Why are the towns and cities of the UK other than London kind of unfairly maligned by the press and social media?
Posted by TheHaplessBard@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 386 comments
I'm a foreign student currently living and studying in London. Since living here for school, my feed has been flooded with articles, videos, and social media posts that kind of unfairly denigrate all British towns and cities that aren't London. Like, for example, there's a particularly popular sentiment here and apparently in many parts of the web that if London didn't exist, the UK would essentially be a glorified Third World country and that non-London British cities and towns are basically run down shitholes. Having actually lived in various UK cities and towns on-and-off throughout the years, I strongly disagree with this sentiment and find many British cities to be quite beautiful, modern, and aesthetically pleasing in their own right.
Accurate_Prompt_8800@reddit
London is not just the capital but the economic, cultural, and political heart of the UK. A significant portion of investment, jobs, and infrastructure development is concentrated there, which creates a stark contrast between London and other parts of the country. This disparity feeds the narrative that “London is everything, and the rest is nothing.”
EdmundTheInsulter@reddit
It's hard to leave London since if the transport upgrade isn't in London, it seems not to be built. Are they still wanting crossrail 2 after the first was a bailed out disaster ?
Left_Set_5916@reddit
It's pretty easy to leave London and transport links are pretty good. Could be much yeah of course but it's certainly not hard to leave.
Teembeau@reddit
I disagree that it's the economic heart of the UK. London has the city and it has some media. What products are designed or made there? What software is developed there?
Most of the talking up of London is because that's where the news media is and they can't be bothered going beyond the M25.
Triadelt@reddit
What do you mean 🤣. As a software engineer most of the fintech startups, and all the top ones, are in london, financial services, trading etc. its factually the economic capital.
Teembeau@reddit
OK, but that's part of the city, finanical markets stuff.
KnarkedDev@reddit
So? Still software. Software that is both used and sold for money.
KnarkedDev@reddit
Honestly don't know if this is a joke or not, but I'll assume good faith. I'll concentrate on software because it's what I know.
Monzo. Starling. Citymapper. DeepMind. Spotify. TransferWise. Zopa. Rightmove. Zoopla. Depop. ARM chip drivers. Unreal Engine.
Seriously, the UK is the 3rd largest tech sector in the world. A few years ago London had more tech funding than France and Germany combined. London is the single biggest software hub outside the US.
dotelze@reddit
If you look at where big companies have offices they’re almost all in London. They might have smaller ones in another city as well, but not always
Teembeau@reddit
Really? Dyson are in London? Nationwide?
Lots of companies have a small London office but it isn't where the bulk of activity is happening.
dotelze@reddit
Dyson are in Singapore
Teembeau@reddit
I think Meta are closing their London office. My mate works for them and lives in one of the market towns around Swindon.
Admirable_Fault@reddit
I don’t think I have ever seen someone argue that London isn’t the economic heart of the UK. What a wild take. Even ignoring that plenty of tech companies are based there, financial services is one of the most important economic drivers of the economy.
KnarkedDev@reddit
Oh fuck off. A massive number of Londoners are not from London (or abroad for that matter). I spent 20 years growing up and studying in Wales, moved to London because the Welsh government keeps finding new and interesting ways to shoot themselves and their economy in the foot, and then I get shat on for being in London.
Good Christ.
Left_Set_5916@reddit
Maybe its because I'm in the North but there seems to be other way around London that yeh crime ridden hell hole where you can't step out your front door without getting stabbed or your phone stolen.
Note I don't think that is actually true while there has been a recent increase in violence and crime and it needs to be delt with and not ignored it's still a relative city
CheesyLala@reddit
We've over-centralised the country around London and the Southeast for decades now; it gets all the investment, so it offers the best opportunities, so it attracts more people, so infrastructure needs grow and it demands more investment; it's self-perpetuating and effectively leaves the rest of the country paying tribute through the form of under-investment and its brightest people leaving for the capital. The media is almost entirely London-based and London-centric, and are convinced that they're in the centre of the universe and are usually deeply patronising about anywhere in 'the regions'.
So yeah, I've lived up North, in the West Midlands, in London and now in East Anglia, and every part of the country can be awesome for different reasons (yes, even London). But if you use the media as your viewpoint then you'd barely know the rest of the country exists.
Constant-Estate3065@reddit
London gets lots of investment, the south east doesn’t. The region’s biggest city Southampton gets absolutely bugger all government investment, and it’s quite seriously deprived in places.
CheesyLala@reddit
I wouldn't call Southampton Southeast myself, just South.
Helpful_Sample_4715@reddit
I agree with you from a geographical perspective but the media only really talk about the south east and the south West, so cities like Southampton and Portsmouth get lumped in with London and Surrey
BritishBlitz87@reddit
It does rankle a bit when London gets £19 billion pounds for a railway line while other cities in the north struggle to scrape together enough to stop their 1960s infrastructure from collapsing coughGateshead FlyovercoughTyne Bridgecough
Definitely_Human01@reddit
There's 4 million journeys on the TFL network every day.
That's more than several of the next most used public transport networks put together.
If you assumed 1 person has 2 journeys (somewhere and back), that's still more people than people living in the next 2 largest cities put together. It's over half the entire population of Wales.
RickJLeanPaw@reddit
Yet what opportunities do the inhabitants of Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield etc got to travel between each other? It’s like chiding The North for not using hoverboards to get around.
Definitely_Human01@reddit
What need to the inhabitants have to travel between each other. Most of the need is for travel to and from London, so unsurprisingly most of the money will go there too.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
What needs do inhabitants of the largest metropolitan area (Liverpool > Manchester > Leeds) in the UK have to go between each other? Are you cracked?
Definitely_Human01@reddit
Compared with travelling to, from and around London, it is just a lower need.
London has more people, more businesses and more tourists.
It's like someone comparing a regular town with the 3 cities you mentioned above and complaining that the town doesn't get enough investment. Nobody would think that's unreasonable. It's because those 3 cities are larger in population and economy than some town.
Well, from London's perspective, it's the same thing.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Liverpool Manchester Leeds is basically one contiguous urban area. With shite public transport links. It's not unreasonable to compare it to London and the only reason London is so far ahead is because it gets all the investment. Which is then used to justify giving it even more investment and fuck the rest of the country.
monkyone@reddit
considering manchester and leeds as part of the same contiguous urban area is pushing it tbh
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Barely. Look at Hebden Bridge here. Is it part of Leeds or Manchester? People who live there commute to both
https://geoportal.statistics.gov.uk/maps/db35406344ad4172b0b926e0f5205cb1/explore
monkyone@reddit
commuter belt/sphere of influence is not the same thing as ‘contiguous urban area’
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Perhaps I should have said economic area. Fact remains this is a highly urbanised area with a lot of potential for investment and development that is sacrificed to keep funneling money into the capital.
I live in Liverpool, it takes about an hour to drive to Leeds and over 2 hours if I want to get the train. Nonsensical.
monkyone@reddit
totally agree there is a lot of potential to be unlocked in the north. it’s not healthy for a country’s economy to be so disproportionately concentrated in one city.
Definitely_Human01@reddit
Population of Liverpool: 1.5 million people
Population of Leeds: 822k
Population of Birmingham: 4.3 million people
Total population: 6.6 million people
Spread out over basically 1/4 of England.
Population of London: 14.9 million in a very dense area.
It is unreasonable to compare the 2.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Compare these two circles. Why do we build in one and not the other?
Definitely_Human01@reddit
Because the blue circle has a 10% higher population and a 60% higher GVA per person (approx).
If you wanna get ROI, you wanna invest in the blue circle.
In fact, you do get a return on the blue circle since the SE is one of the few areas of the country that has a tax surplus.
Also the blue circle should be smaller considering a reasonable share of it is in the sea.
So your question is why should the smaller circle with more people and a track history of providing ROI get more investment?
Healthy-Drink421@reddit
GVA in the red circle is higher yes.
But investment in the blue circle returns a higher GVA on that investment as there is so much catch-up that could happen.
That is what British policy has missed.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Why is the GVA in the north so low? Because there's fuck all investment! Because transport is shit! We should be trying to bring GVA in the north up. Not just letting it rot because London go brrr
jsm97@reddit
Because linking economic hubs generates economic growth. It's why the government is building east west rail to link Oxford, Milton Keynes and Cambridge because there is a concentration of biomedical and life science industry there.
The cities of Northern England except Newcastle are so close together than the region should effectively function as an economic 'superhub' like the Rhine-Ruhr region or Silicone Valley but the infrastructure doesn't exist so they can't which holds back growth.
RickJLeanPaw@reddit
Eh? What need do the people of Surrey have to go to London for work?
Is there a deeper question you’re trying to convey that I’m missing?
Transport demand and supply are intrinsically linked (cf adding extra capacity to the road network). Create a bigger potential workforce and many of the ‘issues’ that London solves for businesses will go away.
What makes you think that this desire to travel easily, conveniently, and cheap(ish)ly is unique to London and its satellites?
baildodger@reddit
Maybe more people use it because it’s had so much investment and they can actually use it to go where they want to go?
I don’t use public transport to get to work because it takes me half an hour in the car, whereas it would take 2 hours via public transport including 3 busses and 30 minutes of walking.
Definitely_Human01@reddit
Or maybe it's because more people live in London than at least the next 12 largest towns and cities put together.
There's about as many people in London as there are in all of Scotland and Wales put together
baildodger@reddit
It’s not about population size, it’s about spending per capita, which is twice as much in London as anywhere else.
Public transport spending in London isn’t just a bigger number because there’s more people, each person gets twice as much investment as the rest of the UK, and 4 times as much as some parts of the UK.
Definitely_Human01@reddit
And yet when you look at expenditure per capita as a whole, London isn't even that special.
The level of public investment per capita is about the same as Scotland and less than that of NI
So what they lose out on transport investment, they make up for in other areas.
There's also a question of return on investment.
Will the investments in these other places bring in greater tax revenue per £?
If the answer is no, then it shouldn't be that surprising that those places will get less investment.
baildodger@reddit
Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland have their own parliaments and have control over certain areas of taxation, as well as being able to make decisions about their own spending. It doesn’t justify the imbalance in spending across England.
It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you regularly make investments into a house and keep it maintained and looking nice, it’ll be more valuable than your other house which you barely keep ticking over, and you’ll have to throw a lot of money at the shit one to get it up to standard. Is it worth throwing that money at the other house if it’s not going to be worth more than the nice one? Maybe we should think about the fact that the shit house still has a family living in it, and they’re paying the same rent as the family in the good house, they’re just getting less for their money.
Definitely_Human01@reddit
You know what? Fair enough on the devolution point.
However, I will still argue that
They're not paying the same rent.
London pays about double the tax per person than the rest of England. And it gets less than double the expenditure per person than the rest of England.
There are only 2 regions that pay more tax than is invested into them. That is London and the rest of SE England.
Meaning the other regions are getting in more than they give out.
It's not that the other regions are funnelling money to London. London is funnelling money to the rest of the country.
So why shouldn't the house that pays more rent, enough so to subsidise the other house, get more renovations?
baildodger@reddit
Ok, the house that’s had all the renovations earns more rent. Does it earn more rent because the people there are inherently worth more money? Or because it’s had lots of money spent on it so it’s got better facilities? There’s got to be a point of diminishing returns, where the better house has already got all en-suite bedrooms and a hot tub in the garden, where’s there’s a better return on investment to spend to improve the cheaper house and subsequently increase their rent.
sjr0754@reddit
Incorrect, the east coast of Scotland (oil and whisky) and a tiny fragment of the Liverpool City Region (bioscience R&D) are also net contributors to the Exchequer.
winkwinknudge_nudge@reddit
Have to laugh how people make excuses for the public transport being so dire outside of London.
ashisanandroid@reddit
The point is there is a cyclical relationship between investment and usage.
