5 yrs ago, the Gvt consulted on how dangerous pavement parking could be tackled in England. The Gvt has yet to respond. If pavement parking is a problem in your area – fill out our form and add to our map of danger hotspots across the UK. act.livingstreets.org.uk/page/176767/...
Why on earth do the Tories want to keep people locked into high energy bills? And, come to that, why is the BBC citing Reform but saying nothing about climate science or renewable alternatives? Complete madness - except for the fossil fuel industry of course
Most doctors, most of the time, draw on their years (decades, in my case) of medical training & expertise to do the best we can for you. What distinguishes us from snake oil salesmen - persuasive grifters who prey on human fears to line their pockets - is our expertise & our integrity. Trust… 1/n
Another excellent feature from @birminghamdispatch.bsky.social Now a walking route, the city's first dedicated commuter line has a huge legacy www.birminghamdispatch.co.uk/how-harborne...
More concerned mums at Epping
I’m going to use that
I hate to judge but judge I will. They literally have Cannon Hill on their doorstep with a weekly Parkrun… make it make sense
Why, you might ask, do the BBC and Sky News, casting their editorial guidelines to the wind, keep giving massive airtime to the far right, while shutting out leftwing voices? Don't their bosses understand the likely consequences? Only one explanation now remains. They do. And it is what they want.
No doubt people will defend themselves for having the right to choose but this is grossly irresponsible IMO. This is what a deliberate minimising of the climate emergency by powerful stakeholders does to the public.
It’s a quid for 4 hrs! Anyone would think the world is caving in. Cannon Hill Park hasn’t suffered following charging. The doom mongering simply isn’t rational. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Eesh. Notts Reform leadership blacklisting both the local paper and the local democracy scheme that covers the council for the BBC. Don’t like this at all www.nottinghampost.com/news/news-op...
What on earth are we doing??? This is not normal
It is clearly the case that asylum protests were smaller this weekend than the small over-hyped protests on August 8th, and smaller than in the second half of July. No broadcast outlet has accurately conveyed that + asked why: they have explicitly stated and inferred growing protests
Probation Service and the impact these reforms will have upon it’s already precarious state is barely mentioned www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
Flying English flags from street furniture is basically this year’s Ice Bucket Challenge isn’t it?
This story is a few months old but I just saw it. It's the far right account Jenrick was DM'ing. A spectacular if depressing irony...
Once again, excuse me if I don’t seem very patriotic when other things on lampposts include the Flag of St George’s and suggest rejecting me because I’m poison. Take the bloody flags down already.
Why is the debate around criminality and shoplifting I’m listening to on Radio 4 not talking about WHY there has been such a rise? It’s maddening. You won’t solve this be reactive responses.
I can’t quite put my finger on what the picture of those responsible is giving a strong vibe of…hmm
A sad case of the Beeb falling for the PR. Hammerson, its Bullring and the Council have done a sterling job sucking retail out of swathes of Birmingham City Centre: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
And comments are being monopolised by these people. You can see how easily this will then radicalise others. Any sensible country would be insisting on much better regulation, particularly around the algorithms concentrating this content on people.
This ‘Innocent white girls at risk from evil brown men’ narrative is poisoning our society. It must be repeated as many times as necessary: There is no evidence that men arriving on small boats are more likely to conduct a crime compared to the rest of the population. Stop this demonstration.
Lowe is dangerous and he seems to be revelling in it. His Facebook page is racist and vitriolic. It’s a deeply dark place to spend any time.
An extraordinary story
I prosecute and defend the most serious sexual offences in our courts. The overwhelming majority of offenders are British-born. Overwhelmingly the victim is someone known to them, either a partner or relative. Anybody purporting to care about protecting women might start there.
Yet we continue to spend billions on roads with nothing like the levels of opposition HS2 attracts. Roads which soon reach capacity and then the clamour starts that new roads are needed. A quite literal road to ruin.
And not a soul walking or waiting at the bus stop. The auto industry really has done a number on us.
As a general rule, regardless of the topic, the media is at least 50% of any problem. taxjustice.net/press/millio...
Our basic need to have liveable neighbourhoods is being held ransom by big developers and a Gvt apparently unwilling to act: www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Bristol Live and Reach PLC’s other regional titles have over some time enabled this as 1. It drives traffic to their online platforms 2. Comments on its posts have historically been poorly monitored and allowed behaviour like this to proliferate. 3. Fake profiles are easy to create on their sites
Just over a year ago, there was an identical demonstration at the Yardley Wood Rd/Wake Green Rd crossroads. We had TV present and the now WM Mayor. Response from Council/Police? Absolutely nothing.
