EXCLUSIVE

VICTORY FOR FRED GROVE

26-01-2007

Battling Brummie pensioner Fred Grove has won an amazing victory by forcing Birmingham City Council to withdraw the Compulsory Purchase Order on his canalside cottage in Eastside. It means that Fred can continue living in the house that has been his home for more than 40 years.

See picture gallery - click here © Mike Drayton

The 76-year old was threatened with eviction from his property at Belmont Row, even though - bizarrely - there were no plans to demolish it. AWM and the council who are planning to redevelop the area argued that the noise and dust of demolition work simply meant that it was “in his own best interests” to leave.

Fred reckoned that he was a better judge of his own interests than a few faceless bureaucrats and told them in no uncertain terms that he wanted to stay.

Stirrer editor Adrian Goldberg broke the story when he was presenting BBC WM's breakfast show last year, and the story of the “little man” fending off the big battalions won immediate public sympathy.

Now an improbable victory has been achieved, thanks to the efforts of Fred's solicitor Alastair Wallace of Moseley based Public Law Solicitors, who has persuaded the council to remove the CPO that was due to be discussed at a public enquiry next month.

“I'm pleased and delighted” said Fred. “I shall sleep better now than I have at any time in the two years this has been going on.”

There are still more than a dozen other CPO's outstanding in the locality - one has been served on the popular Rosa's café, for example. The question now is why should any of the CPO's be acted on?

After all, if the developers can work around Fred, surely they can accommodate other sitting tenants too. Such an approach would surely be more in keeping with the professed desire to create a truly “sustainable” development.

In any event, one significant victory has been achieved, and this is a time to be magnanimous - let's be charitable and and say that Birmingham Council have heard the voice of the people and acted upon it, for which they deserve praise.

So too do the likes of Karen Leach from Localise West Midlands and Fred's unofficial legal advisor Mark Jackson who have given him invaluable assistance along the way.

By far his biggest supporter though was his daughter Marilyn who tragically died before Christmas - after so much hard work on her dad's behalf, the only note of sadness in this entire story is that she isn't around to celebrate with him.

Watch The Stirrer's interview with Fred, below