{"id":79255,"date":"2025-05-06T13:36:16","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T13:36:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/79255\/"},"modified":"2025-05-06T13:36:16","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T13:36:16","slug":"birmingham-city-council-accused-of-undermining-local-democracy-after-divisive-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/79255\/","title":{"rendered":"Birmingham City Council accused of ‘undermining local democracy’ after divisive change"},"content":{"rendered":"

Birmingham City Council has been accused of \u201cundermining\u201d local democracy following a divisive change.<\/p>\n

The Labour<\/a> -run council<\/a> had to make an enormous wave of cuts during the past year and a half as it battled a huge black hole in its finances.<\/p>\n

One of the \u2018savings\u2019 included in this year\u2019s budget was to reduce ward forum meetings, which provide a platform for residents to gather and focus on issues important to people in their local area.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/b> Parking charges plan for popular Birmingham parks despite backlash – full list<\/b> <\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s also one of the ways that they can get involved in the decisions that affect their neighbourhood.<\/p>\n

The choice to cut the number of meetings was therefore raised by frustrated opposition councillors at a finance scrutiny meeting on Friday, May 2.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just undermines local democracy,\u201d Conservative<\/a> councillor Alex Yip (Sutton Wylde Green) said. \u201cI think all councillors will stand opposed to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s absolutely ridiculous,\u201d Coun Deirdre Alden (Conservative, Edgbaston<\/a> ) added. \u201cWe\u2019re doing less [for people] and everybody can see that, no matter how you try and dress it up.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Coun Rob Pocock (Labour, Sutton Vesey), the cabinet member overseeing the council\u2019s transformation, said there is a programme being developed to improve the council\u2019s engagement with residents.<\/p>\n

\"Birmingham<\/p>\n

Birmingham City Council’s cabinet member for transformation Rob Pocock -Credit:Birmingham City Council webcasting portal<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a whole package of work that needs to be done here to make sure the council is pursuing its work at neighbourhood level more effectively,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a rebuilding of this council\u2019s work at neighbourhood level and the ward forum work is part and parcel of this package.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coun Ewan Mackey (Conservative, Sutton Roughley) responded: \u201cWhen you talk about local democracy and engaging more – there\u2019s some wonderful words you used but the actual outcome is that ward forums are being cut down.\u201d<\/p>\n

He went on to argue that the council\u2019s \u201cfootprint had been cut back\u201d when it came to interacting with residents.<\/p>\n

The consequences of the council’s turmoil have been far-reaching, impacting bin collections, libraries, parks, street lighting, adult social care day centres, culture, pest control charges for rats and much more.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/b> Birmingham residents make demand amid \u2018outrageous\u2019 update on council crisis inquiry<\/b> <\/a><\/p>\n

One particularly divisive proposal to introduce parking charges<\/a> at three popular Birmingham<\/a> parks will be considered at a cabinet meeting next Tuesday, May 13.<\/p>\n

Providing insight on the city council\u2019s financial position, external auditors recently highlighted several issues including the equal pay debacle, inadequate budget setting, poor service management, demand led pressures and the disastrous implementation of a new IT system.<\/p>\n

Labour politicians have also pointed to the impact of funding cuts over the past decade or so.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Birmingham City Council has been accused of \u201cundermining\u201d local democracy following a divisive change. The Labour -run council…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79256,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7820],"tags":[855,984,748,38706,393,4884,38702,38705,38703,38704,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-79255","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-birmingham","8":"tag-birmingham","9":"tag-birmingham-city-council","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-coun-rob-pocock","12":"tag-england","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-local-democracy","15":"tag-neighbourhood-level","16":"tag-sutton-vesey","17":"tag-sutton-wylde-green","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114461159291075885","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79255\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}