Four-year-old Isabella Sulikowska runs up to me, cuddles my leg – it being the only part of me she can reach without clambering on a stool – and tells me how excited she is at having me stay over.
Isabella lives with her mother Alina and her father Krzysztof (pictured above) in Erdington, a suburb five miles north of Birmingham city centre. Like 50,000 other Poles, they have made the West Midlands their home, and this is one of the more popular destinations: indeed, their neighbourhood is known as Little Poland.
But Erdington had one of the biggest leave votes in Birmingham, too. And so, as part of the Guardian’s Voices and Votes series, I’m interested to understand how the place feels to the Polish immigrants who came here – and how they think this election could shape their future.
A lot could change in Erdington. With a diverse population of about 100,000, the seat has been held by Labour since its inception in 1974; its current representative, Jack Dromey, has been here since 2010. In 2015, his majority was a relatively healthy 5,129 – but that makes it a seat the Conservatives could hope to win.
In the past, the Conservatives have shied away from campaigning hard in blue-collar areas. But Nick Timothy, one of Theresa May’s closest aides, who hails from Erdington, urged the Conservatives to chase the working-class vote in a brand revamp called “Erdington modernisation”. On Thursday it will be decided – in his hometown – whether his strategy worked.
The sense that immigration is a problem could help with that. The 2011 census recorded 2% of Erdington’s population speaking Polish as their first language, but 2015 figures suggest the number may now be closer to 4%.
The blame for many socio-economic problems in these parts is laid at the door of the Polish immigrants. One of the first people interviewed for this series, local author and life-long Erdingtonian Collette Elliott, said they were “taking over the area”.
“The Polish have set up on Slade Road and that is causing a lot of problems,” she said. “And they are in between the Muslim shops, and they have been there a lot longer. I know a lot of people who voted to leave, including myself, because – I don’t want it to come across as racist, because I’m not racist, but they are taking over. Taking over our high street, Slade Road, everywhere, and they have no respect for anybody.”
Last week at a focus group organised by BritainThinks, immigration was the paramount concern for all. Behind that concern lay a sense of unfairness. There was a feeling that while the participants in the group were working hard, others were coming to the UK and “getting to the front of the queue”. This was true of leavers and remainers alike.
But there are others who feel that Polish migration into the area has been nothing but positive. Gerard Goshawk, a local minister, believes they “bring a rich-cultural diversity to Erdington” and have given new life to a dying high street. Goshawk heard one leave voter give a withering verdict on the area on TV. He was outraged and decided to show that the community was not as divided as it was being portrayed. The result was #EveryoneErdington, a community celebration that culminated in more than 100 people from many of the town’s nationalities holding hands along the high street in a show of solidarity.
So what do the Sulikowskas make of it all? A former coffee shop owner, onetime office coordinator, and now wannabe childminder, 37-year-old Alina lives in Tyburn, which had one of the highest votes in both Birmingham and the constituency for leaving the EU, at almost 68%. She talks as she fries kotlety mielone – turkey patties – for dinner. As the pan spits and Isabella interrupts our conversations with impromptu bursts into Spanish – she takes lessons – Alina says: “I don’t normally cook Polish food, I prefer Thai and Spanish, but my husband loves it and of course we knew you were coming … so it had to be authentic.”
As Alina cooks, Isabella puts me in charge of painting her nails with bright blue sparkles – her tiny feet jutting over the table in my direction. Her father, Krzysztof, 38 – “Kriss for short, please” – comes in shortly afterwards. The software engineer is tasked with making the cucumber salad with yoghurt and dill as the couple joke about Polish men in general being a little shy of housework. They also reminisce about first coming to Britain, and their attempts at integration.
“I didn’t speak a word of English,” says Alina. “But I got a job in a cafe washing straight away, and then the company that employed Kriss took a chance on me and hired me in their offices – we were so grateful – and it meant that we could start looking at renting somewhere. We know some others who have come over haven’t been so lucky, and we feel blessed.”
At the dinner table, when the humdrum of the day begins to settle, the conversation turns to the upcoming election. There is a palpable frustration in the air. Neither Alina or her husband, although politically conscientious, will be able to vote. They are not British citizens, despite being in the country for 10 years, and were not able to vote in the EU referendum.
Both say they were blindsided by Brexit. Neither had ever expected the leave vote and they are still coming to terms with the bureaucratic process they will have to go through to remain in the UK. “The decision about our future was taken for us. We were never given an option, and that is hard to deal with after being in this country for 10 years and paying all our taxes,” says Kriss.
Citizenship and a need to feel like they belong is the one of the main issues raised again and again in the Polish community in this pocket of Birmingham.
Alicja Kaczmarek, who we spoke to last week for our third instalment from Erdington, speaks at length about the issues affecting her fellow Poles who have emigrated to Britain. Kaczmarek, 39, who moved during the first wave of eastern European migration in 2004, came to the country looking for “adventure”.
But, she says, after years of fighting her way through British bureaucracy and subtle discrimination, she created the Polish Expats Association, which has its base on Erdington’s high street.
Over a bowl of stew, the former psychotherapist discusses the lack of opportunities and provisions for the Polish community, and how they feel they are not represented by the local authority and politicians.
“It was about identifying the problems Polish people have,” she says. “And providing a link with our culture here in the UK. It was very clear that these people were not doing very well.
“People were isolated, they were becoming visibly marginalised and they were living on the outside of the society. This is still pretty much the case. In Erdington, it is like a little Polish ghetto. Most Polish people don’t live outside their comfort zone in Erdington and they live their lives around Polish shops, hairdressers, newspapers, and watching only Polish TV. Unfortunately, many problems grow out of this.”
Kaczmarek says this segregated living has given young Polish people an identity crisis and has caused conflict among them and other migrant communities.
“Many people become depressed. The social mobility is not there. They do not develop. People do not move up. They stay in the same jobs. History of migration repeats itself, the problems repeat themselves. No action taken,” she says.
She is worried about community cohesion, a growing problem of far-right politics among Polish immigrants, and anti-Muslim rhetoric. But she is worried about a lack of self-confidence, too.
“Polish people self-stigmatise themselves as a migrant,” she says. “They think: ‘As a migrant I cannot expect to have a good job,’ so they do not progress. People do not participate. They do not feel they can contribute. It leads to isolation and poverty. They live in closed communities. There is a massive language barrier, and this hasn’t changed since 2004.”
All of this will form the backdrop of one of the most closely fought elections in Erdington’s history. Kaczmarek is keen for others to cast their vote and begin a process of change.
She says: “I can’t vote. I am not British. I cannot agree with Tory national politics due to their migration outlook. But then, it is really hard to vote for Labour here – most people feel they have not worked for their vote. A lot of the problems here are down to politics.” She takes a deep sigh. “It is going to be a tough one.”
Alina and Kriss aren’t allowed to vote, either. But after Isabella has finally gone to bed, they talk about how they would if they were allowed to. Neither of them know the local political candidates running in the election: their focus is more national than local. In the leaders’ debate, they say, they were impressed with the Liberal Democrats and the Greens. And they are proud that their daughter attends a diverse school.
But they are concerned about people who commit benefit fraud: their compatriots, but British people who abuse the system too. And so Nick Timothy might find reason to be optimistic in Little Poland. “If we had to choose,” says Kriss, “it would be the Conservatives.”
• This article was amended on 9 June 2017. An earlier version used the word “palatable” where “palpable” was meant.
