Summary
Birmingham City Council were working with a luxury developer called St Joseph – Berkeley Group to regenerate an area of Ladywood, Birmingham, UK. The council documents suggest demolishing buildings and building new homes, green spaces, businesses, schools, and community centres. There were nearly 2,000 homes that were at risk of demolition, affecting over 5,000 people. It is one of the largest regenerations in Europe.
Many people were not happy about the proposals for several reasons. Those affected weren’t consulted early on about the plans. There were no firm plans to build any social housing. If homes, businesses, schools, and churches are knocked down, experience from other UK regenerations suggests that only ‘market value’ (before any regeneration) and some disturbance compensation will be paid. For many, this would not have been enough to afford to stay in the area. They would have to leave their communities and potentially the city due to affordability, as has happened elsewhere. The negative consequences of demolition for the environment from waste and pollution are concerning, too. Local people were frequently ignored or belittled by council staff and elected officials, which is unfortunately common in UK regenerations.
There are many beloved community assets in the regeneration zone we neede to protect from demolition. This includes the Vine Inn pub, which dates back to 1857. There are several churches and schools, and surprisingly, there are freehold houses and good quality council and social homes inside the regeneration zone, too. We believe it is rare in UK history that non-council built, good quality, freehold homes were kept at risk of demolition in a housing-led regeneration.
The council documents released suggested knocking homes and churches down and replacing them with housing for other people and secular community spaces. When people purchased properties inside the regeneration zone, the plans did not come up in searches and this appeared to be legal although we complained about it.
In May 2025 the council signed a developer agreement with Berkeley Group and they set up a consultation website to work with local residents: https://www.ladywoodcommunity.co.uk/
We were awaiting the masterplan in 2026, which would have shows what the developers and council plan to knock down and keep. But on Nov 2026, there was a surprised announcement that the developer and council have mutually parted ways. Ladywood Unite residents group are delighted by the news that the council and developer have parted ways. Regeneration should be for people not for profiting greedy developers. We will continue to fight for a fair deal for Ladywood!
Developer website
In May 2025 the developer started to provide information to residents on their website: https://www.ladywoodcommunity.co.uk/
Council’s timeline
You can read about what the council was proposing here.
