Ten years ago riots erupted in Lozells in Birmingham over a rumour that Pakistani shop owners had gang-raped a Jamaican teenager. The accusation touched a raw nerve of tension between the respective communities. Two days of violence led to the murder of Isaiah Young-Sam, whose killers have still not been brought to justice. The tension arose from the competition for resources in a deprived area, and the ownership of black hair and food shops by the south Asian community.
Ten years on the issues have still not been dealt with: recently, a local business had to appeal for calm because his business faced threats due to accusations of racism. The complaints were ones we in the African-Caribbean community know well. Just as 10 years ago, the issue is not whether or not the accusations were true, but rather that they were believable.
Ethnic minority populations are just as liable to act in racially prejudiced ways as anyone else. Complaints about the negative treatment of black customers can be found across the UK. The issue is not imagined, and cannot be wished away by embracing a mythic unity of everyone whose skin is not white. However, we must also recognise that the underlying cause of the tension is poverty and not the inability of communities to live together.
Lozells and East Handsworth is one of the poorer parts of Birmingham, with a 19% unemployment rate that is treble the national average. Almost 40% of the properties in the ward are social housing, and 20% are overcrowded. In such a deprived area trade and resources are limited. South Asian domination of the black hair and food shops stands out, and because of the scarcity of opportunity it becomes a flashpoint for anger. Ten years after Lozells the city should have heeded its lesson and invested heavily in such areas. However, the development agenda in Birmingham, as with most British cities, has gone in the opposite direction.
To compete as a global city means to have a thriving commercial and entertainment sector. Birmingham is perhaps the archetype of a process of redevelopment that pours billions of pounds into building a vibrant city centre, while neglecting already deprived neighbourhoods. Over the past two decades the centre has rapidly expanded, with the Bullring redevelopment, the Mailbox and now Eastside by Millennium Point. This latest project involved taking Birmingham City University, where I work, out of the deprived Perry Barr and into the plush new centre.
The Big City Plan for the future reads like a blueprint for gentrification, with an ever-expanding city core transforming formerly disadvantaged neighbourhoods into luxury apartments and wine bars. All this development is perfect for tourists and attracts those with money, making Birmingham rank as a great place to live (if you ignore the poorer and darker neighbourhoods). However, the impact on the rest of the city is as predictable as it is problematic.
While the centre booms with development, areas of deprivation have been plastered with colourful billboards, with slogans such as “Hands on Handsworth” and “Be a star in Perry Barr”, and smiling pictures of local community figures. The boards are now falling down and it is clear that their main purpose was to hide the dilapidation that lay behind them. The ruins of the billboards stand as testament to a failed development plan that envisaged the benefits of the booming centre to magically trickle down to the poorer parts of the city. The impact of this neglect will be felt by future generations.
The root cause of the Lozells riots was poverty and the desperate competition this created for scarce resources. Particularly in the age of austerity, investment in cities is centred on private profit rather than public benefit, which has led to further neglect of disadvantaged neighbourhoods. Unfortunately, if there is no serious investment in areas like Lozells it’s only a matter of time before a spark ignites simmering community tensions.