Community News

To celebrate Commonwealth Day, former, current and future stars of athletics in Birmingham tried out the track at the newly transformed Alexander Stadium and they were joined in the impressive new facility by 72 school children from across Birmingham. Each pupil represented one of the nations and territories that will participate in the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games, with the facility in the Perry Barr area of the city set to play a crucial role at Games time, hosting the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, as well as 59 athletics events.

Over 100 community groups across Birmingham are to stage their own festival events and projects as part of the Birmingham 2022 Festival thanks to funding from Birmingham City Council.

The Creative City programme will see 107 community groups and artists get creative over the six months of the Birmingham 2022 Festival which accompanies the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.

Galleries, museums, libraries and cultural venues across the country - including Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery - are to benefit from almost £50 million of funding which will improve people’s access to the arts, safeguard cultural assets for future generations and power economic growth through culture.

Birmingham City Council has been awarded a grant of £4,998,820 by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sports, delivered by Arts Council England and will be utilising the funding to address specific works as part of a wider electrical upgrade and refurbishment of the city’s flagship museum - Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery (BMAG) located in the city centre.

Black Country Radio is hosting a multicultural celebration event in Brierley Hill on Saturday 19 March.

The event, which runs from 10am-3pm will feature live entertainment, cookery demonstrations and will be broadcast throughout the day by Black Country Radio. The day is part of the Welcome Back campaign to encourage people back into town centres and support local businesses as the country emerges from the pandemic.

This week marks one year since the launch of the West Midlands Cycle Hire scheme, which has so far seen more than 200,000 journeys taken across the region.

People using the hire bikes have also cycled for more than 90,000 miles and covered an incredible 550,000 kilometres during the first year, showing that there is a real appetite for people to cycle in and around the West Midlands. Since the initial launch in Wolverhampton in March 2021, 1,350 green and grey branded pedal bikes and 150 green and purple electric bikes have been delivered onto the streets of Birmingham, Coventry, Sandwell, Solihull, Stourbridge, Sutton Coldfield, Walsall and Wolverhampton.

Her Majesty The Queen will not attend next week's Commonwealth Service at Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace has said.

As a significant occasion for the Queen, it had been hoped that she would attend, but the decision is understood to have be about concerns over her discomfort with travelling, rather than illness.

Award-winning content marketing agency, HDY Agency, has further strengthened its senior team after appointing an experienced marketeer and brand specialist to join the agency to bolster its national and international expertise. 

Beatrice Vears will bring her rich marketing experience, which spans creative leadership, ATL advertising and brand strategy to her new role as Managing Director of HDY Agency.

Voting is now open for the Pride of Croydon awards 2022. You now have an opportunity to vote for all those who have been nominated for a Pride of Croydon award via www.prideofcroydon.com/vote   

Please note, that you will only be able to vote once.

The event, which runs from 10am-3pm on Lye High Street on Saturday 12 March outside the church, will feature live entertainment, cookery demonstrations and will be broadcast throughout the day by Black Country Radio. The day is part of the Welcome Back campaign to encourage people back into town centres and support local businesses as the country emerges from the pandemic.

Recognizing the value of women and the diverse roles they play, home textiles company Bedsure celebrates the comfort and coziness of home through their 2022 International Women’s Day Campaign and Giveaway.

The brand’s 2020 Women’s Day campaign was popular with social media followers, receiving 4,926 views, 152 likes and 11 comments from people around the world.

Two years into the pandemic and with fake news and images flowing in fast from the Russia-Ukraine situation, research shows that 65 percent of Brits are concerned about the spread of fake news.  

The UK is in the top three countries in Europe who reported being the ‘most concerned’ about the spread of fake news. Readly, Europe's leading magazine and newspaper subscription service, has examined attitudes towards fake news and how this compares across Europe.

City of Wolverhampton Council is set to submit an outline planning application at the end of this month to facilitate the first phase of the transformational Brewers Yard city living regeneration masterplan.

Ahead of this a public consultation will be held on Monday, March 14, between 4pm and 7pm, at the University of Wolverhampton’s Springfield Campus, which neighbours the Culwell Street site earmarked for development.

It’s going to be a FIERCE year. As the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games draws nearer, today a huge cultural programme is launched including major events produced by Fierce.

Partnering with Birmingham 2022 Festival, two large-scale public realm projects are amongst many featured highlights in the 6-month cultural programme: Key to the City and The Healing Gardens of Bab.

Hundreds of people have attended a vigil in Birmingham to show support for Ukraine after the country was invaded by Russia. The event in Victoria Square was organised by the city's Polish community. The crowd heard speeches and music and was addressed by the West Midlands mayor Andy Street.

The Birmingham 2022 Festival has announced its six-month long cultural programme taking place across Birmingham and the West Midlands. It will be the biggest celebration of creativity ever seen in the region and one of the largest ever cultural programmes to surround the Commonwealth Games.

There will be over 200 events including a spectacular open-air show, a brand-new Birmingham inspired album, an immersive 3D experience on public transport, photography exhibitions across billboards, a city centre forest of magical proportions, a mass tap-dancing extravaganza and much, much more.

The RSPCA is asking the public to pressure their MPs to stop the Government u-turning on its promise to ban the import of cruelly-produced foie gras and fur.

Despite the production of foie gras and fur being illegal in the UK due to the suffering involved, it is still legal to import these goods.