Community News

Christmas lights switch-on events for all the family will light up City of Wolverhampton for the countdown to Christmas.

The city centre switch-on will take place in Queen Square on Saturday, 19 November. The fun starts at 3pm with a funfair, a festive market on Dudley Street, real reindeer, face painting, food and drink and much more.

A charity who provides free legal advice to asylum seekers in Birmingham and the West Midlands is closing down, despite being financially healthy.

Trustees of the charity have rejected attempts by the workers’ union, United Voices of the World (UVW) to negotiate with them, after the workers’ asked for union recognition and an end to alleged trade union victimisation.

The sixth annual Remembrance Sunday Parade is set to take place in London this weekend. In recent years the afternoon ceremony at the African & Caribbean War Memorial on Windrush Square has attracted hundreds which remembers the two million African and Caribbean military personnel who served in World War I and World War II.

The GINA Project and Ovacome in Birmingham have been awarded a cash donation from TalkTalk’s Future Fibre Fund and is set to receive a combined total of £1,500 to support their local community project and initiatives. The Future Fibre Fund received nearly 50 applications across Birmingham, Greater Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool from youth club projects to organisations supporting people with disabilities.

An investment of more than £5m was announced by the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) to help kickstart the first phase of the transformational Brewers Yard regeneration scheme in Wolverhampton city centre.

The investment will pave the way for the first enabling phase in the delivery of almost 600 new homes and hundreds of construction jobs on the site of the existing City of Wolverhampton Council depot in Culwell Street.

A leading youth charity is appealing to people to part with a pound to make a difference to the lives of local young people who need it the most.

Proceeds from YHA’s Christmas Raffle, which has a first prize of £3000, will go towards ensuring that no child misses out on the transformative power of a residential school trip.

Councils across ​the West Midlands face a collective funding gap of over £222m in the next financial year forcing them to cut essential services, says a report published by UNISON. 

Waste collections, leisure centres, nurseries and other vital services will all be hit according to the findings based on information* from local authorities in England, Scotland and Wales.

A new ‘Star’ on Broad Street’s celebrated Walk of Stars in Birmingham, is to be awarded to Steve Gibbons, the famous Birmingham singer-songwriter.

The Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Councillor Maureen Cornish, will make the presentation at the Birmingham Rocks event, which opens at Velvet Music Rooms on Broad Street at 5pm on Sunday 6 November.

Work is under way on Birmingham Airport’s new security screening area.

The new facility, being built within the existing terminal building, will result in a speedier, simpler pre-flight security screening process for customers. UK Government requires all airports to be compliant with new standards by 1 June 2024, which is the completion deadline for the project, a total investment of more than £20m.

Members of the RMT and TSSA unions have announced strike action, impacting Network Rail and West Midlands Railway employees on Friday 4, Saturday 5, Monday 7 and Wednesday 9 November 2022. As a result, a limited timetable will be in operation on these dates.
Strike action will also take place across other train operators, with people asked to check before travelling. Apologies are made for the inconvenience caused by this industrial action.

A survey of residents in and around Birmingham by Project Solar UK indicates that now is the time to consider solar energy as an alternative to heat and light our homes. An original poll, six months ago in March 2022 showed 5% of respondents in and around Birmingham said they would switch to an alternative energy source such as solar panels if there was an increase of up to 10% in their electricity bills.

The Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games was a wonderful event, with so many iconic people and highlights. Who could forget the amazing Raging Bull at the Opening Ceremony, the many memorable moments with athletes like Eilish McColgan, Adam Peaty, Katrina Johnson-Thompson, Olivia Breen and Delicious Orie and, of course, the Games mascot Perry.

Three more organisations have successfully secured funding from the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) to help better connect their local communities to nature.

All Saints Action Network in Wolverhampton, Marsh Hill Allotments in Stockland Green, Birmingham and Northfield Stroke Club in Birmingham have each received funding under the WMCA’s Community Green Grant scheme which helps green space poor communities improve their existing open spaces and enhance the local environment.

Residents, businesses, schools, faith groups, charities and other organisations are once again being encouraged to 'Orange Wolverhampton' next month, as the city says ‘No’ to interpersonal violence.

The annual Orange Wolverhampton campaign, which begins on 25 November, aims to raise awareness of the city’s continuing drive to end domestic abuse, female genital mutilation, forced marriage, ‘honour-based’ violence, sexual violence and stalking and harassment.

Plans to grow and develop the region’s rail network over the next 30 years are to be revised following the Covid 19 pandemic.

The updated draft West Midlands Rail Investment Strategy sets out how the region’s rail sector plans to tackle challenges like post-pandemic recovery, maximise the benefits of HS2 and contribute to achieving net zero carbon targets. Like the first strategy, issued in 2018, key elements remain the continued development of HS2 and the delivery of the Midlands Rail Hub.

The City of Wolverhampton Council threw its doors open across the city as it launched its Warm Spaces scheme to help residents beat the cold and soaring bills this winter. 

The council opened its own wide range of buildings across the city providing a warm welcome, as well as a Warm Space and somewhere to charge devices, connect to WiFi and get a hot drink.