At a point in time the decisions have been made to invest, and accelerate, that cycle in London.
They have not made the same decisions in our other cities.
Modern London is a patch of grass. The people who have built it were not often born 20 minutes from Tottenham Court Road. They do not eat jellied eels while locking down a business deal in the City.
We built it together: with people, investment, and business from across the whole country.
We could build a smaller version elsewhere. Or we could put all our eggs in the London basket. Long term VS short term. It's a choice.
KeyConstruction5539@reddit
Look, surely you can see the circle economic investment gets trapped in. If you use the "bigger population" justification every time, the rest of the country gets deprioritised every time. Which it does. And given house prices and rising inequality between reasons, that would lead to worse outcomes. Which it does. So... your plan is keep driving off the cliff, because there's still road?
cinematic_novel@reddit
If people in smaller centres were serious about wantingorr public transport, the single most effective thing they could do is to use it more, even if it were occasionally at weekends. But no, public transport is only coveted when London gets it. In daily life, it smells, it's impractical and it's ultimately for losers who aren't able to drive a car.
Sudden_Fig1099@reddit
What is londons population in comparison?
pizzainmyshoe@reddit
I mean, London pays for its infrastructure projects itself and the elizabeth line has over 200 million riders a year. London has the oldest trains in the country on the Bakerloo line so it lacks investment. The problem is nowhere in the country has proper levels of infrastructure spending.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Per capita transport spending in London for 2023/24 was £1,313 compared to £687 for the UK as a whole (including London). In the North West (2nd highest pop density in the country) it was £729pc. London spending dwarves spending in the rest of the country.
Yes nowhere has proper levels of infrastructure spending but to say London "lacks investment" is just spitting in the eye of every other region.
CarpeCyprinidae@reddit
investment should be comparable to demand and need. If you sum up the population of greater London and all its satellite towns - say everyone within 15 miles of the M25, which is a proxy for everyone who could commute by train into London conveniently, you get a population close to 20 million
Out of 70ish for the whole 4 countries of the union. Check what proportion of railway journeys happen within or into london? use that to assign investment and you;d probably find London's underfunded.
monkyone@reddit
commuter belt goes waaaaay further than 15 miles out too
ThinAndRopey@reddit
This is the problem. London "has all the need" because everything is focused on London. So it gets all the investment so it pulls further ahead then it has more need so needs more investment. And on and on. The solution to London's transport problems is give people incentive to live elsewhere in the country so it's not as crowded, not just keep funnelling money into it to the detriment of anywhere else.
Are you even curious why so many rail journeys pass through London? How many main lines do we have that don't have a terminus in London? For many to get anywhere, you have no other choice but to change trains in London.
Dry_Interaction5722@reddit
Per capita is not a good way to view this.
Think of the amount of people that live outside London but commute in on a daily basis.
Think of how many tourists come in to London (both foreign and british) compared to, say, Leeds?
ThinAndRopey@reddit
When per capita spending is twice that of anywhere else in the country it is absolutely indicative of the issue at hand. Again, you're justifying all the investment London gets because it's far ahead because it gets all the investment. Spread the investment round, give people reasons to live and work elsewhere aside from London and the pressure on the London transport system goes down.
Or we can let the rest of the country fall into ruin and keep stacking everything in London in the hope that what? One more rail line will fix everything?
Dry_Interaction5722@reddit
You're purposefully missing the point of my comment.
London has much higher number of non-residents requiring transport in the city than anywhere else in the county. Thats not a product of induced demand like you are saying.
And no im not justifying anything. Just because Im pointing out your stats are bad does not mean im arguing the opposite of your point.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
I'm well aware of the stats. You're arguing that increasing investment in London, which will just exacerbate the issue of concentrating wealth, GVA, and everything else in London, is somehow the solution to the problems London faces with overcrowding. Meanwhile the rest of the country, which is lagging behind due to lack of investment, is supposed to fester and bleed more talent to the all consuming London? And this will help the country how? Shall everybody just move inside the M25? Maybe then all our problems will be solved!
Dry_Interaction5722@reddit
No, im not.
Please read my comments again and highlight where I make any sort of argument on this matter.
I know you are desperate to have this argument, but I am not actually arguing against you.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Ahh sorry. You're not arguing with me, you're just wrong that per capita is a poor measure for identifying inequality in spending between London and RoUK. Fair enough.
Dry_Interaction5722@reddit
Okay buddy, if you need to win this "argument" that badly, then go ahead and chalk this up as a victory :)
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Do you understand the point of debate? Make a counterpoint if you think I'm wrong. Don't cry just because I think you're wrong and am not afraid to say so. Christ almighty
Smtn87@reddit
bit more nuanced; London funds the rest of the country. Damage London and we're fucked
Healthy-Drink421@reddit
It does, but that holds the UK back, infrastructure investment at the level of London for the rest of the regions would kick off development, so the rest of the country could fund itself.
CheesyLala@reddit
Of course it funds the rest of the country, it has to be because it sucks everything of value out of the rest of the country. Where I live anyone who wants a decent career has to leave home and head to the Southeast.
ThinAndRopey@reddit
Hate to break it to you but the rest of the country is already fucked.
Kitchner@reddit
If you look at that investment on a per passenger basis basically you see that it's impossible to do that sort of investment in some areas of the UK without massively overspending.
Even doing rough maths, Crossrail was £19bn for a city of 10m people and 1m commuters, not to mention tourists. Let's say £19bn divided by 11m people and that's £1,727 per person over 30 years (£633m per year for 30 years).
The North East has a population of 2.6m people, so that's £4.49bn over 30 years (£149m per year for 30 years).
So then part of the problem is just economies of scale. Crossrail was complex drilling underground, but ultimately it had to go 73 miles, of which 26 was underground. Let's call that £19bn for 100m of train (assuming it's twice as expensive to do the tunnel, could be higher though). That's £190m per mile of track.
Newcastle to Middlesborough is 36 miles. At £190m per mile of track, the project would cost £6.84bn, more than crossrail on a per head basis.
Worth noting Crossrail has 200m passengers a year, Newcastle has a population of 200,000 people and Middlesborough a population of 25,000. So even if both cities in their entirety travelled on that line every single day, they would only hit 82m passengers a year, which is under half of crossrail.
The solution here obviously isn't just "Fuck everywhere that isn't London", and as someone who lives in London now but has lived all over the UK including some very poor areas, I would like to see everywhere get more investment. I just wish my fellow Brits could get over this idea that if it makes sense to spend £19bn in London we should also spend the money to provide the same infrastructure everywhere because "that's fair". London has 10 times more people living there than any city in the country, more commuters visit than the total population of most cities, and that's before we consider tourists. What people are asking for is more than their "fair" share, which is OK but a little perspective would be refreshing.
Thendisnear17@reddit
I think people in the country have no idea where the population actually is.
I have met people who believed that the north has the majority of the population living there.
Kitchner@reddit
On the one hand I also did not really comprehend the comparable size of London until I moved here.
On the other hand, I wasn't dumb enough to start arguing about things like where investment should go without considering it on a per head basis.
BeerPoweredNonsense@reddit
HS1, HS2, Thameslink upgrade, Crossrail. All either terminating in London, or going through London.
Come to think about it - how many big rail projects in the last few decades have been entirely outside London?
Alex_Strgzr@reddit
Scotland seems to be the exception? We had the Airdrie-Bathgate line open in 2011 and the Edinburgh trams in 2014. The trains to Stirling were electrified as recently as 2018.
BritishBlitz87@reddit
The last straw that made me stop supporting the Tories was cancelling HS2 north of Birmingham lol.
Also just 70 years ago the North used to be richer and more influential than the south while London was a shrinking city in decline. Hence all the 1960s infrastructure lol.
Serdtsag@reddit
God I just wish they started it from Manchester to Birmingham first of all, would never see it cancelled until it got to London. They’d get through more of the development until they got to the ballache that is the density of London, but hey! They’re so close so may as well finish it
Healthy-Drink421@reddit
not many, i suppose the West Coast Mainline upgrade 1998-2009
or the current transpennine route. https://www.networkrail.co.uk/running-the-railway/railway-upgrade-plan/key-projects/transpennine-route-upgrade/
but both are upgrades not a while new fancy line.
HS3 / Crossrail North / Northern Powerhouse Rail - whatever its called - would be the only wholly new line. But I haven't heard much about it recently.
OldHelicopter256@reddit
The last big rail project outside of London was when Beeching closed all the lines and stations in the 60s.
Dry_Interaction5722@reddit
Depends what you mean by "big"
East-west rail is fairly big
Sim0nsaysshh@reddit
Theres a bypass called Beeching way in my town, Beeching used to live in it.
He closed one of the lines down because it went along the bottom of his garden, these roads are incredibly busy in the mornings and evenings with all the commuters now.
CardiologistEqual@reddit
He married my mum's cousin.
Sim0nsaysshh@reddit
Oh so she lives/lived in East Grinstead?
OldHelicopter256@reddit
Wow.
CJThunderbird@reddit
Edinburgh - Tweedbank Borders railway maybe? £300m about 10 years ago.
BeerPoweredNonsense@reddit
As opposed to nearly 20 billion for Crossrail, so roughly 100 times less.
I'm not saying that there's no investment elsewhere - just that it's pennies compared to London.
doomladen@reddit
There have been a few new rail lines (or reopened ones that were closed years ago) outside London within a similar timescale. Romsey - Eastleigh, Robin Hood Line, Corby/Kettering, Birmingham-Worcester via Kidderminster, Northumberland line and quite a few more. There have been tram systems delivered too - Edinburgh, Manchester metro link, Nottingham, West Mids metro. The really big rail ones have all involved London though.
crucible@reddit
Depends, does extending electrification count?
cinematic_novel@reddit
Technically London and the wider south east are net contributor while the rest of the country is a net recipient. That is because investment has a much higher yield in richer areas
suckmyclitcapitalist@reddit
Make the poorer areas richer, then. I could work in London in my line of work, but I don't want to. I don't want to live in a city or commute for ages. I don't want to leave my family and friends. We should have more options.
cinematic_novel@reddit
Agreed in principle, but London doesn't offer the opportunities that it does just because someone in Westminster decided to strip those opportunities away from other UK regions. If those opportunities had to go somewhere else, they would likely go to the likes of Paris and Berlin, not the likes of Sheffield or Newcastle. I appreciate that you don't like to leave family and friends and to commute for ages, but neither do folks in London. They just decided to trade off some things in life for others. So I think it is naive of you to expect to have comparable opportunities to London's while also enjoying the comforts of living in a quiet place.
baldbarry@reddit
Or even worse, you have no train station at all because apparently a bus link that drives all around the town before going anywhere and takes an hour to the train station is sufficient.
https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/skelmersdale-train-station-bid-rejected-24441795
cinematic_novel@reddit
Part of the problem is that buses and trains are directly competing with cars for resources (ridership and funds) and limited urban space. So if you want public transport that is frequent, reliable and doesn't need massive subsidies that drain money from other areas of spending, then you need to penalise private transport. That is where all public transport policies fail because people (especially outside London) are viscerally attached to their cars and would never willingly give it up.
baldbarry@reddit
I definitely see that point and understand what you're saying but that puts us in a catch 22 situation because there are very few opportunities for work other than zero hour warehouse work in this area and a lot of people who don't drive.
While the links to the motorway are good here (30 mins to Liverpool 40 to manchester) it means having a car is essential. I had a car accident in September (my car was written off) and haven't been outside the town since. Now I see why so many of my neighbours have such a narrow view of the world.
CardiologistEqual@reddit
You have busses to the train station?
baldbarry@reddit
The bus to the train station which is in a town 15 miles up the motorway, but the bus drives a normal route around all the housing estates before it leaves here.
