The Pallasades shopping centre is to be sold to make way for the #350 million redevelopment of its downstairs neighbour Birmingham New Street Station.

Owner The Mall does not want to be involved in the revamp of the city's main rail hub - which sits underneath the shopping centre and car park.

Meanwhile, it has also emerged the New Street Station project - creating five times the passenger capacity and a landmark city "gateway" - is in a race against time to be completed before the London Olympics in 2012.

Ken Ford, chief executive of The Mall, said: "Following a number of unsolicited approaches from interested parties, we have decided to explore selling our interest in The Mall, Pallasades."

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The administrator of MG Rover revealed tonight it was locked in detailed discussions with three potential buyers of the collapsed car giant, in Birmingham.

The news revived hopes that car production could one day resume at Longbridge, with the possibility of creating new jobs.

Tony Lomas, of administrator PricewaterhouseCoopers, confirmed talks were three separate parties were ongoing but stressed each was at a different stage of completing its negotiations.

He said: "One of these parties is from the UK and the other two are from overseas. All three are intending to acquire all of the car and engine production assets of both MG Rover and Powertrain.

"All the potential buyers have an ambition to continue at least some car production in the UK although it will take some time for any of them to get production up and running again."

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Owners of Victorian dwellings in Birmingham have been accused of pursuing a "destructive policy" by allowing historic properties to fall into disrepair in an attempt to force the City Council to approve demolition.

Once they have been knocked down the sprawling 19th century villas typical of Sutton Coldfield, Edgbaston and Moseley are usually replaced by new, larger, apartment blocks ? generating extra income for the owners.

An attempt yesterday to secure permission to demolish a home in Moseley originally built for the Victorian Birmingham industrialist Thomas Padmore was blocked by planning committee members who said the city's heritage was being "chipped away".

Councillor Peter Douglas Osborn (Con Weoley) said: "There is a perception that there is a deliberate attempt to remove the core of our heritage for the sake of a short term gain in income. We are being asked to approve second-rate neo-Victorian construction where dense accommodation can be crammed in.

"The Victorian character of this city is being chipped away so much so that it is almost a destructive policy."

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Health managers will face the sack if they fail to clean up wards, under new laws to be announced today .

Every hospital in the country is to be forced to appoint a cleaning 'tsar' to fight the MRSA superbug, Ministers will pledge.

But the Government has backed away from controversial proposals to make hospital directors liable for criminal charges.

The latest initiative to beat infections followed a scathing TV documentary which exposed poor hygiene standards at a Birmingham hospital.

An undercover Panorama reporter discovered cleaners using just one bucket of water to clean a whole ward at Heartlands Hospital.

Dr Mark Goldman, the hospital's chief executive, has promised "action not words".

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More than 80 couples have booked a gay marriage service at the Birmingham Register Office for December when the ceremony becomes legal.

The city has one of the highest demands in the country for civil partnership services and is one of only six places to have a waiting list.

Birmingham's Register Office in Broad Street has nearly six times as many couples as on Manchester's list ? 16 ? and nearly four times the 22 on the London Borough of Camden's list. Both areas are known for their large gay communities.

Brighton ? Britain's gay capital ? has by far the longest list in the country with 457 gay couples waiting for a civil partnership ceremony.

Liverpool City Council and Bath and North East Somerset Council also have waiting lists.

For more on all these stories, get your hands on a copy of Friday's Birmingham Post