Locals in the deprived Hodge Hill area of Birmingham are not optimistic about their prospects under Keir Starmer‘s Labour.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves‘ £40bn ‘tax bomb’ may promise to help Britain’s impoverished, but for hard-up families in the suburb six miles out of the city centre it looks set to be the same old story of poverty and despair.

Birmingham used to be an Industrial Revolution powerhouse. Now, it has the highest proportion of people claiming unemployment benefits in Britain at 8.9 per cent and the city centre is a ghost town of empty shops. 

DWP statistics for June 2024 showed a total of 202,475 people on Universal Credit in Birmingham – the highest number of any local authority area in Britain – with only 61,473 of those in employment. 

Hodge Hill also has the highest fuel poverty and child poverty rates in the country. 

It’s so desperately poor that even the beggars have moved out to find leafier streets, one local claimed.

Fabrication engineer Alan Whitaker, 34, told MailOnline: ‘The truth is that it doesn’t matter if it’s Conservative or Labour, this place is f***ed.

MailOnline saw first-hand the devastating state of the Birmingham suburb

Fabrication engineer Alan Whitaker, 34, (pictured) said: ‘The truth is that it doesn’t matter if it’s Conservative or Labour, this place is f***ed’

Diane Shaw, 69, (pictured) is a volunteer at the Welcome Change Community Centre foodbank who said she feels forgotten by the system

Cans of hippy crack adorn the pavements in the most deprived area of the once great city

‘I actually live in Solihull where you see lovely greens and parks and the place being kept looking decent and then I come into Birmingham and they don’t seem to care because it’s council estates.

‘No one goes to the shops any more so the city centre is dying. They’ve wasted millions on useless tramlines that go nowhere and now even the beggars have moved out and come to the suburbs.

‘This area is so neglected. It makes me mad seeing veterans begging on the street when people just arriving illegally in the country end up getting so much support.’

Walking through the barren streets a day after the Budget was announced, MailOnline reporters were greeted with forlorn acceptance.

Rubbish littered the streets and cans of industrial-sized hippy crack adorned the pavements. 

A little more than a year ago, the City Council declared itself bankrupt by issuing a Section 114 notice.

At the same time, food banks in the West Midlands saw a surge in numbers, handing out more than 270,000 emergency parcels a year compared to 200,000 before 2022.

Now, after the first Labour Budget in 15 years, the mood remains distinctly downbeat.

Diane Shaw, 69, a volunteer at the Welcome Change Community Centre foodbank, says she feels forgotten by the system.

She spent 30 years caring for her husband who suffered from early onset Parkinson’s and then dementia, and then her brother, leaving her with just a basic pension.

She said: ‘Being a carer is tough work, it’s 24 hours a day, you rarely get a night’s sleep. I have saved the Government a lot of money over the years but now I am left with just a basic pension and that is hard.

‘I really noticed the cost of living going up and after losing a family member in June, I came to the food bank myself.

‘I felt utterly ashamed which is why I now volunteer and what I see is heartbreaking.

‘I’m afraid I have no confidence in this Labour government. As soon as they took away the heating allowance, I knew they weren’t right.’

Community outreach worker Toqueer Quyaam, 39, explained: ‘People feel let down by Labour’

He added: ‘People have had 14 years of austerity and now they are told to wait another 10 years to see the benefits. People can’t wait that long’

Another food bank volunteer Pam H, 66, said: ‘We see a lot of single people with drug and alcohol issues and probation issues but now we also see pensioners.

‘We hardly ever used to see older people coming in here but now they are coming and that breaks my heart.’

Sian Dunstan, 44, a recovery coordinator, said: ‘I don’t know much about politics and I don’t vote but I always thought Labour were for the working man.

‘Now, I don’t know. I can’t believe they took the winter fuel payment from pensioners. At the end of winter, deaths will have risen.

‘I work with people struggling with addictions and I know there are people out there that can’t afford to heat their homes, they are living without gas because it is too expensive.

