Aston is a ward covering an area of north east

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

, including the district of

Aston Aston is an area of inner Birmingham, England. Located immediately to the north-east of Central Birmingham, Aston constitutes a ward within the metropolitan authority. It is approximately 1.5 miles from Birmingham City Centre. History Aston wa ...

Demographics

The 2011 census found that 32,286 people were living in Aston. 50.4% of the population was female and 49.6% was male. This was above and below the national and city average respectively. Aston is a very diverse community, ethnically, with 44% of the population born outside the United Kingdom. The largest ethnic group was Asian at 55%. More specifically, the Pakistani ethnic group was the largest at 38% of all Asians. Black British was the second largest ethnic group at 26%. White British was the third largest ethnic group at 18%.

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

was the most prominent religion in the ward with 54% of the ward's population stating themselves as Muslim, above the city average. Christianity was the second most prominent religion in Aston at 26%. The ethnic makeup of the area drastically changed in the 1950s and 1960s with immigration from the

Commonwealth A commonwealth is a traditional English term for a political community founded for the common good. Historically, it has been synonymous with "republic". The noun "commonwealth", meaning "public welfare, general good or advantage", dates from the ...

. Most of the immigrants were from the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...

, though a significant number were from the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

Ward history

The ward was created in 1911, when

gained the Aston Manor Urban District. As a typical inner city ward, which tends to lose population the boundaries have been altered on a number of occasions.

Election fraud scandal

In 2004 the ward saw a voter fraud scandal in which

Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

councillors were guilty of a systematic attempt to rig elections. They had set up a "vote-rigging factory" in a disused warehouse, stealing and intercepting hundreds and possibly thousands of ballot papers to achieve this. Three councillors, Mohammed Islam, Muhammed Afzal (later cleared) and Mohammed Kazi were convicted of voter fraud, with the elections having to be rerun. All three were barred from standing in the following election. The charges against Afzal were quashed by the

Court of Appeal A court of appeals, also called a court of appeal, appellate court, appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear an appeal of a trial court or other lower tribunal. In much of t ...

Politics

The Aston ward is currently represented by two Liberal Democrat councillors: Mumtaz Hussain and Ayoub Khan.

Demographics

Ward history

Election fraud scandal

Politics

Election results

2020s

2010s

2000s

1990s

1980s

1970s

1960s

1950s

1940s

References