A Birmingham street has been closed due to a police incident.

Image source, @ReissOmari

Bus services in the area could be affected, said the city council.

We'll bring you more on that incident as we get it.

A serious fire at a property in Edgbaston, Birmingham, last night is being investigated.

Image source, West Midlands Fire Service

Three people were taken to hospital after fire crews were called the the terraced property in Christchurch Road shortly before 18:45.

The fire was prevented from spreading to neighbouring properties, said the fire service.

Specialist officers have been at the scene to determine the cause of the fire.

BBC Politics

Gavin Williamson has strenuously denied he leaked information from the National Security Council as calls are being made for a police inquiry.

Image source, EPA

The South Staffordshire MP was sacked as defence secretary for allegedly disclosing plans to allow Chinese telecoms giant Huawei to help build the UK's 5G network.

Opposition MPs said there should be an investigation into whether the Official Secrets Act had been breached.

Downing Street said it had "compelling evidence" and the matter was closed.

Crimes are being investigated by inexperienced uniformed officers because of a shortage of detectives, the police watchdog has said.

A report found offences such as burglary and theft are often resolved over the phone or assigned to "beat" officers.

The report looked at a representative group of 14 constabularies in England and Wales including the West Midlands and Greater Manchester forces.

Failings mentioned in the report include evidence not being gathered and potential lines of inquiry being missed.

Youth workers are to be based in two more West Midlands hospital A&E departments to help victims of violent crime.

The four specialists will work alongside medics in the West Midlands to identify young victims and perpetrators of serious violence.

The youth workers will be based at University Hospital Coventry and Warwickshire and New Cross Hospital, Wolverhampton, for an initial one-year period.

A similar project is already running at the Queen Elizabeth and Heartlands hospitals in Birmingham.

Alex Hamilton
BBC Weather

It will be a mixed day with some rain and some sunny spells and highs of 14C (57F).

Vanessa Pearce
BBC News

Welcome to our live service for Thursday.

We'll be bringing you all the news, sport, travel and weather for the West Midlands.

We love to hear from you so share your news, thoughts and photos of the area with us via email, Twitter, external and Facebook, external.

Inexperienced officers are tackling burglaries, car crime and assaults, the policing watchdog says.

Four specialists will be placed at hospitals in Coventry and Wolverhampton in a £285,000 project.

We'll be back with our usual mix of news, sport, travel and weather from 07:00 tomorrow, but keep an eye out here for more updates this evening and into the morning.

Local Democracy Reporting Service
Tom Dare

The word "orgasm" could make a return to Birmingham City Council emails under plans being considered by the local authority.

In February, it was revealed as one of more than 100 words screened out by the council's email servers.

While many on the list were racist or extremely offensive, other banned words included "viagra" as well as anatomical terms such as "nipple", "vagina" and "penis".

If any of those words are included in an email to the council or councillors, it gets stopped from getting through to the recipient.

Councillor Nicky Brennan, who has been vocal about online abuse in the past, has argued many of those words could be legitimately used in correspondence.

She met with other councillors and council officers today and said the banned words would be reviewed and less offensive terms struck off the list.

Following a Freedom of information request earlier this year it was also revealed that very few quarantined emails are ever read by a person, meaning that potentially threatening, abusive and intimidating emails are not being reported to the police.

Allen Cook
BBC News

A police constable who's served for 18 years for Staffordshire Police has been dismissed after the force said he was given a criminal caution for fraud offences.

Craig Davis was based in Stoke-on-Trent and was found guilty of gross misconduct at a hearing today.

The force said he received the caution last month from another police force for two offences of fraud by false representation., external

Local Democracy Reporting Service
Tom Dare

Two sexual assault referral centres used for Birmingham, Solihull and the Black Country are to be relocated to a single premises, it has been announced.

Birmingham City Council has proposed the two centres, which are located in Walsall and Castle Vale, be moved to a facility in Hodge Hill to help improve support services.

A sexual assault referral centre (SARC) is used to assess the health and well-being needs of victims following either a recent or historic sexual assault, with referrals then made to services in their home area.

Papers from this week’s Health and Wellbeing Board said the move would cut waiting times.

The local elections are taking place tomorrow.

We'll get to choose who decides on things like where houses get built, who runs the buses and which pubs get late licences.

But last year only one in three people went to the polls.

Allen Cook
BBC News

Plenty of pride in Staffordshire is being shown by people in the county today on Twitter.

They're celebrating Staffordshire Day as 1 May was picked in 2016 for the initiative to coincide with the day the first Wedgwood pottery factory opened in 1759.

Shefali Oza
BBC Midlands Today

Any heavy showers that have been around today are expected to die away as we go into tonight.

Here's the full weather forecast for tonight and tomorrow in the West Midlands:

You can get a latest forecast for your area at any other time by heading to the BBC Weather website.

BBC WM Sport

Solihull Moors will find out who they will face for a place at Wembley this evening.

AFC Fylde and Harrogate play each other for the right to face the Moors in the National League play-off semi final on Saturday at Damson Park.

BBC Politics

The sacking of South Staffordshire MP Gavin Williamson as defence secretary came after a probe into the leak of information from the National Security Council.

Image source, Reuters

The inquiry followed reports that ministers had raised concerns over a plan to allow Huawei limited access to help build the UK's new 5G network.

The Daily Telegraph had then last week reported details of the meeting and that the council had agreed to allow the access amid the warnings.

The issue has been a hot topic recently, with the USA yesterday warning that its intelligence sharing with other countries would have to be re-evaluated if those countries use Huawei to build their 5G networks.

Mr Williamson has been defence secretary - his first cabinet role - since 2017 in the wake of Sir Michael Fallon's sudden resignation.

Voters in part of England will use a touch screen system to vote tomorrow in a trial developed by the University of Warwick., external

Image source, University of Warwick

The test is being carried out in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, and will see voters go into a booth, enter a passcode issued to them and then pick the candidate they want to vote for on a screen.

The university says they'll then get a receipt allowing them to check their vote was properly cast and recorded.

Allen Cook
BBC News

South Staffordshire MP Gavin Williamson has been sacked as defence secretary by Theresa May.

Image source, EPA

A Downing Street spokesman said the prime minister had lost confidence in his ability in the role.

He added that the decision followed an investigation into the leak of information from a National Security Council meeting.