It’s an underdeveloped article IMO. Needed more time.
!!! ‘The scale of the plastic problem is staggering. About 450m tonnes of new plastic is produced every year and production is set to triple by 2060 under current growth rates, damaging every aspect of a safe environment.’
Sick of capitalism!!! ‘Total infiltration’: How plastics industry swamped vital global treaty talks www.theguardian.com/environment/...
And they only occasionally enforce it and in areas people generally don’t live in great numbers. Meanwhile our suburbs and around the city centre are ignored - it’s here the street racing arguably has the most negative impact.
Sorry to burden you with another jaw-dropping scandal. But what the government intends to do to chemicals regulation in the UK is chilling. Its consultation was slipped out so quietly that most of us missed it. When I read it, I saw why. This week's column: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Seems Farage is going for the tough on crime mantra - an ideology that has consistently failed this country for decades. His plans appear to not be couched in the reality of delivery but such is public understanding of our Justice system, it’ll be lapped up.
Because he’ll have either served his sentences or received community sentences.
In a year where we’ve had three heatwaves in close succession and record low rainfall, promoting one of the most carbon intensive modes of transport seems, well, irresponsible?
Rail passenger numbers have been released for 2023-2024 and as predicted by literally everyone who knows anything about transport, they have already surpassed pre-Covid figures. Birmingham’s passenger growth second only to London.
Reform should be ripped to shreds over this. The clean energy transition is incredibly popular. A climate-denier funded party are trying to keep Britain locked into filthy fossil fuels www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...
Lost mine on the bus a couple of weeks ago. That was an expensive ride.
Reform Party:
Just a reminder that the people who want to stop Net Zero will be the first to blame migrants when none of our infrastructure can cope with runaway climate change. 👍
Crikey. We need character, not blandness.
Councils urged to install pavement gullies... Government pledging cheaper EVs... Sometimes it feels like the main function of government is just continually to funnel our money to the car industry www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...
Shame on the international community for enabling this continued outrage. There is no excuse for this continued killing of children and innocent Palestinians: Children fetching water killed in Israeli strike in Gaza, emergency officials say www.bbc.com/news/article...
Another normal day in the land of car brain: ‘Two residents die after car crashes into care home’ www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Probably GB News
Why Manchester is leaving Birmingham for dust.. it’s called public ambition
If failing Tories are just decamping to Reform aren’t we just getting a party full of failing Tories and essentially, more of the same. I’m amazed Chris Mason’s fawning piece on the BBC News app this morning didn’t pick up on this. But no, everything is ‘extraordinary’.
FFS!!!
Tebbit was one of the architects of Section 28 which sought to prohibit ‘the promotion of homosexuality.’ This law emboldened bigots and silenced many librarians and teachers, including some of mine. As a gay kid I was left without official support from my school. It was terrifying and cruel.
More from the unserious party - ‘Reform UK puts teenagers in charge of vital public services’: www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Another great read. I was intrigued one of the people you spoke to said their friends won’t visit them because of the CAZ. That sounds like utter BS to me.
Our High Streets are now hot beds of organised crime hidden in plain sight and perpetrators don’t appear deterred by criminal convictions. Communities have long suspected something wasn’t right. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
I’ve just witness an Audi driver doing I reckon 70mph past the Shell garage on KH High St. Our roads are chronically lawless.
Recognising this is a TfWM plan, it certainly makes more of a mockery of the Birmingham Transport Plan. A Plan most councillors don’t appear to realise they endorsed at Full Council.
Spotted in my corner of South Birmingham
It’s another kicker to public trust in Birmingham City Council at a time public trust is barely registering.
Who couldn’t have predicted that combining highways, waste management and parks and open spaces into one brief might mean commitments on road safety would be woefully under-delivered by Birmingham City Council? Yet another example where they provide a plan but don’t deliver.
But this is a cool move from her
All the Tweenies in the crowd looking utterly perplexed by Robert Smith guesting Olivia Rodrigo at Glastonbury
No. Only if they’re out of control.
Thanks. Just a bit odd given Charli XCX’s set was uploaded v quickly.
Anyone know if last night’s Glasto set by Doechii is going to be put on iPlayer or is there some rights issue preventing it?
It went on all afternoon and beyond 9pm. Kids were trying to play out but went back indoors.
Time to expand Birmingham’s CAZ to the boundaries of the A4040 outer ring road www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
More reason to direct your fury at the super rich
There’s a special place in hell for people who decide to have bonfires in windy weather on the hottest weekend of the year.
