House of Fraser’s much-loved, festive winter wonderland raised an incredible £8,100 to support the pioneering work of Birmingham Children’s Hospital Charity. The Christmas grotto, which was located on the fifth floor of the department store, was open from the end of November until Christmas Eve and donated £1.20 from every ticket purchased to the charity’s £3.65 million Star Appeal, to help construct the UK’s first paediatric Rare Diseases Centre.

Free, cancer advice and support is coming to West Midlands between Tuesday 21 February to Friday 24 February. Macmillan Cancer Support’s mobile service will be visiting the area, with cancer information specialists on hand to answer questions and provide information. The team encourages anyone with worries relating to cancer to stop by, whether you’re living with cancer, or care for someone who is.

The public are being invited to participate in a mass walk through Selly Oak on Monday 6^th March, by the national disability charity Sense. The walk, which will involve members of the local community, people with disabilities and local business, will raise awareness of a major new community centre set to open in the area in the summer.

A petition calling for the price of University courses to be reduced back to their original £3,000 a year levels from their current £9,000+ a year point has gathered momentum since its creation. The petition on the UK Parliament website states "University fees is too high and the stress of being in dept is what puts individuals off applying for degrees.Now that grants have been removed it makes it difficult for family's who need financial support but can't get that anymore."

TV presenter Rylan Clark-Neal got up to 'nose' good in a Sainsbury's store in Nine Elms when he pranked shoppers with an animatronic talking Red Nose, for the launch of this year's official Red Nose Day merchandise. Sainsbury's worked with a specialist animatronic company to create the larger-than-life Red Nose character, complete with hidden microphone, moving eyes and mouth. Placed out of sight, Rylan was able to use a remote control to make the Nose come to life, surprising shoppers and colleagues with jokes, banter and even some singing.

Data from the Sexual Relations and Activities Questionnaire within the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing has been collated to examine difficulties with sexual activities and function, attitudes towards sex and details about the current sexual partners of over 50s. The analysis, published by the International Longevity Centre – UK (ILC-UK), University of Manchester and Manchester Metropolitan University, gathered information from over 7000 over 50s which found that whilst self-reported difficulties in becoming aroused steadily increase in women aged 50-79, these then decrease after 80 to below the levels seen in 60-69 year olds.