OldHelicopter256@reddit
At least we got the A1 upgrade though, long four years but we’re finally there.
In unrelated news, apparently the reason the cones are still out on the new elevated section is due to the fact that they’ve already found structural defects in the newly constructed bridge.
BritishBlitz87@reddit
Find a structurally sound bridge north of the Watford Gap challenge
Difficulty: Impossible
Capable_Change_6159@reddit
Thelwell viaduct?
BritishBlitz87@reddit
Don't spoil my amazingly witty Reddit comment with facts
Smtn87@reddit
Although I agree the UK would be much better off having power split; you don't kill the golden goose (London funds the rest of the country)
Rico1983@reddit
HS2 Wales Barnett formula something something grumble moan :@
DaveBeBad@reddit
Not just improved the London area, but government policy has been to suppress areas that might rival it - like Birmingham in the 50s.
France has a similar problem with Paris, but Germany has Frankfurt, Berlin, Hamburg, etc so investment is spread more - although they have different issues studying from reunification.
Marvinleadshot@reddit
Yeah, Germany isn't a good comparison as they were spilt for decades. Just focus on countries that haven't been split.
If anything Germany should be the poster country to show that having multiple cities that bring in revenue is good for the country as a whole.
But Birmingham and Manchester know London doesn't play nice.
Iranicboy15@reddit
It’s less Germany was split post world war 2 and more recently unified from 1866-1871, for along time many of these cities were former capitals of their own states for like 1000yrs.
Marvinleadshot@reddit
Whilst that is true they weren't as industrialised as they were in the 20th Century.
olimeillosmis@reddit
Mad to think Birmingham had higher growth than London all the way from the Industrial Revolution (1800s) all the way to the postwar period (1940-60s).
So much so in fact that Mr Atlee had ask Parliament to ban all new office developments in Birmingham, as well as moving established Brummie industries up North so that London would have a chance. Wonton destruction, never trust British "industrial" strategy.
Shoddy-Computer2377@reddit
What surprised me the most about the US is how many huge, gazillion dollar juggernauts are based in places you have absolutely never heard of.
DaveBeBad@reddit
America is a little different though with the different taxes and laws in each state. But most of the larger companies are either west coast, east coast or Texas. Although some are Bumhole Alabama.
Extension_Drummer_85@reddit
To be fair there are three different legal jurisdictions in the U.K. so it's not like there isn't an element of that, it's just no where near as advanced.
Tom22174@reddit
On the flip side, the UK is approx. 1/3 the size of Texas alone
Just_Engineering_341@reddit
Sure, but England is the size of NY, and there is plenty of jobs and industry outside of New York City (which, of course, isn't even the capital)
notanothergav@reddit
It's also very clearly delineated in the US (and other federal countries), whereas we have a mish-mash of different systems that are a bit all over the place.
cragglerock93@reddit
I do sort of feel slightly bad for the decision makers, though. You mention London's infrastructure investment and you're right - the Elizabeth Line is vastly better than anything you can find in the rest of the country and cost £15 billion or something crazy like that. But to not have built it would have handicapped by far the most productive part of the country, when we desperately need growth. So I feel like they practically don't have much choice. But of course, that creates a vicious/virtuous cycle where more companies are attracted to London because the EL just made Paddington, the West End, the City and Canary Wharf even more accessible.
Valuable_Teacher_578@reddit
I never forget this article discussing London-centricity: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-248d9ac7-9784-4769-936a-8d3b435857a8
Woffingshire@reddit
It's like how the BBC shows the London fireworks at new year's as the countries big new year firework show, but the London fireworks themselves seem themselves as the LONDON fireworks and always include a bunch of messages in the presentation about how great London is. They don't care that it's the national show.
CheesyLala@reddit
Yes agreed.
The one that really boiled my piss was the London museums versus regional museums. Particularly personal to me as my wife has worked in museum services for a lot of her career.
Where I live in East Anglia we're near where the Sutton Hoo treasure horde was found in Suffolk. Unsurprisingly, this was taken from where it was found and moved to the British Museum, as were lots of other regional finds like Iceni treasure hordes; let's be honest, pretty much anything of any value that's found in 'the regions' ends up in the London museums.
So far so annoying. But imagine how it then felt when all London museums switched to being free entry, paid out of the public purse, whereas all the small regional museums were not granted this and so are forced to continue to charge entry for their tiny collections, made even smaller by having to send their best artefacts to the big London museums. My wife worked across a number of small museums during austerity, which saw further funding pulled from them; several closed, several more move to restricted opening times to try to spread their meagre funding.
So our local artefacts are taken away from East Anglia to be held in London; taxes from residents of East Anglia are used to subsidise free entry to those museums while our local museums still have to charge, and then further cuts during austerity tore the heart out of the small local museums even further with widespread closures.
It really is like some form of medieval tribute where we literally handing our treasure to the capital so that it may be kept magnificent while the rest of the country is left with fuck all.
olimeillosmis@reddit
Interesting because the Staffordshire Hoarde was sent to Sutton Hoo Suffolk for display for a while, but they couldn't even send the original Sutton Hoo helmet back to Sutton Hoo.
UnSpanishInquisition@reddit
People always lump the SE with London, yes we benefit from the rich ex Londoners who moved out for cheaper housing but that's only limited to working class services and doesnt outweigh the house price increase it causes. Our councils are up the shitter and our towns are just as run down as the rest of the country. Our trains largely only go to London which makes travel to rest of the country expensive, Our nearest Motorway is the M25 which again is the only way out of this corner. 90% of things to do point to London. I love the SE and it's great but I've lived in the NW and we have exactly the same issues as there except the transport was 10 times better. Please stop lumping us in with the city is all I'm saying as it's only a positive if you actually go there and can afford it!
olimeillosmis@reddit
Unfortunately the SE is desirable only insofar due to your distance with London.
Berkhamstead or High Wycombe aren't nice towns and villages. They are nice towns and villages "on the doorstep to London". As you say, your infrastructure is only centered around getting commuters into London on the morning and evening peaks.
merlin8922g@reddit
You see it when people visit on holiday from abroad, especially American's, the only place they're interested in seeing is London.
Maybe Scotland for countryside but for everything else it's London, like between London and the Scottish Highlands is just barren no man's land of nothingness 🤣
To be honest though, i quite like that image, keep the annoying tourists away from our hidden gems.
gnorrn@reddit
It arguably goes all the way back to the time of the Romans, with the exception of a brief flourishing of the north during the Industrial Revolution.
McCretin@reddit
As someone who lives in the southeast outside London, it’s really not accurate to lump the two together. We also get fuck all investment in infrastructure compared to London.
We have great rail links…If you want to get into London. Getting between local towns is a nightmare without a car. Public transport takes at least three times as long - and that’s assuming that the old, knackered, filthy buses even show up (which isn’t guaranteed).
Maybe there are pockets of the south east where this isn’t true but it’s definitely the case where I live.
RevStickleback@reddit
Yeah. I used to work in a town 12 miles from my own, and it would take 2.5 hours by public transport.
(bus into town, train to Reading, train to Maidenhead, train to Cookham, train to Marlow, then walk)
And the bus and train elements would be separate tickets.
London is great for public transport because it has a public transport network, allowing the separate lines to link up. Nowhere is the rest of the country has anything close.
Specialist_Moment147@reddit
Totally. We need to have a cultural, financial or political presence outside of London. Can't really move the cultural or financial centre as it is private. So only one left is political. Never going to happen, but if the Commons was moved to, say, Newcastle then you would suddenly get a lot more investment in the NE and a bunch of CS jobs relocated. And centre of political power in UK is then more in the centre between the devolved powers rather than on the edge. Would be a chance to also rethink what UK Gov is as well. Hugely expensive, no MP is going to want it and requires multiple pieces of long term infrastructure. But in long run could be good.
CarpeCyprinidae@reddit
Narrator: Dee four in the big ganment hoose
Dazz316@reddit
I love being in Scotland, listening to one of the national Radios and hearing about the traffic in london. Thanks!
absurdmcman@reddit
You've just saved me 10 minutes writing out what would have been more or less my exact answer. Great response!
coffeewalnut05@reddit
While this is true, it’s also just plain insulting to say that it’s a third world country outside London. I’ve studied in London and live in the north now and London has plenty of pockets of poverty. At least up here we have strong communities, fresh air and beautiful countryside.
AgeingChopper@reddit
and ignores just how much money london has sucked up that could have been spent on helping the entire country to thrive.
Saxon2060@reddit
Pretty great explanation.
Just anecdotally, I'm from Liverpool and I was recently added to a Whatsapp group for a school friend's stag in Dublin. They needed numbers so that they could group book flights from Gatwick, I'm the only one going from Liverpool.
We're all professionals with degrees, I think they most work in finance and stuff. I work in manufacturing so it's a bit different for me, moving to London wouldn't make much sense. But all the ones who went in to money or law fucked off to London after university.
imminentmailing463@reddit
Tbf, London is also unfairly maligned on social media. I imagine you'll get plenty of comments doing just that.
It's the nature of many British people. A lot of Brits are just quite cynical and negative and love shitting on places.
tangl3d@reddit
London’s alright for a day in the museums, or if someone’s paying you to be there.
imminentmailing463@reddit
London is the best place in the country.
tangl3d@reddit
That’s pretty unequivocal, isn’t it? Congratulations on your opinion, but I disagree.
imminentmailing463@reddit
Why would I be equivocal about it? I can't think of anywhere I think is better.
tangl3d@reddit
Yes I see that.
InfinityEternity17@reddit
I don't hate London, I hate how those in power have prioritised it to the point of most of the rest of the country being deprived
PharahSupporter@reddit
This logic doesn’t really make much sense when London generates more revenue than it spends on itself (ie it subsidises a lot of other areas far from London).
Accurate_Prompt_8800@reddit
Correct. Already comments here saying about how grotty and disgusting London is already.
Shoddy-Computer2377@reddit
A friend of mine used to live in Leytonstone/Wanstead and walkable to Redbridge.
Of course that's "East London" therefore a total bin, right? Redbridge is one of the biggest shitholes in England?
Well... no? The area they lived in was very quiet, leafy, low traffic, you could walk to Wanstead (which is lovely) and the parts of "Redbridge" reachable on foot were again very quiet with huge houses and lovely parks.
happybaby00@reddit
What's a "roadman" and you didn't see children around? That's a weird area then lol
ElactricSpam@reddit
I live in that area now and really like it. Wanstead village is really nice and pretty quiet since the LTNs. The flats are great and Epping Forest is huge. People love to make blanket judgements without having even been to some of the areas they're talking about.
Also everyone loves to talk about muggers and knife crime. Never had a single problem in all the time I've been here.
InsectOk5816@reddit
Leytonstone/Leyton is the hip place to be these days now people have been priced out of Hackney/Stoke Newington.
JimmyJonJackson420@reddit
I like to call it projection
ThreeRandomWords3@reddit
Everyone says where they live is shit yet also get upset if someone who doesn't live there says its' shit.
DaveBeBad@reddit
I can criticise my family as much as I want. If you criticise my family you’ll get a punch on the nose…
Delicious-Cut-7911@reddit
I read an article about a Londoner who thought the world was a hostile place outside of Watford. He travelled to Leeds and was amazed as he thought we were peasants working in fields and didn't have cars. This was a decade ago,
Kitchner@reddit
Two different things here.
1) It is factually true that if you just waved a magic wand tomorrow and then looked at the UK's GDP and standard of living, the UK would be behind countries like Poland and no where near France or Germany. Obviously that's never going to happen, and that's not a "third world country" but people in the UK often have quite a dismissive view of the rest of the world. There are 192 countries in the world and Poland is number 36 for quality of life, which is pretty good objectively. The UK is number 15. Tell people they are behind Poland, Latvia, Estonia in terms of how good their life is though and they will be upset.
