It must be remembered that under Labour, the Council singularly failed to address the astonishing levels of economic inactivity in the third city - now the highest of any BIG city in the UK. Whilst the beggar-ridden sh*tty centre shows signs of an ugly renaissance, the suburbs look distinctly peaky. A stonking 42.8% of Birmingham's neighbourhoods rank within the top 10% most deprived areas nationally, yet this is of no consequence to Labour, nor to its leftist, anti-capitalist, successors since May, 2026. These councillors are determined to destroy the road infrastructure (before great technological advances kick-in) and to dismantle the capitalist system in favour of state control. Yes, the people who bankrupted the city (and their fellow travellers) want increased, dictatorial, economic control. What could possibly go wrong?
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York Road has been closed off to traffic to the delight of local leftists (overwhelmingly white and bourgeois), but not to all traders in the street. One told Crow how this had adversely affected his business, and he believes Labour/Leftists wish to drive his untrendy shop out of the street in favour of something more twee and "right on". Another, a pizza place targeting a more mass market clientele, took to social media to complain that his delivery crew could not get to his shop, and that when the street was full of King's Heath's brahmin lefties [sic] they remonstrate with, and harass, his delivery staff. He went so far as to accuse these unpleasant individuals as "rascists", and he too opined that these anti-capitalists wanted to drive his business away - to be replaced with something more "artisanal" (and, presumably, owned by a co-op).
The Kings Heath cronies of Labour make hay while the sun shines by taking over the street completely - massively extending their premises' footprint. The Birmingham Artisan Market - closely associated with local Labour figures - holds periodic markets selling kitsch tat, and events take over the whole street such as the local Pride event. This is a giant windfall for some local hospitality businesses. (It should be said that some of the businesses regularly encroach onto the blocked-off road on many occasions, seemingly when no authorisations has been given for them to do so.)
Despite the frequent use of the road by businesses the disastrous (then) Labour Council says that it only issued 6 (yes, six) Temporary Pavement Licences for York Road and the Hare & Hounds between 2nd April, 2025 and 30th April, 2026. Given that Crow has personally seen the street covered in tables on very many more occasions than that during the period in question, it is blindingly obvious that Labour are not enforcing the collection of fees from their cronies. The businesses have done very well from this, but the taxpayer has only received £2,100.00 from the licence system in Labour's last year in office.
It is not the Council that usually operates the markets in the street but a private market operator (Bham Artisan Markets for one) who seek to make profit from what they extract from stallholders (mostly small, or even micro businesses) and what they pay to the taxpayer via the Council. Event organisers can be private or the notorious local BID (Business Improvement District [sic]) which is a Labour-front organisation in which a number of York Road businesses are highly influential.
The usual rent the hapless Council has been charging (with a very limited number of higher exceptions) is, we shit ye not, £163.80! WTF?
For municipal year (01/04 - 31/03) 2023/2024 the taxpayer was deprived of the use of key infrastructure but received just £1,310.40. And it gets worse - in 2024/2025 the market operators and event organisers paid just £491.40.
(Unlike many market operators, Birmingham Artisan Markets does not advertise its stall fees on its website, but the Council itself says that it is receiving very low amounts from them for the whole market. Kerching!)
In 2025/2026 - with some rents for the whole public road still as ridiculously low as £163.80 but a few more events - the taxpayer received just £2,020.20 over a whole year!
There we have it - public infrastructure destroyed and in three years the taxpayer only received £5,922.00 - and don't forget this sum will be much reduced by the money spent paying council (public) employees to organise the bookings and collect the payments etc. (although, as above, there is clearly a deliberate policy not to collect full payment from crony businesses).
For context, the head of the Council paid service is reported to receive (including gold-plated pension contributions) £397,097 per annum. No wonder Labour bankrupted the fxxxxxx Council!!!!
* Crow understands the arguments of the likes of Prof Bailey and former Labour Leader [sic]. John Clancy that Brum was only declared to be in the local government version of bankruptcy due to a miscalculation of the pension fund deficit, but the fact remains that Brum was served with a s114 Notice in 2023, and the disastrous Labour administration placed in Government "special measures".
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