Express and Star

A 3.99% council tax hike as well as £13.5m cuts to tips, car parks and roads as well as other services in Wolverhampton have been rubber-stamped by councillors, external .

Three-year-old Poppy-Arabella Clarke was using a pelican crossing with her mother when she was hit.

BBC Business News

Plans to help nearly 100,000 small businesses due to be hit by changes to rates next month are being considered by Communities Secretary and Bromsgrove MP, Sajid Javid.

Out of those, some 25,000 firms face a "cliff edge" under the new revaluation of business rates, according to ratings agency CVS.

It presented a number of proposals to Mr Javid during a meeting on Wednesday.

Image source, Getty Images

The government is trying to come up with some additional help for small firms after an  outcry from  businesses.

Ministers have said that the revaluation - the first since 2010 - will mean three-quarters of firms will see their rates stay the same or decrease.

But Mr Javid and chancellor Philip Hammond have come under pressure to act to help businesses facing large rises in areas where rental values have increased dramatically.

Critics claim the situation favours large retailers and online firms over high street shops.

A Birmingham city councillor has stepped down from the ruling cabinet after he was criticised for accusing a school of breaching anti-discrimination laws when it told a four-year-old Muslim pupil she could not wear a headscarf.

Image source, AFP

St Clare's Catholic Primary School, in Birmingham,  received a complaint from the pupil's family .

Waseem Zaffar, whose cabinet role put him in charge of equality and openness, was related to the pupil but did not make that public,  the Birmingham Mail said, external .

He said speculation about him was a distraction for the council at a time when it had important work to do. 

Aston Villa midfielder Leandro Bacuna is banned for six games following an altercation with an assistant referee.

It's a fair question.

Well we all know that top footballers really wanna be rock/rap stars deep down. And vice versa.

Stormzy and the world's most expensive footballer Paul Pogba, external will tell you that.

Now, Premier League side West Bromwich Albion have been re-working some classic album covers on their matchday programmes this season.

The Midlands club have paid homage to the likes of David Bowie's Aladdin Sane, Oasis's Definitely Maybe (scroll down for more on that beauty) and Genesis' I Can't Dance.

BBC Music sent bona fide pop stars The Vamps down to the club's grounds to find out more (and to guide the players through how to look mean on a band photo-shoot).

Premier League Burnley sign 1966 World Cup winner Ron Flowers' grandson Harry from ninth-tier Brocton.

Lauren Johnson is making history as Birmingham's first female professional boxer in 150 years.

BBC WM Sport

Birmingham City boss Gianfranco Zola believes the effects of last week's crisis meeting involving the players, directors and coaching staff continue to be felt.

Image source, Empics

Tonight the club look to follow up last Friday's win at Wolves with a good performance at home to promotion-chasing Leeds - a match you can hear live from 19:00 on BBC WM. 

Zola told us he felt that clear-the-air meeting brought more of the squad onside.

A jobs fair at the sports hall at North Bromsgrove High School from 10:00 is being hosted by Sajid Javid, the MP for Bromsgrove and secretary of state for communities and local government.. 

BBC WM Sport

Wolves boss Paul Lambert said both Kortney Hause and Jordan Graham had apologised after being disciplined last week .

Image source, PA

They reportedly "weren't able to train",  which saw Hause dropped for the Blues derby last Friday.

The head coach has described it as a "one-off" occurrence. 

Wolves go to Reading tomorrow looking to stop a run of five straight defeats that has left them two points off the drop zone. 

You can hear full coverage of the game with BBC WM on 95.6FM from 14:00.

A man is detained for 13 years after a stabbing in Newtown, Birmingham

Birmingham Mail

Equalities boss Waseem Zaffar has resigned as a cabinet member, external after pressurising a head teacher to overturn a pupil’s hijab headscarf ban - without publicly revealing she was a relative.  

A man has died after a house fire in Malvern last night (pictured) and two other men needed treatment for a head injury and the effects of breathing in smoke.

The ambulance service says, external they were called to Belmont Road in Malvern just before 21:50 on 2 March. 

A man was rescued from the house but later died at the scene, a spokesman said. 

You have been using Your Questions to ask about the West Midlands. Here are some of our answers.

A partially-sighted man says he was left feeling disappointed and humiliated.

BBC Midlands Today

An IT worker from Birmingham says taxi drivers regularly refuse to pick him up because he's blind and travels with a guide dog.

Saleh Ahmed, who lives in Balsall Heath, says drivers working for the online service Uber have refused him and his dog a ride 14 times in the past two years.

Minicabs and taxis are obliged to carry passengers with service dogs unless there's a medical reason not to. 

Uber says it has barred two drivers while they investigate Saleh's complaint.

Vanessa Pearce
BBC Local Live

Council leaders in the West Midlands will be asked to agree a salary of £79,000 a year for the region's first elected mayor.

Image source, Coventry City Council

Voters in Birmingham, Coventry, Dudley, Sandwell, Wolverhampton, Walsall and Solihull will elect a Metro Mayor on 4 May. 

An independent panel has suggested the winner should be paid around £4,000 more than an MP. 

Charlie Slater
BBC Weather presenter

Rain moving in this morning means it will be a thoroughly wet day with lots of showers and highs of 9C (48F).

Why are West Bromwich Albion's players pretending to be Phil Collins and Oasis?