2) I dont really agree with your assessment of how things are portrayed on social media. On social media what I see from UK people is constant hate on London. Saying how they hate the place, it gets too much money etc. It's seen a lot in real life too. I lived all over the UK and have settled in London now. If I travel to say, Yorkshire, and I say I live in London there's a good chance the taxi driver goes "London eh? Can't stand the palace myself. Full of people who don't care, rude, in the middle of the urban sprawl". If I say "Well to be fair I can't stand Yorkshire, it's full of little England country folk who live in run down industrial towns with nothing going on" the taxi driver will be offended.
It's because people know in the UK, deep down, that having a go at London is OK because it's better there. Londoners giving shit to the rest of the UK is not OK because it's "punching down". It's why jokes about the rich and powerful are OK but jokes about the poor are not. But because they are British they can't admit that, so instead they will insist that their town is way better than everywhere else in the UK, while also thinking London people shitting on their town is unfair. It's great doublethink.
So yeah, it's both true that London does significantly drag up the UK's GDP and living standards when viewed as a nation. I don't think it's true though that London is discussed positively online and the rest of the UK isn't.
As for the media, I would argue the media is playing a big part in effectively covering up how run down the UK is outside of London. Organisations like the BBC are big on trying to get regional representation in their shows, but they always film the areas that are the nice or tidied areas. Not what the location actually looks like. Paints a nice happy picture that people oop north are all happy in their quaint post-industrial towns and charming terraced houses, when I don't think that's largely true.
Zealousideal_Day5001@reddit
what would Poland's GDP per capita look like if we excluded Warsaw tho?
Kitchner@reddit
Poland's GDP per capita is $22.1k, Warsaw is $35k (58% higher) and the next region down is $19.5k ($16.k gap).
The UK's GDP per capita is $48.9k, Londin is $69k (41% higher) and the next region is $43k ($26k gap).
So on paper it looks like Warsaw would distort Poland more than London.
Howeverver, Warsaw has a population of 1.8m people out of Poland's 36.7m people, which is 4.9% of the population. London on the other hand has a population of 10m out of the UK's 70m which is 14.2%.
So I don't know what the actual answer is, though it can be calculated, but it's worth noting is both capitals "dsistort" the national picture by have a large gap between national and capital, London does it three times worse than Warsaw because it's a bigger chunk of the population.
Also GDP doesn't = living standards, but I can't easily find a metric to calculate that myself. Others have done similar stuff though. Also reflecting on it, I think it's not the case today that Britain without London is worse off than Poland, but we are on course for that to be true by 2030 i.e. a combination of Poland's growth plus our lack of improving economy.
Other journalists though have found evidence without London Britain would be poorer than every US state, including the poorest most rural US states.
Zealousideal_Day5001@reddit
thanks! much appreciated that you actually did (a lot of) the maths! <3
Kitchner@reddit
It's alright, it's not the complete picture and it's totally fair to say that in most countries the capital distorts the picture of the economy etc.
London is just so big compared to other cities though. Until I moved to London I didn't appreciate just how big it is.
Literally every other city in the UK is about 1.5m people max. Warsaw is 1.9m people, so they are similar sizes. You got to these cities and you're like "Wow, thiss is a big, busy city".
London is 10m people. It takes over an hour on public transport to get from the edge to the centre. 2 hours to cross it. Pretty much the only city in the world that compares to it is New York, with Paris and Tokyo being close but not quite there. London and the South East are in fact the only two regions in the UK that pay more tax than they spend, they effectively are subsidising everyone else.
Rather than be "proud" of the British instiution of London driving the UK economy and recognising we have a world class money maker in the shape of that city which can rake in cash we can then distribute to the rest of the UK, mostly what London gets is hate and pettiness driven by a jealous that people are too British to openly admit.
nothingandnemo@reddit
When are they going to start distributing it properly? Why is it surprising that the only area of the UK with any significant government investment in its economy and infrastructure, has the beat economy and infrastructure?
Kitchner@reddit
The NE already gets more investment per head than London when you include commuters into the figures. It's very close to the Midlands too.
London and the SE already are the only regions that tax more than they spend, everywhere else is subsidised by them.
If you don't invest in London at all, the only result is going to be the cash cow that let's the other regions spend more than they earn goes away.
Because it factually isn't true lol
London is a city with a population bigger than the next ten largest cities combined. It's been the largest, richest city in the UK with the best infrastructure for about 2,000 years. Taking even more money off London which needs the investment to keep earning and giving it to other areas both isn't going to change the situation and won't help generate cash that can go elsewhere in the long run.
winkwinknudge_nudge@reddit
London is about the only place the government gives a damn about.
It's wild to me how Londoners think the UK being so London-centric is something people in areas which have long been abandoned should be proud of.
Kitchner@reddit
Thanks for proving my point lol
winkwinknudge_nudge@reddit
And thanks for proving my point how detached Londoners are from the UK.
Kitchner@reddit
Yeah sure. My point is that I've lived all over the UK and even in poorer parts of the UK, and while I would want them to get more funding they can't get over the chip on their shoulder and recognise having one of the top two cities in the world is a huge boon to our country which we, as a nation, should make more use of.
I provided a nuanced view that explains I appreciate how difficult it is elsewhere, having lived there myself. Then you sweep on with "Londoners are all wankers who have never been further north than the M25".
And you think I'm proving your point? Lol
Thanks for flying the flag for Little England buddy.
winkwinknudge_nudge@reddit
Because it's a boon for London and Londoners.
The rest of the country saw HS2 get canceled to be told the money would be spent filling potholes in London.
Telling people they should be proud of how centric their country is because London "world class money make"
Absolutely deluded.
Kitchner@reddit
HS2 got cancelled going into London too. The decision was taken by a government lead by a political party that London overwhelmingly never votes against. Of the billions that were "saved" about £50m was used to fill potholes in London.
But sure, Londoners don't know what's what lol
You don't even know what you're on about in basic factual terms. Then again, when about 40% of the country doesn't have an A level or the equivalent of one, what am I to expect?
suckmyclitcapitalist@reddit
It's because that word class money maker should be expanded and diversified away from London. If it were, it wouldn't get shit on. Jealousy is a normal reaction to people rubbing it in your face that they're richer and more important than you. Well, a mixture of jealousy and disgust. It's not a good look
Kitchner@reddit
How? People want to be in London because it's London. You cannot just wave a magic wand and be like "Leeds is actually just as good!".
Maybe if you went back 1,000 years you can do that, but in our lifetimes London will always have more there, be more desirable (to most people), than pretty much anywhere in the UK. The house prices here aren't high because no one wants to live here you know!
I don't see anyone I've ever met from London rubbing it in anyone's faces ever, not least because out of the maybe 15 close friends I made moving down to London, only one of them was born here. They visit their families outside of London every Christmas.
Anyone from London gets sit through a set of totally unfounded allegations and remarks disparaging the place they live, and yet if someone from London speaks back we are rubbing it in someone's face?
suckmyclitcapitalist@reddit
Not true. Depends on what sort of life you want for yourself. I want to live in a lovely semi-rural village like the one I grew up in, not in a city (which is where I currently live now. Not London, though). I don't want a stressful, cutthroat, nonstop, high-powered career. That's just not for me. I like a slower pace of life. I'm only 29, but I'm done with constant gigs, bars, pubs, clubs, raves, comedy shows, restaurants, drugs... it's just boring to me now.
I want a nice, decently-sized house surrounded by countryside and beautiful places to walk every day. A post office and a farm shop. I want my own home gym instead of paying £33 a month to share one. I want flowers, trees, and countryside estates. I'd love to own a horse of my own one day as I love horse riding. I want to raise a small family with children who play outdoors every day like I did growing up (finding other children to play with might be a struggle, though).
I want enough money not to worry. My priorities are different from yours. I want a stress-free life. I'm disabled, but I still work. I want access to private healthcare and the money for complimentary therapies. I want a garden I can sit and work remotely from. An art studio. A small indoor pool is probably my biggest dream as it would be amazing for my joints, lol.
My best chance of finding that sort of life whilst having a well-paid but 'normal' job exists somewhere from the East Midlands to the North.
Kitchner@reddit
Ok, let me know when you achieve all that then, I'm rooting for you.
I've talked to loads of people who have expressed what you've said, and the truth is you need a high paying job to get it, and the vast majority of those are in cities.
Best of luck!
RadiantRain3574@reddit
Because plenty of people who dominate discussion live in London and never venture out save to go to private school, uni and maybe a weekend in the Cotswolds.
Seriously though always remember that most of the young journalists of today live in a house in wandesworth / Wimbledon that daddy bought them.
Teembeau@reddit
It really annoyed me when they started talking about Silicon Roundabout, as if London was the only place in the UK with startups. In fact, London is quite bad for startups because you can put a startup in a lot of cheaper cities like Bristol, Manchester, Leeds. So why would you choose London.
It's the same if you watch something about food and they go to a London restaurant. Which means lots of people don't know that Bristol, Cheltenham, Manchester, Leeds have Michelin star restaurants, which also cost a lot less to eat in.
TheFlyingHornet1881@reddit
Cambridge has a tonne of startups, almost too many for the infrastructure in the city.
Nohopeinrome@reddit
I think places like Birmingham, Bradford etc are genuinely unpleasant places to be. Then you have Bath, York etc which are beautiful. Like any country really there’s nice places and not so nice places.
AoAo45@reddit
Why, do Bradford and Birmingham have similar demographics or something?
marmarama@reddit
Bradford has some of the best Victorian architecture in the country. Within the borough boundaries is some of the loveliest countryside in the whole of England, with picture postcard villages and towns, including a UNESCO World Heritage site.
It's got pockets of deprivation and it's been starved of investment for too long, but that's true of virtually everywhere that's not Zone 1 London.
Bradford being unpleasant is such a dog whistle.
I don't live there, I just like it.
Nohopeinrome@reddit
Dog whistle ?
I’ve been in Bradford enough to form my own opinion, it’s not somewhere I’d choose to live. It’s not somewhere half the people who there now would choose to live either.
The surrounding area might be lovely, the city itself isn’t, in my opinion.
Majima_Hazama@reddit
Majority of the hate Bradford always gets focuses on the south Asians community same with Birmingham.
No need to get triggered by "dog whistle", you probably have a legit reason for your opinions. Am not fond of Bradford due to the road users especially on Leeds road
slagriculture@reddit
bradford always struck me as a huge waste of potential, it could look like harrogate if it were properly landscaped and maintained and invested in
Ayman493@reddit
Then you got really average places that nobody talks about like Preston, which is not necessarily a bad city, but just nothing special to write home about.
Emotional_Ad8259@reddit
I think a lot of it is driven by the press. As an example, the Guardian does not acknowledge the existence of much outside their Islington bubble. Read the Telegraph and you get articles like the 10 best villages in the UK, and find that they are referring to those located in the Home Counties within commuting distance to London.
Ayman493@reddit
Don't get me started on articles upon the lines of "10 worst towns in the UK" where 9 out of 10 happen to be in the North, with maybe one place in the Midlands or West Country.
TheFlyingHornet1881@reddit
I disregard any of those "Worst 10 towns" that are all in the Nirth or Midlands as they've clearly never experienced Luton.
Easy_Bother_6761@reddit
Throughout the entirety of British history no other city has had a comparable role to London: it has served as the financial, political and cultural capital of the UK simultaneously for centuries, so it has always served as a sponge soaking up any opportunity from the rest of the UK. Other cities especially Manchester like to think they are in competition with London but they clearly aren’t: the only comparable cities really are New York and Paris. The deindustrialisation of the UK from the 1960s-1980s was the final nail in the coffin. Today, now that we’re a service economy, if you want a well paying job as a young British worker you’re basically either looking at London or abroad.
sailboat_magoo@reddit
As an American living in Britain, I have come to the quite perplexing conclusion that there's nothing the British love more than complaining about perfectly fine things, while grinning and bearing the things that actually are unconscionable.
