairweather councillor on its hands. Residents of Hall Green North are complaining that Cllr Akhlaq Ahmed is ignoring their emails, missing meetings and not attending committees.
Context: Constituents and fellow local councillors are complaining about Ahmed’s attendance — with many claiming the councillor is rarely seen in the ward, doesn’t attend committee meetings and fails to respond to emails and casework. Ahmed was first voted onto Birmingham City Council in 2018, won again in 2022 (with 7.2% fewer votes) and has been reselected by the party to run in next year’s local elections. His 2026 campaign leaflets promise “fresh ambition for Birmingham”.
Constituents complain: However, some of Ahmed’s constituents are sceptical about his optimism. Several people recently took to the Hall Green Residents Association Facebook group to complain. On 10 November, Margaret Danks wrote: “I hardly hear anything from him, except when it’s election time. I haven’t a clue what he does or has done to benefit the community.” Naseem Khan posted: “Over the last year I sent a dozen emails to [Ahemd]. Never even an acknowledgement, let alone a decent reply.”
The Dispatch reached out to Khan for more information. He told us: “I don't get replies from him, which is why my go to councillor is Cllr Suleman.” Another resident, Andrew Lydon, sent a Freedom of Information request to the council, asking about Ahmed’s attendance between May 2022 and October 2025. The response shows that the number of committees Ahmed sits on has been reduced from three to one in that time, but overall, he has attended just 36 out of 74 meetings across the three years. The Dispatch understands that some of these absences are due to bereavements which occurred in 2022.
Andrew Lydon told us: “I think he must be one of the worst [for not replying]. [I] have emailed him to ask how he does his job…He seems to have been here around August then missing.” Lydon showed us an email he had sent to Ahmed, raising his concerns. It was ignored.
Data check: Ahmed’s average absence at committees and council has declined — from a staggering 58.96% in 2023/24 to 37.50% between May and October — implying somewhat improved attendance at the smaller number of committees he now belongs to. However, Ahmed’s full council meeting attendance rate is getting worse. Between 2023/24 and 2024/25 his average attendance dropped from 66.67% to 60%. Then between 2024/25 and May-October 2025 it decreased again from 60% to 50%.
A councillor speaks out: The neighbouring councillor for Hall Green South, Conservative Timothy Huxtable has noticed Ahmed’s absence both from his ward and council, telling The Dispatch: “he is getting a lot of people coming to his advice surgeries saying they can’t get hold of their local councillors…a significant proportion of my inbox is from Hall Green North constituencies.” Huxtable also tells us that the FOI request issued by Lydon missed off one of Ahmed’s committees: sustainability and transport. We checked the records and, during his brief membership of the committee between March and May 2025, Ahmed attended zero meetings.
Bottom line: The Labour group has already dealt with a lack of attendance from its Allen’s Cross councillor Jack Deakin, which The Dispatch has previously reported on — now it seems the party has another truant on its hands.
Councillor Akhlaq Ahmed has been contacted for comment.
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Brum in Brief
⚽ According to Dutch law enforcement, West Midlands Police (WMP) used “false intelligence” to prevent the attendance of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans at an away match in Aston. A spokesman for the Amsterdam division of the Netherlands police, Sebastiaan Meijer says that claims made by the WMP to Birmingham City Council about the fallout from Maccabi Tel Aviv’s 2024 game against AFC Ajax were “incorrect.” The Times put a leaked WMP security briefing to the Amsterdam force this week: revealing numerous claims made to the council were “untrue.” Meijer disputed claims around numbers of police on the street, levels of violence and IDF (Israeli Defence Force) connections. In turn, the WMP have claimed their investigation into violence in Amsterdam was “thorough.” (The Times).
🏟️ Images of Birmingham City Football Club’s new Powerhouse Stadium have been released, with 15,000 people beaming in to watch a live stream of a launch event on Thursday. The club's American investment firm owner, Knighthead Capital, is investing $3 billion into a new sports quarter in the city, with the 62,000-seat venue its centre piece. Some people love the design which features 12 giant brick chimneys, likely a nod to the city’s industrial history. Others are less than impressed: ‘my missus just said it looks like an upside down coffee table’ wrote one YouTube commenter. (ITV).
🔍 The daughter of the inventors of long-running murder mystery board game Cluedo has gifted her parents’ archive to the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. This month, Marcia Lewis handed over the first versions of the game, letters and other memorabilia saying they deserved to “come home” and that “without Birmingham, Cluedo would never have been invented.” Her father Anthony Pratt, whose poor eyesight meant he could not enlist in WWII, dreamt up the idea for the game at home in Kings Heath, during long and boring blackouts. Marcia’s mother, Elva, designed the now iconic board. (BBC).
Quick Hits
✈️ Brummies will be able to fly to Inverness again on Mondays and Fridays from 30 March. Easy Jet will take on the route which has been unavailable for two years. (BBC).
💸 The NEC is set to be sold for £1bn next spring. Blackstone bought the venue in 2018, hoping to treble its income, but business was hit badly by the Covid pandemic. (Financial Times).
🧃 A father and son from Birmingham have been sentenced after they imported more than £20m of heroin laced juice from Afghanistan. (BBC).
🚮 The West Midlands has been declared the “worst region for road litter” according to a recent AA survey. (Express and Star).
🔥 Source of major fire at University of Warwick halls of residence confirmed. (Coventry Telegraph).
📺 A television and film production house, funded by the WMCA, has been launched (Business Desk).
Media picks
📰 Fifteen years after taking the mantle from Clare Short, Ladywood MP Shabana Mahmood has risen to one of the most senior positions in British politics — and looks set to make her mark. As British flags continue to fly high from lampposts in Birmingham, her sweeping changes to the country’s asylum system could be era-defining. In a recent opinion article for The Times, Patrick Maguire argues that Mahmood has a couple of things her colleagues – especially Starmer – do not: conviction and religion. Whereas the PM can’t even decide on his favourite poem, Maguire writes, “Mahmoodism, as they have started to call it in the Home Office, is a politics of place, class and faith — and it is forcing the Labour Party to think.”
🎞️ One from the archives today: Associated TeleVision’s (ATV) 1969 documentary on the Black Country. The 30 minute, grainy, black-and-white production explores the particular culture, history, economics and folkways of the area — and its defining relationship with coal. The narrator Gwyn Richards declares: “In the Middle Ages the Black Country was owned at one time by the Bishop of Winchester — the bishop was sitting on some pretty exciting real-estate: a broad coal seam 30 feet deep, abundant iron ore and lime, a brooding volcano.”
Our to do list
🎞️ Tonight, experience the movie Labyrinth as you’ve never seen it before — accompanied by a live band at Symphony Hall. Tickets from £35.50.
🎀 Also tonight, make a festive wreath to decorate your home in time for Father Christmas at The Golden Hind pub in Kingstanding. Tickets are £40 including all materials and instruction by a local florist.
📺 Fans of iconic 90s TV comedy can catch An Evening with the Fast Show on Tuesday. Get a behind the scenes look from Paul Whitehouse and friends. Tickets £40.
🎞️ At Norton’s on Wednesday it’s Overlap, a night of animation, featuring films, costumes, and a talk from a BAFTA award-winning director on his work with Tim Burton. Tickets £10.
📖 Crime novelist Ross Montgomery will be discussing his detective debut The Murder at World’s End at Waterstones on Wednesday. Tickets from £4.
✨ On Saturday, take the family to Glue Garden in Northfield for SPARK in the dark, an atmospheric evening of shadow puppetry and illuminations complete with comforting bowls of soup. Under fives go free.
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