It’s ‘game on’ as city goes for gold

overstretched for the 1992 Olympics and were humiliated, the national stadium was always going to be Wembley, and the City of Culture proved a struggle.

Even our successes have been low key – our status as the birthplace of heavy metal prompted just a brief exhibition, not the constant stream of coach tours that other cities generate from their music and film heritage.

We now have a chance to change that narrative. We have an excellent case for both bids. One of our greatest assets is our young people, as other areas are ageing, 40 per cent of Brummies are under 25. We also have a diverse city – we are a microcosm of the Commonwealth.

We are already seeing the economy grow – around HS2, Paradise, the Aston manufacturing zone, the life sciences boom around the QE Hospital and the investment in creative industries at Eastside.

But winning these bids would not only be transformative in the physical and economic sense, they are good for the soul of the city.

That is why we should all get behind it. By all accounts Birmingham is the ideal place for a re-located Channel 4. But in the interests of politics – in that Mayor Andy Street speaks for the whole West Midlands – we have to go through the charade of pretending our neighbours in Coventry and the Black Country are realistic options for the TV channel’s headquarters.

Even the marginally more credible alternative site near the NEC is not nearly as compelling as Birmingham city centre.

This is a result of the imbalance on the West Midlands Combined Authority which means Birmingham, a city of 1.1 million people, has the same voting rights as Walsall for example, which represents a population of 269,000,

The area around Digbeth and Curzon Street is already becoming a hub for the creative industries and Birmingham City University, with its state-of-the-art facilities at Eastside is turning out young media graduates ready to take up positions in the creative and digital industries.

This was even recognised when culture minister Karen Bradley and future mayor Andy Street toured the site of the new Birmingham Conservatoire at Eastside in April.

Birmingham has the compelling case – but has to pay lip service to its neighbours. The Birmingham Labour Party bloodbath has begun with a number of established councillors and credible challengers blocked from standing for the dwindling number of council seats available at the 2018 election

Two inner city councillors have already been struck off the approve lists and dark arts have been blamed for leader John Clancy having his rubber stamp declined – at least until he gets his paperwork in order.

And the party has also become a front in the battle by Momentum and the Corbynistas against deputy leader Tom Watson and the West Midlands Party organisation.

A block on members who signed up since June 2015 voting for council candidates was reinforced by the party’s Birmingham Board on Friday. Corbyn cheerleader Councillor Majid Mahmood had been pushing for this only to be overruled by his fellow board members.

Now the national party has intervened and brought the cut-off forward to January this year – meaning hundreds of Momentum types who flooded the party in 2015 and 2016 will be able to back the most vehemently pro-Corbyn candidates.

This, of course, means several established councillors who have failed to show due deference to Dear Leader Jeremy are vulnerable and should probably start browsing the situations vacant column.

Everyone else should grab their popcorn – this is going to get messy.

During the 50s and 60s there was a can-do attitude as the city was transformed – but since then it has been battered by relative decline.