Who are we?

We are Allan and Samantha Poole, and have been trading from street stalls in Birmingham City Centre, selling flowers for over 40 years, and more recently branching out into souvenirs.

We are also chair and vice chair of the Birmingham Street Traders Association.  Members of the association are hard-working local entrepreneurs - selling everything from food and seasonal goods to clothing come rain or shine.  Both of our families have operated as street traders in Birmingham for several generations.  Street trading is in our blood.

We love our city but we feel that Birmingham’s New Street Trading Policy threatens our livelihoods and the heritage of street trading in our city.   

What’s wrong with the policy

At its heart, the policy priorities bricks and mortar shops and gentrification over traditional street trading.

Under Birmingham’s new policy, to obtain a consent, which traders must reapply for annually, applications will be scored on how “innovative” the products traders propose to sell will be. The policy defines “innovative” as whether the product is readily available in the High Street market place.

We contend that the “innovative products” criterion is uncertain, anti-competitive and in breach of the Provision of Services Regulations 2009. It gives an unfair advantage to shop retailers who have no need to “innovate”. The Council have not said how they will judge what is “innovative” and what is not. We are challenging the policy on this basis. We think the application process should mean a level playing field for all retailers.

The policy also contains numerous other elements that are problematic, which seek to micro-manage what traders’ stalls look like, what sort of units they use, and the ways in which they trade. All of this threatens to put ordinary working class street traders out of business. If you don’t believe us the policy is there for you to read yourself. 

Please help us fight this policy that threatens our community by making a donation (every little helps!) and sharing this page on social media, via WhatsApp or email.

What we are trying to achieve and what have we done. 

Before the policy was imposed in November 2020 we sought to persuade the Council that the policy was misguided. We were not listened to.

We subsequently instructed a solicitor, Dan Rosenberg, from Simpson Millar LLP and barristers, Sarah Sackman and Conor Fegan from Francis Taylor Building.  

We brought a Judicial review in January 2021.  Judicial review is a way of challenging unlawful decisions of public authorities.

We are seeking to get the new street trading policy declared unlawful and quashed.

A High Court Judge has looked at our case, and the Council’s counter-arguments, and on 22nd February 2021 decided that our case was arguable and granted it permission for it to proceed to a full judicial review hearing in the High Court.  

This is likely to take place in late March or April – we will let people know when we have a date. 

How much are we raising and why?

We have already invested a significant amount of our own money in fighting this unfair policy.  We realise that times are hard for people right now, and we made a conscious decision not to seek funds more widely unless and until a Judge agreed that our case was arguable.  

Should we lose the Judicial Review, we would have to pay not only our own costs, but the costs of Birmingham City Council.  We have been seeking to keep the case as streamlined as possible to keep costs down.  Nevertheless, our lawyers advise us that it is prudent to budget £20-25k to cover Birmingham’s costs if we lose.  We need to raise half of that (i.e. at least £10,000 and preferably a bit more) through crowdfunding, from the people of Birmingham and beyond. We are starting with an initial target of £5,000.

We know it’s a lot of money. But we feel that we have to fight this cause to preserve the trading that is at the heart of Brum.  We have no prior experience of legal action, and have never done anything on this scale before.  We know and love the City, and spent our whole working life in the City Centre.  We have tried everything to get the Council to listen and to reconsider, and have resorted to litigation as a last resort.