Tell someone the weather's been lovely recently? They're scoff at you, even if the sun has been shining and it's been a perfect 23 degrees for the past 5 days. "Well," they'll say, disdainfully, as though you just admitted to being sympathetic to the BNP, "I don't know what YOUR definition of lovely is, but I haven't been able to leave the house without an umbrella all week!"
Tell someone that the rest of world has heat and insulation in their homes, and that energy companies don't send out electric blankets to people because they can't afford heat, and they'll look at you like you've just insulted their mother and piously say something about how really we should all be turning the heat down at night to save the planet anyway.
Tell someone that London is a vibrant city full of amazing places to see and you love visiting, and they'll look like you're speaking Greek and tell you how it's the most crime ridden hellhole on earth and everyone is wandering around with stab wounds and can't even call the police (who wouldn't even come) because their phone was just stolen out of their hand.
Tell someone that it is actually possible to pass laws and regulations so that half your village isn't vacant AirBNBs and they'll look completely shocked like you just described a particularly disgusting gastrointestinal issue, and then excuse themselves from he conversation immediately because they don't want to talk to the lunatic.
It's... weird. Some sort of "keep calm and carry on" attitude left over from WWII that's instead just being used to keep people accepting their crap lot. The UK has absolutely abysmal wages compared to other wealthy countries, the infrastructure is absolutely terrible, so many of the health, educational, traffic, and living systems are based on the 1950s and have not adapted to the modern times... these are all things that voters could demand. But they just sigh about how this is just how things work, and then complain about something that's not really an issue at all.
SeatSnifferJeff@reddit
God, this is painfully accurate. So many people are stuck in a 1950s mindset - if you say we should improve the quality of housing, you just "well there's some people in Africa who live in a hole in the ground, so we should be grateful for what we have".
Luv me mouldy house
Hate me proper ventilation
Simple as.
nothingandnemo@reddit
You had mould? That's practically like free cheese! We had a 5⁹⁰ of us crammed into a sterile, lightness void between dimensions. AND WE WERE GRATEFUL FOR IT!
ListeningForWhispers@reddit
Complain about the little things and grit your teeth about the big stuff is a real thing.
That said, I think most people are beyond angry about the state of wages, the health service, housing etc. It's just, there doesn't seem to be a way out.
Productivity has been in the toilet for decades. We have no overhead for borrowing money, the markets would destroy us, and the biggest difference between us and our European neighbours in terms of tax revenue is that our taxes on the poorest are more mild.
"It's just the way things are" isn't a lack of acknowledgement, it's accepting that the country is in the toilet and it will be decades of misery to fix it if we even can.
sailboat_magoo@reddit
Everyone's always angry at everything... that's how information is shared these days. But there doesn't seem to actually be any actual discussion, debating, pushing, demanding. Just some surface level anger before they move to the next topic to be angry about.
ListeningForWhispers@reddit
Part of the problem is that there really doesn't seem to be a way out now. We can do some stuff. Improve planning, better regs etc.
But there really is no money for anything. We can't reform the NHS without money. We can't improve productivity without money. Councils can't improve services without more money.
So what do we demand? More taxes on the poor. Slash pensions? We'll likely need one or both, but either would get the government thrown out on it's arse so no suprise they won't do it.
I don't know how long you've lived here, but it genuinely wasn't like this 15 years ago. This is more recent, and it's because there's little hope left. No one knows how to fix anything.
nothingandnemo@reddit
Here's a couple of revenue raisers:
1) Two tier corporation tax system. Those businesses that cannot leave the UK (supermarkets, power companies and the like), and who have been ripping off the public shamelessly for the last few years, now pay a way, way higher proportion of their profits to the treasury. Those businesses that could easily leave the UK (manufacturing etc) pay the current rate.
2) If a panel of experts believe a company is using labyrinthine licensing and internal lending agreements solely to reduce their tax bill and send the money offshore, then they are a placed in a category where their corporation tax is charged on turnover rather than profit (though obviously not at the same rate). This is for when a company like Amazon claims they only made £100,000 profit a year in the UK, because they need to buy a licence from Amazon Ireland which costs £15 billion. An obvious corporate fiction! Under the new system they will pay whatever % of turnover needed to equalise revenue with what would have been raised, if they'd set their company up normally.
sailboat_magoo@reddit
That's true for some things, like fixing the NHS and the schools. But every city in this country needs to come up with traffic plans, more one way streets, stop allowing parking on both sides of busy streets. That would be free, but unpopular, but make both driving and being a pedestrian so much safer.
Jimmy_Tightlips@reddit
What a beautiful summary of us as a people, brings a tear to my eye.
olimeillosmis@reddit
It's covered in "Watching the English" by Kate Fox. One of the chapters- Social rules, Don't be earnest.
The one thing we can't stand is a chap/lass who is too earnest, too passionate and deadly serious about a topic, especially one that nobody can do anything about. Although see exception for eccentricism and humour - you may be earnest if you are eccentric and funny about it.
tangl3d@reddit
I started reading that book, but the tired stereotypes became too much. I stopped when she started going on about how repressed all men are.
paddyo@reddit
It was even covered in the 1950s by naturalised Hungarian immigrant George Mikes in his book “how to be a Brit”. Things don’t change very much.
The other thing he covers a lot is how British people like to pretend that being northern/southern/yorkshire/english/Scottish are all radically different and special and don’t understand each other, and he was like “I literally can’t tell you apart except accent”.
ThatsMeOnTop@reddit
This is such a great description, I've often felt like a foreigner for this reason. Can't possibly have nice things, no not us.
sailboat_magoo@reddit
And it's WILD to me, because the Brits have such an amazing history of organizing and fighting for rights! And then, like, in 1975 it completely stopped and now everything terrible must be endured and it's just not done to even THINK about improving things.
sjr0754@reddit
Thatcherism, and the destruction of communities from 1979 onwards has caused that. Couple that with Murdoch/Rothermere/Barclay/Marshall owning virtually the entire media ecosystem, and there's why it's persisted.
SnooStrawberries2342@reddit
I enjoyed your observations, they ring true, and your style reminded me of Bill Bryson!
coffeewalnut05@reddit
I don’t think our infrastructure “is absolutely terrible” at all
sailboat_magoo@reddit
I live in a small but fairly popular city where half the busses only run every hour. The schools that I've been in look like they haven't had a coat of paint in decades. There is absolutely no attempt at traffic or parking management that's based on the cars people actually drive, or where people go, or their driving patterns. Everything that was privatized in the 80s is now an absolute mess: water, sewage, trains. The highways are... I don't even know how to describe them. In the US, the highways are designed to transport you from major city to major city. I don't know how the UK highway system was designed, but it wasn't for that... they mostly seem pretty random and there's no direct route between lots of major cities.
Which aspects of infrastructure are you happy with? I didn't even mention the collapse of the NHS, because that just goes without saying right now.
coffeewalnut05@reddit
Roads, railways, buses, NHS, schools, etc. All largely in decent condition.
sailboat_magoo@reddit
That’s quite a take.
coffeewalnut05@reddit
I don’t see how
sailboat_magoo@reddit
I mean, this is a country that you can't even get your kid into their local state schools without some insane calculus of timing, religion, and having the foresight to have bought a house literally next to the school 20 years ago. Otherwise, you're SOL and... your kid just doesn't go to school, I guess? Does any other country's school system work like that? In the US, sometimes there are catchement areas if your town/city is big enough to have multiple schools, but everyone in that area has a legal right to go to that school. If there's a birth boom, the district has to hire more teachers and make more classes.
Tummoe@reddit
What about our infrastructure do you think is good? Or at the very least mediocre?
coffeewalnut05@reddit
Almost everything.
Tummoe@reddit
Can you be more specific?
coffeewalnut05@reddit
Im satisfied with almost every aspect of our infrastructure besides perhaps the sewage system
Tummoe@reddit
Fair enough. Are you a regular public transport user? Do you live rurally or in a city? Do you earn a comfortable wage? I expect all of these will influence you perceive our infrastructure
coffeewalnut05@reddit
Yes and I live semi-rurally.
PineappleFrittering@reddit
Absolutely spot on!
orderfromcha0s@reddit
That’s honestly one of the best descriptions of the British attitude I’ve heard.
AsbestosFuck@reddit
Personally I don't think they do, and you are perhaps projecting this as an expat living in london. If anything, as someone who has lived all over the country in various cities, it's the other way around. People in other cities and towns calling London a dump.
I don't really see the media unfairly maligning non-london towns eithwr. And the UK media will malign anything given half a chance.
NathanDavie@reddit
Class system. London has more wealth so everywhere else is disparaged.
The Northern cities are still playing catch up after deindustrialisation. Manchester is only as developed as it is because of a bomb.
cragglerock93@reddit
This is no fault of other places, but most of the UK is far behind London, economically at least. They're not making it up. London's output per head is higher than many Swiss cantons and major American cities, yet the UK as a whole has a pretty modest GDP per capita by developed world standards.
mr-dirtybassist@reddit
That's funny seen as I consider London to be one of the Shittiest places in Britain. So many lovely places to go other than London.
Your opinion is very heavily lead by the media rather than your own research into other parts of Britain that aren't London
KnarkedDev@reddit
OP, this is an example of London being slagged off for no particular reason like much of the country is.
TryToBeKindEh@reddit
London is a mix of bad and good, like almost anywhere else.
Shoddy-Computer2377@reddit
My experience of London is that the "good" is truly unbeatable, the "bad" is also truly unbeatable and the worst you will find anywhere.
Teembeau@reddit
The best of London is amazing. But you need to be very rich to afford it.
I think location matters less and less now. You want a huge selection of books, wine, cheese, you can get it online. Almost everyone is within 45 minutes of an arthouse cinema. London has the museums, but how often do you want to do those?
mr-dirtybassist@reddit
Only with a much larger area. I understand that. It's quite spread out
martzgregpaul@reddit
There are large areas of London that are as bad as anything in Bradford, Rotherham or Middlesbrough. And there are lots of areas of Sheffield, Manchester, Newcastle, Leeds that if they were located in London would be full of million pound houses.
NeverEat_Pears@reddit
Leeds resident here. We do have areas with million pound houses.
SomeKidWithALaptop@reddit
because it’s true lmao.
help. it sucks.
illarionds@reddit
Ironically enough, you couldn't pay most of the people who don't already live in London enough to persuade them to live in London.
randomaccess24@reddit
This is interesting to me because, as a Brit, I have often wondered how many of our cities foreigners would actually want to visit - we have so many but I feel like so few are actually worth visiting. Might just be a ‘grass is greener’ thing but I’d be interested to know what others think
tylerthe-theatre@reddit
Is it unfair? A lot of towns are really run down and stagnating
AlpsSad1364@reddit
Because the media is based almost entirely in London and the journalists who work in it have probaby spent more time in New York and Tuscany than they have in the UK outside the M25.
carbonvectorstore@reddit
I find that travelling and living outside the M25 has only increased my opinion of London.
wtclim@reddit
Things like this are the reason a lot of the rest of the country has the opinion of certain types of people living in London that they do.
colei_canis@reddit
They might also have been to Oxford, but only to throw up on its pavements and sniff coke in its toilets for three years.
glasgowgeg@reddit
Where do you think the members of the press writing these stories tend to live?
Sirlacker@reddit
Because most UK cities and towns are run down shit holes. I mean London is a shit hole too but you can't have people thinking about the capital so it doesn't get said.
The media isn't exactly wrong. They're just not admitting that London is a horrible place at the same time.
