Friday Thoughts - Back in Brum?

LET'S get this straight shall we.

You live in Chelmsley Wood which was built by Birmingham but has belonged to Solihull for the past 40 years. Once upon a time this was all in the county of Warwickshire, now it’s part of the West Midlands. Your MP is Caroline Spelman, who represents the constituency of Meriden. Which is a small village several miles away. But, hang on, it’s also the name of your local park. Is there any wonder you’re having an identity crisis.

SAME NAME: Meriden and Meriden Park, Chelmsley Wood,
are both in the Meriden constituency

The fact is that so many lines have been drawn and redrawn on the map it’s not always easy to adjust. It doesn’t help that place names have a habit of being repeated. Apart from the Meriden Park that isn’t actually in Meriden village, there was the slightly strange choice of name for a new housing scheme in Fordbridge. Bellway Homes dubbed the development Damson Wood, even though there’s already a Damson Wood in Solihull - a stone’s throw from the Land Rover factory. You can hear parcel companies and sat-nav users gnashing their teeth already.

But probably the biggest headache can be traced back 40 years, to the creation of Solihull Council.  As part of a massive shake-up of council boundaries in 1974, all sorts of different suburbs, villages and estates were thrown together to form the metropolitan borough. There was Solihull County Borough, the Meriden Rural District (which included what is now North Solihull) and even one parish (Hockley Heath) which had been inherited from Stratford-Upon-Avon.

The plan to put all these places together wasn’t entirely popular, with many communities worried they’d lose their identity. In truth, many decisions were made based on the relative wealth of areas or the size of their population.

VARIED AREA: The Solihull borough
coat-of-arms

You only have to take a quick glance at a map of the borough to see that it’s an awkward shape. North Solihull sticks out, if not like a sore thumb then a crooked finger. Poking up and curling round areas like Sheldon – which are actually closer to Solihull town centre, even though they’re still part of Birmingham.

The thing is though, the powers-that-be haven’t finished with the faffing about. Every few months there seems to be a new plan to redraw the region. Remember the, thankfully failed, attempt a couple of years ago to cut Castle Bromwich adrift from the rest of Solihull. Well technically it would have still been part of the Solihull Council area, but at the same time it would have been shunted into the Birmingham Erdington constituency. 

More recently, there’s been a lot of talk about creating a Greater Birmingham authority. This would see the city, Solihull and parts of the Black Country being amalgamated into a sort of super council, with a population of over two million.

MERGER: Some people would like to see the West Midlands
joined together as Greater Birmingham

The irony for the residents of Kingshurst or Chelmsley Wood is that after 40 years of being told, ‘yes, you’re part of Solihull’, suddenly they’d be back under the Birmingham umbrella. Except this time so would Knowle and Dorridge, Hampton-in-Arden and, yes, even Hockley Heath. And you can’t imagine the regulars at the Wharf pub would be happy about that.

In many ways it would be the furore of ‘74 all over again, only larger still, with politicians trying to give an entire region common purpose. For areas like North Solihull, who even at the moment feel marginalised, it would not be a comfortable experience.

There are politicians who argue that dealing with issues like transport and housing on a region-wide basis makes sense. But there are hidden dangers. There have already been whispers that Solihull may be put pressure to help Birmingham deal with its chronic housing shortage and that’s while the authorities are still independent. Should the councils be combined then the ability of the borough to protect its greenbelt would be hugely reduced. How long before great swathes of open space in the Cole Valley and near Birmingham Business Park were being eyed up to build overspill estates?

PRESSURE: Dealing with policies like housing on a region-wide
basis may mean more development in areas like the Cole Valley

Of course, councils should work closely together. But the Greater Birmingham project could well be created with the best interests of business and infrastructure at its heart, not the people. Lessons should be learned from earlier changes, including the creation of Solihull borough. If, 40 years after the event, there are still some who feel their voices aren't being heard, imagine the difficulties that may arise from allowing the borough to be subsumed into an entity of this enormity.