A former nurse has become the first Black person to be appointed mayor of Wolverhampton.

Councillor Sandra Samuels OBE is the first politician of African Caribbean heritage to hold the post in 200 years. She is also the 11th female mayor of the city and hopes her appointment will inspire underrepresented groups.

Tributes have been paid to life-long anti-apartheid campaigner, Hanef Bhamjee, who has died. He campaigned against its whites-only rule from the age of 10.

He fled in South Africa for the UK in the 1960s because of his involvement in the student wing of the African National Congress. Paying tribute, Lord Hain described Mr Bhamjee as a legend.

Create Central, the West Midlands trade body for the creative content sector, has assembled a star-studded array of home-grown industry talent to join its existing membership to act as global roving ambassadors for the region.

Create Central Chair Ed Shedd said: “I’m delighted to announce that Sir Lenny Henry has agreed to be a Create Central Champion, alongside Steven Knight, Adil Ray, Marverine Cole, Angela Ferreira, and more amazing industry leaders.

Councillors in Wolverhampton will be asked to consider bestowing the honour of Freedom of the City to Lisa Potts in recognition of her exceptional bravery and charity work.

Lisa, a former nursery teacher, was proclaimed as a heroine in 1996 when she protected children in her care from a machete-wielding attacker who burst into St Luke’s Primary School, Blakenhall.

Nearly 400 years before the birth of Louis Armstrong a Black musician in London’s Greenwich Palace was making a healthy living playing the trumpet. In fact, he was not just making a living; he was amongst the highest-paid musicians in the court of Henry VIII.

Having also played for his father Henry VII, court accounts reveal that John Blanke successfully petitioned him for a wage increase from 20 Shillings a month to 40 (Shillings) a month.

As Britain looked to recover and rebuild after the devastation of World War Two it turned to the Commonwealth.

But many of the migrants who filled crucial jobs amid labour shortages routinely encountered racism and discrimination. Two friends who arrived in the country just before the war would go on to play major roles in changing the face of modern Britain.