Now I'm not saying they're third world run down, because they're absolutely not. However they're definitely not as nice as they could or should be by a long shot. Especially major cities. Towns I can forgive because they're plentiful and keeping them all modern would be an astronomical ask. But major cities, yeah they still need a ton of work.
Bertybassett99@reddit
8 of the poorest places in western Europe are in the UK. Typically up north.
The trick is to live within commute distance of London. There are some very nice places to live just outside London. I'm not.going to highlight them as more cunts will move there.
I lived in a very nice place until people caught wind and then it overgrown with Londoners.
Beaver-hausen@reddit
Peterborough is frequently rated one of the worst places to live in the UK and is always slated on social media.
Peterborough has a massive amount of green space (Ferry Meadows) and events on all the time. Winter festival, boat festival and lots of water sports.
Its got important historical first including Flag Fen and the Cathedral. It has 4 large shopping areas (Queensgate, Brotherhood, Hampton and Maskew Avenue)
It has a great range of places to eat and drink (my favourite being Thai at The Brewery Tap.
Thriving music scene with gigs, open mic nights and festivals (Willow Festival, Beer festival)
It has invested in a university and has plenty of job opportunities from the head office of CITB to the Environment Agency to the factories.
Yes there is crime here but the crime level isn't even among the highest in the country. Yes there are rough areas but there are also really nice areas.
txe4@reddit
There are lots of historic towns with magnificent buildings.
The larger provincial cities - Leeds/Birmingham/Manchester are somewhat economically alive.
But yes, without London, the UK would be second world - with the per-capita economic status of say Brazil. The majority of the UK population takes more from the state than it gives in taxes over a lifetime.
Much of the income, corporation tax, and VAT take comes from London and the surrounding area. The UK, particularly, has an income tax system whereby almost all of the tax take is from the top 20% of earners - and most of them are in London. London is very heavily supporting the rest of the UK via transfer payments.
Teembeau@reddit
I don't believe that. There's a lot of government jobs in London, jobs that depend on the taxpayers in factories, warehouses, call centres outside.
The city is a net contributor but that's a very small percentage of the total population of London.
If London wants to, they can piss off, and we'll take all the government, BBC etc out and see how well they stand alone, especially as we'll cut off all the water pipes from the west country.
txe4@reddit
If you're suggesting "London free of the rest of the UK, but also free of the dead weight of government and the BBC" - that's the way to its get per-cap GDP to $100k and be the richest place in the world.
As for "pipes from the west country", that's delusional. London's water supply is mostly from the Thames, some from boreholes, and there's a desalination plant to supplement.
Teembeau@reddit
Government isn't a dead weight to London. It creates huge numbers of jobs for the city, paid for by taxpayers across the country.
txe4@reddit
It does create jobs.
But if you think of the flow of money, it's in the order of:
* People employed in London to govern the rest of the UK: £17.93
* Transfer payments from Londoners to keep provincials in GP appointments, hip replacements, pensions, fags and mccain microchips: £234852
EdmundTheInsulter@reddit
Or are you just saying they get more of the pie that they won't share?
txe4@reddit
The opposite: I'm saying that London and the South East are excessively sharing "the pie".
If the situation were to be changed such that they kept the portion of "the pie" that they created/earned, London would be a beautiful gleaming place of modern infrastructure and growth, and the rest of the UK would look like the Eastern Bloc in 1992.
EdmundTheInsulter@reddit
I think what you are saying really is that London is in fact hogging national wealth then investing most back into itself.
txe4@reddit
"Hogging wealth" is crabs-in-a-bucket talk. Poverty mindset. Only a fixed amount to go around, top priority is to make sure other people don't have more.
The situation is that London is under-invested-in due to all the money it loses supporting provincials in lifestyles they can't afford.
EdmundTheInsulter@reddit
No it's over invested by push-pull factors and weak initiatives to spread investment around the country.
suckmyclitcapitalist@reddit
You've got a cunt mindset
txe4@reddit
I'm swayed by the logic of your argument.
coffeewalnut05@reddit
That’s because the government is overly centralised.
txe4@reddit
Reading comprehension error on your part. (Do you live in the provinces?)
> "without London, the UK would be second world"
The UK is not without London. Therefore not second world. Yet.
coffeewalnut05@reddit
Yikes
AnonymousTimewaster@reddit
London gets an awful lot of unjustified hate imo, at least on social media. I understand the resentment - they get all the attention and resources and the rest of us get near to fuck all in comparison. That's doubly true for the Scots and Northern Irish, and the Northern Welsh, which is why I often sympathise for their calls for independence even though it would be an act of self harm similar to 2016.
But as others have alluded to, the UK is essentially structured like a third world economy. London makes up about 25% of the country's GDP. That's not normal for a country as nominally rich as ours. Most countries of our economic size are pretty evenly dispersed (economically). America obviously has loads of centres for business, Netherlands have Rotterdam and The Hague, Germany have Munich and Frankfurt. The UK has London.
Most developed countries like ours are not so utterly reliant on their capital city like we are. That goes economically, politically, and culturally. *Everything* is centred on London.
When viewed regionally, the UK's economic map begins to resemble the structure of a developing economy or a post-colonial system, where one dominant city or region acts as the financial, political, and cultural center, while other regions remain underdeveloped and overly reliant on the core. This imbalance mirrors the kind of dependency seen in some developing nations where a single city – like Buenos Aires in Argentina, Lagos in Nigeria, or Bangkok in Thailand – overshadows the rest of the country.
This economic centralization exacerbates regional inequality, with the Southeast of England enjoying far higher levels of investment, infrastructure, and job opportunities compared to everywhere else.
Teembeau@reddit
London's GDP is largely because of how many government jobs it has: whitehall, parliament, museums, embassies etc, the money for which comes from the productive wealth outside. If we moved the capital elsewhere, it would sink very quickly.
Outside of the financial district, what does London actually do, as in, selling to the rest of the UK or the rest of the world? Almost nothing. You're not going to put a factory there or a software company or a design company because why would you? Plenty of cheaper places.
AnonymousTimewaster@reddit
Being based in the North, I resent how London-centric everything is as much as anyone, but your comment overlooks some important facts.
While London does host most governmental jobs, they are only a small part of its economic output (less than 5% approx). The city’s GDP is driven primarily by its financial sector, which accounts for over 20% of its economy, as well as technology, media, and the creative arts. London’s status as a global hub ensures it attracts significant investment and talent, far beyond what government roles alone could sustain.
As for whether London would "sink" if the capital moved, that’s extremely unlikely. Its financial, cultural, and technological infrastructure would keep it thriving as one of the world’s most interconnected cities. The city’s dominance isn’t just tied to being the UK’s capital; it’s rooted in its global influence.
Claiming London does “almost nothing” outside finance is just not true. It’s a major exporter of services, including legal expertise, tech innovation, media production, and education. Institutions like Google, Facebook, and leading universities contribute billions annually to its economy.
High costs might deter factories, but London excels in high-value industries like fintech, AI, and design, which benefit from its skilled workforce and international connections. Far from being propped up by public money, London’s economy is globally competitive and remarkably diverse. It could be a city state all on its own.
Teembeau@reddit
OK, 20% is the financial sector. What makes up the rest of it?
dotelze@reddit
This is delusional
coconutlatte1314@reddit
But I think it’s true though. Lots of cities in UK are just not managed well enough. I’ve been to a few and honestly it’s all kind of boring and run down with dying high street. Places like Blackpool that should be very popular because of the beach and the pier is really not that great.
And I don’t think it’s all the government fault either, like I’ve seen local towns do their best to upgrade infrastructure only to have shitty kids and teens come and try to vandalize it.
I’ve seen it first hand, there’s a new bus depot that’s super nice and I’ve these kids ride their bikes and skate boards inside it as if it’s a skate park. And a group of them try to bash up the toilet . It doesn’t seem like the people here love their cities and towns either. I’ve lots of kids/teens just throw their garbage on the floor and in the woods, not to mention I’ve seen them vape. Literal kids vaping.
Obviously it’s not just kids. Adults who pee on the street, who throw glass bottles on the ground, who throw their vaped on the ground, etc are everywhere as well. They out their feet up on the seats in trains and busses. They don’t take out the garbage on the train and bus, they just leave it on the seat. Not to mention a lot of people don’t pick up their dog poo, they either leave it on the floor or they leave the plastic bag on the floor (why?).
I’m a foreigner and I thought British people had good manners and a lot of them are just not. I used to live in a country that people behaved much better so I was in total culture shock.
Terrible-Group-9602@reddit
Stay off social media lad
Pargula_@reddit
The UK is a poor country attached to a very wealthy city, many people don't realize that.
Having said that there are other parts of the UK that are lovely, there are also others that are shit. Do some traveling and experience it for yourself.
StatisticianOwn9953@reddit
Poor by the standards of rich countries, at least.
I do think there's some sloppy generalisations that go on, though. Not every town in the North is a post-industrial hellscape. Most towns have desirable leafy areas. Far lower housing costs for northerners also mean that plenty have reasonable disposable income.
Pargula_@reddit
Of course, western European countries.
StatisticianOwn9953@reddit
Commuter professionals, mostly. Solicitors, barristers, doctors etc exist all over the country.
Pargula_@reddit
I thought that being a solicitors/barrister was not a particularly lucrative profession.
suckmyclitcapitalist@reddit
Tell that to my ex-partner's dad who was a partner for a solicitor's firm. He was loaded.
My other ex-partner's dad was an architect, and he was also loaded.
They lived a village and town respectively in Lincolnshire.
I'm "poor" compared to them (I earn about 40k, working in IT) but as long as I budget correctly, combined with my partner's similar income, we truly have plenty of disposable income where we live. We wouldn't if we lived in London, of course, but we don't want to live in London.
Most of my friends are educated to Master's level.
The rest of the country isn't exclusively filled with either uneducated poverty-stricken people with no career prospects or wealthy toffs who've bought a second home here.
There are so many people who are highly educated and doing just fine for themselves. I know a lot of software engineers, cybersecurity analysts, etc.
I grew up in poverty. My dad was a plumber. Most of my friends are absolutely middle-class. I don't really know anyone who's in total poverty. A few of my friends and acquaintances are struggling a bit, but they have prospects.
Pargula_@reddit
Where do you live that you can live comfortably on 40k, and would you be able to have the same lifestyle without splitting bills with your partner?
StatisticianOwn9953@reddit
That depends on the area of practice and seniority.
Pargula_@reddit
I thought that being a solicitors/barrister was not a particularly lucrative profession.
But that's a very limited group of people whose careers and higher salaries are less location dependent, don't you think?
jsm97@reddit
London's weight on the UK's GDP per Capita is not unusual. It's a simular story to many other European countries and is less than the effect that Paris has on France.
What's unusual about the UK is that it's other big cities are mostly poorer than the UK average. There are many wealthy towns in the UK, but they are fairly small like Oxford and Cambridge. The wealthiest of the big cities is Edinburgh which is very nearly as wealthy as London - But it's still 1/4 of the size of Manchester
Pargula_@reddit
But are those towns wealthy because of their industries and the average salary of their citizens or wealthy because wealthy people live there and property prices are high, but they don't work there?
jsm97@reddit
It's a mix of the two - Oxford, Milton Keynes, Cambridge, Reading, Southampton, Brighton have highly specialised industry that attracts a lot of high skilled workers which is why they're wealthy but commuter towns will be mostly wealthy due to commuters.
It's worth remembering though that a significant proportion of London's GDP is produced by people who work there but live elsewhere. When you factor that in, it's possible that Edinburgh actually overtakes London although I can't find a source to prove it.
coffeewalnut05@reddit
No it isn’t
Carinwe_Lysa@reddit
A lot of press and media is based in London, so everything is absolutely skewed towards London, and very little of the rest of the UK is mentioned. If it is mentioned, it's either focusing on something negative (which further forces the idea that outside of London = bad), or it's to highlight a positive win... which again often comes across as patronising.