It's not town vs country, whatever the culture warriors might tell you. It's money and power vs people. This week's column. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Perfectly encapsulates the hypocrisy of the wealthy middle classes
Apparently, ‘it removes any immediate danger’
I’m chuckling at this ‘interim repair’ Kier has made to a damaged kerb in Stirchley, Birmingham after I reported it last weekend. Does that look like the quality you’d expect of a company receiving hundreds of millions of taxpayers’ money to maintain our Highways @bhamcitycouncil.bsky.social ?
Criminal justice agencies should be developing strategies to manage and monitor those convicted of road traffic offences in the same way we manage domestic abuse perpetrators. Prioritise those that are persistent recidivists and those that cause the greatest harm. I’m hearing nothing in that vein.
Birminghan declared a Road Safety Emergency last year but progress addressing the problem is painfully slow. We simply aren’t managing drivers who pose the greatest road harm well. We talk about speed cameras etc but they are of little consequence to the reckless www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
In 6th form, I lost 2 peers to road collisions - one hit by a driver whilst crossing a road and the other in a vehicle collision. 30 yrs later, we’re losing far too many to the same fate. I was at the screening of a short film last night made by @sarahchaundler.bsky.social which is essential viewing
£16 billion straight down the toilet. Yes, £16 BILLION. Think of what else we could do with the astonishing costs of the Lower Thames Crossing, which will simply worsen congestion and ruin people's quality of life. This week's column. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
My view is that residents in W Mids have become apathetic and don’t report as there is v little confidence the Police will do anything. Those of us trying to do something are largely met with institutional silence other than a few repetitive and performative quotes from the PCC.
We keep electing people who seem incapable of learning from our mistakes of the past. What makes humans vote for such destructive characters?
Interesting.. it’ll come as no surprise that enforcement and highways engineers have informed myself and councillors that enforcement of verge parking isn’t possible as there aren’t TROs on every street.
Shocked? ‘Climate misinformation turning crisis into catastrophe, report says’ www.theguardian.com/environment/...
Have I read that right? They’ve introduced a TRO covering the whole city already?
A great win, with national implications. At last, councils will have to take into account the cumulative effects of livestock factories on river catchments. It's all about increments of excrement. www.theguardian.com/environment/...
We do not need new roads; we need better transport options. Think of what could be done with £9.2bn, which is to be spent on just 14 miles of road! It could transform bus services and/or cycling and pedestrian infrastructure across Britain. www.theguardian.com/business/202...
‘The farm produces more than 20% of the airport's power and is enough to reduce its carbon footprint by about 1,000 tonnes a year, the airport said.’ The report then neglects to mention the airport’s total carbon footprint… I’ll help - it’s 152,230 tonnes per year www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Lol.. I suffer exactly the same malaise
Children in England growing up ‘sedentary, scrolling and alone’ ‘From traffic-dominated streets to the huge decline in youth clubs and loss of funds for playgrounds, experts pointed to the decline in neighbourhood spaces where children could actually play freely.’ www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
Important thread from Adam here. Public space - especially in towns and cities - isn't just there for the fast, efficient movement of motor vehicles and we mustn't let that motonormative thinking enable another generational landgrab as automated driving slides in
If you want evidence of how broken governance is in Birmingham, look no further. Areas like Small Heath have been abandoned. Another insightful read by @birminghamdispatch.bsky.social : www.birminghamdispatch.co.uk/small-heath-...
They’re also dominating many Facebook groups and particularly the comments sections of local media apps
We’ve written to the Council this morning to call for an urgent pause and redesign of local traffic calming schemes that involve speed cushions. They go against local policy and national guidance and are neither a long-term or cost effective solution to speeding.
They called her a mad cat woman and tried to destroy her reputation. Then they dragged her through the courts and tried to destroy her life. But @carolecadwalla.bsky.social is standing tall and continues telling the inconvenient truth. A must see. youtu.be/vG7CvbccdVM?...
World Craft status for Birmingham's jewellery trade www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
One just up the road from me a couple of days ago. Another driver who did a runner after this carnage at lunchtime
*Nothing to see here!
Given the appalling record of the perpetrator, it’s very clear this country is not doing nearly enough to manage the risk of those convicted of serious motoring offences. It was clear the pattern of his behaviour was indicative of escalating risk to the public www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Imagine putting out a press release entirely about how monthly tickets are still the best value, but not saying that the new Direct Debit monthly fare equates to £2.13 per day. www.wmca.org.uk/news/bus-sea...
Yes. I appreciate that
Latest DfT data showing Birmingham has the third highest number of road traffic casualties of all local authorities
