ABSTRACT
Birmingham, second city of the United Kingdom, is located in the West Midlands region, the oldest and most important industrial heart of Great Britain. It lies at the very centre of the country, at the hub of the country’s transport network on road and rail. A leading manufacturing city during the industrial revolution and in the post-war period, Birmingham lost 10 per cent of its population from 1971 to 1988, maintaining the present million inhabitants to the present day, while the West Midlands region counts 5.2 million people. Fifty-one per cent of the population under 18 belong to ethnic minorities.