You just need to look at the New Years Fireworks coverage for a good example.
The presenter mentioned "London" literally 5-10 times every single sentence & how it puts on an absolutely world-class performance, which only London can do. Edinburgh was cancelled, but they couldn't cancel London, simply because "it's London" was basically the reason they gave.
And adding to whatelse somebody mentioned, the Government policy after WW2 was essentially surpressing any city/region which would pose a threat to London's status. Look at Birmingham in the 50s and 60s for a good example. It was on progress to become a truly stellar city "second city", but the Government in power always sabotaged it in one way or another.
peachypeach13610@reddit
What are you on about mate. London is glorified when it comes to job opportunities but it’s actually well known that quality of life is often significantly better in smaller UK cities. Literally no one thinks the UK would be a “third world country” without London.
You really need to get off the internet and live more in the real world.
reco84@reddit
I'd also say that the vast majority of people who live outside of London don't live there by choice.
I personally hate visiting London. It's overly expensive, dirty (compared to my local cities) and I find the people unfriendly.
Every time I go on the tube, I feel like I need a bath.
AnSteall@reddit
That really is a ymmv thing. I used to live in London, not anymore. Where I am the quality of life is definitely much better yet at the same time, there are far fewer choices, options and opportunities when it comes to most things in life. London does many things better and other places do other things better. It's mostly about what your preference is. And while I spent many days on the Underground hating the crowds, especially in the heat of summer or during flu season, having an interconnected public transport is something that's far superior to pretty much anywhere else in the UK. Geez, you have the next Tube coming in 2-6 minutes and if it doesn't work you can hop on a bus/tram/DLR? Compare that to having 1 train/bus every half an hour, hour elsewhere as your only option.
Also in defence of Londoners: we aren't unfriendly, we just have other things on our minds. That's something other parts of the UK tend to do better: elsewhere we have time to chat.
reco84@reddit
We have these things called cars outside of London that can get us anywhere on our schedule and don't involve someone stinking of weed rubbing up on me (unless I'm giving my uncle knobhead a lift).
I'm sure there is a lot to do in London but for me, there's nothing that is so prestigious that it would justify me living there. I can do everything I want in my little seaside town and Manchester and Liverpool are 40 mins away.
Londers are on average definitely less friendly than northerners. "We arent unfriendly, we're just too busy / self important to acknowledge when you move out the way"
Triadelt@reddit
Within 5 mins walk of my flat i have everything i need, within 30 mins walk of my flat in london i can see or do pretty much anything i want, no parking no driving. Museums, theatre, bars, comedy, drag, top restaurants, gym, sightseeing. If i want to tube if heading outwards to meet friends I can but with ubers bikes and busses i rarely do; but theyre not crouded like they are here in central. Theres also just something nice about being surrounded by others who all left their home towns and have done something interesting/become quite successful if theyve survived to late 30s in London. You get that elsewhere Im sure but the attitude was less “reach for success” among my circles in other cities in the uk, and a little more “complain about those who succeed”. This will get me downvoted though.
Ive lived manc, bristol, liverpool, leeds for over a year each at some point in my early 20s and none came close to living in London for me. Been here for 15 years now, but ymmv though.
Theres nowhere as convenient as here for me, i have 4 gyms, 3 supermarkets, restaurants bars all within a 5 min walk from my front door. And if i want to walk 30 mins into the west end then everything covent garden/mayfair, soho(ew no) has to offer. I prefer bars in the city though which are quieter on non Thursdays and have some amazing rooftops. I haven’t had that level of convenience anywhere else, not on the same scale.
I paid £20 to see jo brand on a random wednesday night cus bored. Ive just never felt like you can just assume there were things just on elsewhere, it was always like a few weeks ahead theres a middling local theatre thing.
The experience of going into a crouded tourist destination via crouded tube to crouded tourist pub isnt what london is like tbh.
reco84@reddit
It's horses for courses, mate. I earn decent money, enough to live in London but because I don't ive almost paid of my house (which is an old 5 bed detached victorian house that I paid under 200k for and would conservatively be high single digit million in london).
Because of this, I can afford multiple family holidays a year. My kids can do any activity they want.
If I was paying crazy london prices, this wouldn't be the case.
suckmyclitcapitalist@reddit
Not everyone has the same idea of success as you, though. I don't complain about people who do want that sort of life, but I don't want a stressful, cutthroat, nonstop, high-powered job. I'm disabled (but work full-time). I just want something that will allow me a comfortable life. I'm nearly there, tbh.
I grew up in poverty. I just want my first proper holiday, to move back to a lovely village surrounded by countryside, to explore the country's beauty and history, to raise a small family, to own my own comfortably-sized home, maybe to have a horse one day as I love horse riding. I don't want millions of pounds if I have to sacrifice the life I want for that kind of money.
I'm 29. I had to grow up fast because of my disability. I've already done gigs, bars, clubs, raves, drugs, comedy shows, etc. I still obviously want to do that stuff from time to time, but it isn't my first priority anymore. I love going to the gym but, honestly, I'd rather have the space and money for my own home gym.
matthelm03@reddit
What's wrong with good public transport? In a city environment its much better than having everyone drive around in cars. Also having cars isn't much of a freedom if you need them to go to most places in your day to day life, which is true for a large amount of the UK outisde London.
sjr0754@reddit
Nothing is wrong with good public transport, it's just that beyond the M25 it doesn't exist.
reco84@reddit
There's nothing wrong with it. The tube is top tier public transport but it was sold like it something unique to London to be able to get around without having to wait 45 minutes for a bus.
I can easily walk to 95% of what I need for daily life, I can also instantly leave to anywhere in the UK.
AnSteall@reddit
Not everyone can or is able to afford to drive but yeah, many Londoners have cars too. I've met many friendly Londoners ready to stop and help where needed and on the plus side, they tend to leave you alone when it's none of their business. Friendliness, in my experience, is subjective but the level extended does impact people's perception of a place and their personal needs.
reco84@reddit
It's a massive generalisation based on averages. There is of course wonderful, charitable and caring people in London.
It's obviously just a scale thing. If im out walking in a small village, everyone i pass will say good morning. That's clearly impractical in such a large city where other people are probably seen as an inconvenience.
wizard_mitch@reddit
I would prefer to live in London if it was affordable to do so
Eren-Alter-Ego@reddit
I agree! Outside London it seems like the general consensus amongst non-londoners is that it's an ok place to visit but we REALLY wouldn't want to live there and couldn't afford to, even if we wanted to... Which we genuinely don't!
Used-Eagle3558@reddit
Here me out...Blackpool. Now I get it. Most of Blackpool is run down and in need of redevelopment but I've never had a bad holiday there. There's plenty to do. Blackpool Zoo,Madame Tussards,Sealife,Pleasure Beach,loads of decent arcades. It's one of those places where I understand the criticism but I think people are too harsh on Blackpool.
JAD4995@reddit
It’s because all the media and press live In London and look down on the rest of the country . Simples lol 😂
Healthy-Drink421@reddit
Partially class - lots of rich people live in London.
Partially the media is all based in London, so they don't hear about the rest of the UK as much. (to the extent that they had to force a lot of the BBC to move to Manchester - and it worked really well.)
Partially it is structural - the UK is not that big, and London is a global city so can dominate it. The UK's other big cities until recently didn't have their own governments/mayors and were quite fragmented. That is changing now were say Birmingham or Manchester metros are doing quite well now, and are becoming attractive and competitive places to be.
somekidfromtheuk@reddit
you're right about the class thing in the sense that loads of the country thinks that, but it's actually a complete misconception. the posh people generally live in the shires around london and work in london. of course there's loads of posh people here but most people in london are working class and the poorest and most deprived areas of the uk are in london.
Ok-Blackberry-3534@reddit
Everybody slags off their own town. I reckon AI has picked that up and run with it.
worldofecho__@reddit
London and Edingbrough are the only two cities in the UK that contribute more money to public finances than they receive. The saying that Britain is a rich city with a poor country attached to it is largely true. That explains a lot of the maligning of areas outside London.
BeerPoweredNonsense@reddit
I don't totally agree with that viewpoint. Often the figures put forward are that London-based companies "contribute money to public finances", but if that company is nationwide, is it correct to count it as "London contributing to public finances"?
As an example, the Sainsburys supermarket chain has its headquarters in London, filled with desk jockeys. Sainsburys contributes to public finances - but is that "London money"?
worldofecho__@reddit
I'm not saying that I agree with that view either, but I do think it's a perspective which influences how places outside London are perceived by some
Same_Grouness@reddit
Saying it is largely true is saying that you agree with it.
worldofecho__@reddit
The UK economy is massively centred in London, even if the point about contribution to GDP is a little more complicated. Everyone knows that, or at least, until you piped up, I assumed everyone knew it!
Same_Grouness@reddit
I'm just pointing out that in one comment you said something was largely true, then in the next said you didn't agree with it. I haven't offered my opinion on it yet.
worldofecho__@reddit
The point about the massive wealth disparities is "largely true", though the specific point about contribution to the treasury is a little more nuanced.
Same_Grouness@reddit
Only when taken at face value, which doesn't really make it true. I get your point though, if people think that then it might as well be true.
worldofecho__@reddit
If you do some research you'll see that the UK is one of the most regionally unequal developed countries in the world.
Teembeau@reddit
Also, the contribution is often from government jobs serving the whole country, not industrial creation. Like we all pay our TV license fees which mostly goes to people in London. If London broke away as a city state, we'd not have the BBC there.
TheDawiWhisperer@reddit
because the press and social media is London based
DirtyBeautifulLove@reddit
I think it's part of the British tendency to hate where you're from.
I'm from S London, so that's my reference point. I went to Uni in Bournemouth 15 odd years ago, and thought it was absolutely lovely. Gorgeous area with decent people. The locals acted like it was Hyderabad. It's gone downhill since, but it's still lovely IMO.
I live in Hull/E Yorks now, and I think it's lovely too. But so many of the locals (and the country at large) think it's a shit hole.
There are definitely places in the UK I've experienced that do deserve their shit reputations (Bradford, Peterborough, Luton, Doncaster, Wood Green, Wembley, Tottenham etc) - but most places I've been are much better than the locals seem to think it is, IMO.
I think for most of the UK, it's not the specific area that's shit, it's the people.
I don't count myself immune from this. I think London is massively overrated in a lot of aspects. I don't think it's shit though.
JibletsGiblets@reddit
Easy, becasue they're shit. Have you BEEN to Coventry?
JohnCasey3306@reddit
I suggest you go and visit coastal towns in the south and north east ... Third world countries are hosting fund raising events to support them
KumSnatcher@reddit
Because London is fundamentally extremely different from the rest of the country. It is the economic center of Britain and where the politicians, media etc all are. In many ways, the country's elite would probably prefer to live in a London that is NOT attached to the rest of the UK.
There is a feeling that the rest of the UK weighs down London, which is probably true, but then this is as a result of continuous London centric policy decisions.
London is demographically and culturally massively different to the rest of the UK. In London only around 35% (from memory) of the population is native born white British. The rest of the population are descended from a variety of different cultures and ethnicities whom are primarily recent arrivals to the UK (within the past 60 years). This fusion of cultures has led to the emergence of a new and diverse British identity in London and the surrounding area.
In contrast, the rest of the UK (if we EXCLUDE London and based on 2021 census data) can be estimated to be between 85-90% white British and generally has not had its over all culture or demographics changed nearly as much. If we exclude all urban areas with a population of 300k or more then this figure is likely around 92%.
