More patients than expected are dying at three out of five hospital trusts in the West Midlands and Staffordshire, latest NHS figures show.

A plea by Cannock councillors for an audience with Health Secretary Andrew Lansley to discuss the overnight closure of Stafford Hospital’s A&E department has been snubbed by the minister, it was revealed today.

Litter bins worth thousands of pounds have been stolen by metal thieves or damaged in Staffordshire and the Black Country last year, it has emerged.

One could be forgiven for thinking Charles Dickens had a bit of a downer on the West Midlands.

Our am dram guru Alison Norton casts her expert eye over the shows that you should be looking out for this week – including the Disney musical Beauty and the Beast, Noel Coward’s This Happy Breed and a new play written by a member of Hagley Theatre Group.

Drivers were today warned of icy conditions on the Midlands’ roads after a weekend of chaos triggered by heavy snowfall and freezing temperatures.

A bride-to-be’s wedding dream is in tatters following the mystery closure of Weston Hall in Staffordshire just 15 weeks before her big day.

Weekly bin collections are to be protected in parts of the West Midlands as councils bid for millions of pounds of Government cash to maintain the number of rounds. Fortnightly rounds will stay in South Staffordshire.

A severe weather warning was today issued for the West Midlands, with heavy snow expected to blanket the region over the weekend.

Around £102 million of council tax and business rates went uncollected in the West Midlands last year, a new study has found.