A welcoming city

Open our city to the world and connect our communities before and after the Games

The Games represents a once-in-a-generation moment to celebrate our distinct identity and personality with the world and can help us in the long term to strengthen community resilience and cohesion across the city as a whole so that all areas thrive.

Communities have weathered the hardships of the pandemic, although this and other wider societal issues, such as Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements still highlight inequalities in the city that need to be tackled.

Ensuring equality of opportunities by providing the support where needed and improving community cohesion are key parts of addressing this challenge.

The Stronger Communities programme celebrates and shines a light on all aspects of the city’s heritage from the perspective of our communities through projects that celebrate stories of community heritage and create spaces and places for dialogue. We will use the Games as a turning point in uniting the city’s population and tackling inequalities. In addition, the creation of the Commonwealth Games Community Fund has shown what can be done in our communities with targeted investment, which is locally driven, designed and delivered.

Going forward we need to carry on being bold and telling the world what makes Birmingham a great place, building on the groundwork of the Birmingham 2022 Festival programme in support of the Games.

A central part of this will be the development of a new Cultural Strategy for Birmingham in partnership with the sector. We will embed new cultural projects into the Future City Plan and in wider regeneration plans throughout the city.

Hosting an annual Birmingham International Festival, starting in 2023, will also provide an annual focal point for our residents and visitors.

Within our communities, we want to enhance engagement and participation, and sustain those groups and leaders, and interest in volunteering that have become more prominent during the Games. The investments we’ve made through the Community Fund programmes are providing support to community groups. Programmes such as Creative City and Celebrating Communities demonstrate how making links between communities and groups can improve the city experience and show that we all have vital contributions to make.