‘My son, his partner and their two children have been living with me for three years now because Birmingham City Council haven’t been able to offer them anything. Times are very tough.’

The foodbank manager Laura Jones, 41, is about to leave Birmingham to look after her mother in the Welsh Valleys.

She said: ‘The Section 114 (Council bankruptcy) has had a massive impact.

‘They have had to tighten their belts when it comes to funding food charities when we want to broaden our work to offer help and advice as well as simply giving out food.

‘A lot of people voted Labour thinking it would bring about beneficial change for them but only time will tell what the impact of their budget will be.

‘Their MPs are very proactive and supportive locally but they are up against it when it comes to their Government and keeping basic services like a Contact Centre takes a huge lobbying effort.’

Rubbish was piled high on the streets when MailOnline visited the suburb of Birmingham

Data from the Department of Work and Pensions found that 46 per cent of children, around 3,400 of them, were living in poverty in Hodge Hill

She said many people were now signing up for food packages – a scheme where for an annual £1 subscription, users could collect £4 boxes of fresh food from supermarkets.

It is a step below using a food bank, offering a greater degree of dignity, and, according to Birmingham’s Food Justice Network there was now a waiting list.

As for Labour’s pledge of no more tax rises on working people, that drew laughs at a local vape shop.

Garage engineer Carlos Harrissos, 43, said: ‘I know times are hard but they are fleecing us every which way.’

He has seen his family budget spiral so much in recent years, that despite he and his wife working full time, they struggle to afford what they once considered basics.

The father-of-two-teenagers said: ‘Five years ago my rent was £720, now it’s £980. It used to be £80-a-month for gas and electric, now it’s £196, we used to spend £80-90 on a weekly food shop, now it’s £150.

‘I work 60 hours a week to put food on the table and afford a holiday.

‘We don’t go out any more for meals and the pub and there is no more sorting Christmas out early.’

Both he and his partner gave up smoking to vape, both for health and financial reasons so he was shocked by what the man behind the counter told him about the budget.

Chris Lamb, 30, explained that a tax of £2.20 per 10ml of vape liquid was now scheduled to come in for 2026 meaning prices will more than triple.

‘I think they are trying to recover the black hole left by Covid,’ he said, ‘but it is going to be a ridiculous price hike.

Foodbank manager Laura Jones, 41, is about to leave Birmingham to look after her mother in the Welsh Valleys

Josh Neicho, 42, (pictured) a communications worker, added: ‘We need billions spent on insulating people’s homes’

Hodge Hill has the highest fuel poverty and child poverty rates in the country

The windows of a pale brown concrete building near a church were broken when MailOnline visited the area

Birmingham used to be an industrial powerhouse but now is the city with the fewest jobs in the country

‘They want to price kids out of the market but it will really hit lower middle class and other working people who have tried to quit smoking and save a few quid.’

Data from the Department of Work and Pensions found that 46 per cent of children, around 3,400 of them, were living in poverty in Hodge Hill.

Mother-of-three Mimi Blested, 39, a health and social care student, said: ‘Everything has gone up so we have to make tough choices. It’s the same for a lot of people. I see them at the checkouts not being able to pay for their shopping. It’s sad.’

The Rev Larry Curtis, 69, who runs a food bank from his Baptist Church in Hodge Hill said: ‘We started running a food bank just over a year ago because there were so many people in need.

‘I have been here for 35 years and I think people are better off now but young families are really stretched and they can get themselves into a difficult situation very quickly, if someone loses a job for instance.’

Josh Neicho, 42, a communications worker, added: ‘We need billions spent on insulating people’s homes. Rich people do it, councils are doing it but there is a mass of people in the middle who are really struggling.’

For many in Hodge Hill, change can’t come soon enough and they are begging for a chance to see  their luck turn.

But politicians telling them to wait years to see a change just isn’t good enough for many of them. 

Community outreach worker Toqueer Quyaam, 39, explained: ‘People feel let down by Labour. 

‘People have had 14 years of austerity and now they are told to wait another 10 years to see the benefits. People can’t wait that long.’