These factors often lead to Londoners tending to think of places outside of London as culturally backward, poor and somewhat alien to the modern London way of life
phantom_gain@reddit
Liverpool, apparently the entire city is on benefits.
Throwaway91847817@reddit
Us Brits, by and large, are miserable cunts. If theres an opportunity to be negative about something, for whatever reason, we will take it.
Psittacula2@reddit
The main differences:
* London is a Global City in size, diversity, institutions, international traffic of people, agglomeration of businesses and long term investment eg architecture, museums world class and so on - it combines sheer size difference and diversity and quality differences to all other UK cities and towns. Do note London is made up of vast suburbia if you ever travel around within the M25 and ever explore the edges some of which and a lot which is relatively low quality as any other town or city but with phenomenal transport options usually. Notably other major cities and towns seem one horse towns in terms of restaurants and amenities and options in contrast even if a few or more are good here eg Edinburgh or Oxford.
* London/SE which few or none mention: Weather is better: Drier x4 than West and North and Sunnier with more sunshine hours and days per year. This has a massive difference on mood and even London can be grey and drizzly and depressing but many other towns and cities are much wetter and overcast more of the year so anywhere under those conditions can seem miserable.
Equally on the other side, London Conurbation just creates a pull-push of jobs and young people snd energy whereas regions tend to loose in this pull push and so there are a lot of dismal UK towns and cities that warrant being considered Turd Towns eg see YT on this subject and name amongst others. I think they call it “Ghetto Tours” or “Social Decay Safaris”. There are buckets of these in the UK.
Finally a few towns or cities surpass London in a few respects in terms of diversity of options, quality architecture and ambience but equally smaller and more convenient and able to explore elsewhere easily eg Edinburgh, Oxford measure well here with institutions and universities and international connections etc.
complacencyfirst@reddit
That seems so strange to me considering how dirty London is and how polluted the air around London is compared to most UK cities, I always try to avoid the place or ill have black snot for a week after.
Fluid_Speaker6518@reddit
I've only ever been to London once which was last year to Wembley stadium and the surrounding area when walking to the tube station was one of the dirtiest places I've seen in the country
ElactricSpam@reddit
Yup, Wembley is pretty dire but a relatively tiny part of London.
poptimist185@reddit
All that proves is you went to a famously shitty part of London and have concluded it’s all shit 👍
Fluid_Speaker6518@reddit
I didn't say it was all shit? I'm just sharing my experience of when i visited London and what area it was
complacencyfirst@reddit
Was it for the eras tour by any chance?
For me it's Camden. I used to love Camden when I was young, but the litter oh my, it's so disgusting now. And the rats in Camden market 🤢
ElactricSpam@reddit
Not entirely correct. Since ULEZ London's actually more or less the same compared to a lot of other capital cities and several cities in the UK (eg Manchester, Leeds, Glasgow etc)
Also, have lived here for 20 years and never experienced the black snot of which you speak
choloepushofmanni@reddit
You never taken the northern line? The black snot is definitely a thing
ElactricSpam@reddit
Ah right, not had the pleasure recently.
marmarama@reddit
It was a thing before congestion charging, subsequently ULEZ, and also improvements in emissions standards for vehicles, particularly diesels.
I lived in London from 1997-2003 before moving elsewhere. The particulate levels were pretty grim in Zone 1 and much of Zone 2, and it wasn't uncommon to get back home with a thin sheen of particulates on exposed skin. Black snot is an exaggeration, but you'd find tiny black specks.
I'm always impressed by how much better it is when I visit now. It's still grubby and the air still feels thick, but it's not substantially worse than other UK city centres.
ElactricSpam@reddit
Agree with this. Since I've been living here it's improved considerably, especially over the last 5 years, combo of the ULEZ and increase in electric/hybrid vehicles. I cycle into town every day so really notice the difference. It did use to be pretty bad though
complacencyfirst@reddit
Lucky you, it's gross 🤢 I have been up there since the ULEZ was implemented and I still found it suffocating. I lived in Leeds for 3yrs and never experienced anything similar at all. I don't know how anyone can live in London, it is an urban hell hole.
They__Can__Bill__Me@reddit
This is ridiculous. London is scores of little villages all tied together. There are tons of lovely places to live in London.
complacencyfirst@reddit
Each one as polluted, litter filled and crime blighted as the last.
elnander@reddit
That's just not true at all how out of touch are you??
complacencyfirst@reddit
I could ask you the same question given that London is the 18th most polluted city in the world.
elnander@reddit
Need a source on that lmfao. According to this source, which aggregates data points, it is ranked 4830. And that makes sense considering Balkan cities, within the context of Europe, but also cities in China, India, Nigeria etc are all far more polluted than London is. And I'm referring to the other two as well, in response to OP, there are tons of towns with Greater London that are perfectly safe, all from Zone 1 to the outer ring. I mean it is literally a county of over 8 million people, to paint it all under the same brush is just stupid.
Crime rates don't differ too much across regions of England. You're proving yourself to be a target of the scaremongering that the media loves doing about London. Yes, there are issues, especially with knife crime recently, but these instances do get picked up immediately by the media and everyone's goldfish memory latches onto them. For the vast majority of people, it doesn't affect them.
complacencyfirst@reddit
I'm honestly not going to write an essay with references to explain why London sucks just because you got vexed and defensive about it 😆 I get it, you love your shit hole city, I know it's a shit hole. I agree to disagree.
elnander@reddit
Look mate if you're gonna make a claim as absurd as that come with receipts. Someone saw a couple rats at Camden Market and a few too many brown people on Wembley High Street and really thought they were in Karachi for a second. It's fine, heard it all a million times before.
complacencyfirst@reddit
Look mate, if you actually think London is not dirty and polluted idk what to tell you, it doesn't need receipts because all you have to do is walk around and you will see it, this is reddit not a university essay.
And literally nobody here brought race into this except you. Stay vexed 💚
elnander@reddit
You said it was 18th? That's just not true. You can't lie and post love hearts and "stay mad" and expect people not to be annoyed lol.
complacencyfirst@reddit
I don't expect you to not be annoyed, I'm actually loving it. Isn't that obvious af? Google London 18th most polluted city and my source is literally right there, it is that simple.
Fun-Illustrator9985@reddit
I’ve lived in London for 5 years and never had any problems with the air more than elsewhere, it all depends on how close you live to busy roads
complacencyfirst@reddit
I've never lived there, the black snot seems linked to use of the tube. It isn't something I've experienced in any other major city. London is much dirtier than other world capitals though, compare it with Amsterdam, Prague or D.C and it's actually filthy.
DaveBeBad@reddit
I’d agree with you. Visiting London now is like a completely different place to what it was in the 80s or 90s. The place stunk of diesel fumes and the buildings had layers of grime outside.
It’s a lot cleaner now.
Independent-Ad-3385@reddit
No idea, the Daily Mail once ran a front page article about how the high street in my town was dying and it was an example of Broken Britain. Except that the street they had visited was not the high street, it was about 10 minutes away from the city centre, and was dying because it wasn't in the city centre and people couldn't be bothered to walk to it, and there was planning going through to redo the whole area.
coffeewalnut05@reddit
I disagree too. There are a lot of deprived cities, towns and villages but there are also many amazing ones. And even in the deprived areas, you can find strong communities and a depth of culture and heritage.
Hank_Wankplank@reddit
I honestly feel like I live in an alternate reality to people on UK Reddit sometimes. Even in this thread you've got people calling it 'third world' and saying stuff like the entire North of England is just deprived post industrial shitholes. I live in a Northern city and it's great; modern, clean and vibrant and it keeps getting better all the time, and I'm yet to see all this 'crumbling infrastructure' everyone on here keeps talking about. There's shiny new stuff everywhere here. The suburb I live in is lovely and I have a nice quality of life here and I don't earn much above national average wage, I'm not wealthy.
People bang about how much other countries are so much better. I've spent a lot of time in the US, one of the wealthiest countries on the planet, and their deprived areas make ours look like paradise. Every country has good and shit parts and the UK is no different. Anyone calling us 'third world' clearly hasn't experienced an actual third world country.
Ok-Information4938@reddit
Well the UK excluding London isn't particularly wealthy. GDP per capita outside London and especially the SE is probably similar to eastern Europe.
jsm97@reddit
GDP per Capita in most UK regions are simular to their French counterparts but the very poorest (West Wales, North East England) are on par with Poland - Map
But that shouldn't be suprising - Eastern Europe has a century of catch up growth. Poland and Lithuania have already overtaken most of Italy and they'll overtake France and the UK within 20 years and possibly even Germany by mid-century.
Shoddy-Computer2377@reddit
This statistical breakdown is what makes me chuckle whenever the usual suspects say "Scotland is the most economically productive area outside of London/SE" etc.
Cool story, now break Scotland down into sub-regions the same way England is, and get back to me. What's that? You don't want to?
EdmundTheInsulter@reddit
Can't say I think that theory is correct. People outside the SE still have cars including luxury brands, consumer electronics. Numerous eastern Europeans settled in English regions to escape poverty, I've not heard of workers here going to Bulgaria etc, other than tour rep or cheap retirement.
Ok-Information4938@reddit
Some people are well off, yes. Average gdp per capita outside of the SE isn't high though. And see how run down most places are.
EdmundTheInsulter@reddit
Education is low-er, but I doubt if it's hugely lower.
AlpsSad1364@reddit
Most of London isn't actually that much different to the rest of the UK. There are a handful of areas that have generate huge wealth (The City, Canary Wharf, Heathrow) and a lot of very average stuff.
London as a whole is hugely reliant on the finance industry and having the HQs of a few giant multinationals (some that don't even trade in the UK like Rio Tinto, Shell etc). Internally the inequality is massive and most of London looks like the rest of the UK but with higher house prices.
Eg fig 10 here: https://www.londonchamber.co.uk/LCCI_Media/LCCI/Media/Reports/London-s-Economy-Summary.pdf
https://www.london.gov.uk/media/73699/download
Fartscissors@reddit
Now do investment!
StatisticianOwn9953@reddit
They will say.
It is funny that this reasoning, when it was true of the industrial regions, never caused a self-sustaining investment loop.
Salt-Evidence-6834@reddit
That costs money!
Fit_Manufacturer4568@reddit
Because the press and media all live in West London.
poshbakerloo@reddit
There are a certain group of people who basically exist souly in London, or maybe shuttle back and forth between London and Manchester. They never leave the city, and spend more time abroad even though their home is in London, they've never been to small English towns. Their view on rural life comes from social media and ignorance - ironically they'll say themselves that the small town people are the ignorant ones in a rather patronising tone.
AdventurousMister@reddit
It’s the people who live in London, trying to justify living in London!
tmstms@reddit
I would not set too much store if it is social media- localism is strong in the UK and that goes along with criticising our neighbours, whether as banter or as genuine disdain.
Because you are in London, you will probably get much more pro-London anti-provinces stuff, but outside London, you find that London is Public Enemy No. 1
Personally, I do not find mainstream media is nasty about any towns or cities of the UK, though it is entirely legit to point out some have social problems.
ElactricSpam@reddit
Agree, I don't see much anti any town in the news. It's mainly people on social media. I live in London and see people slagging it off all over the place on SM because that's the area I'm in.
Same_Grouness@reddit
Last time I was in London I got talking to some cockney geezer outside the train station, when I told him I was from Glasgow he was like "cor blimey, you must see some mad shit up there, fights, stabbings, etc."
When I told him no, nothing of the sort, and that I generally feel a lot safer in Glasgow than I do in London, he just flat out refused to believe me, "Yeah right mate I've heard what it's like up there, you Glaswegians are all nuts."
It was strange because he was definitely trying to be friendly, he wasn't trying to put Glasgow down as far as I could tell, that's just what he genuinely thinks is happening up here. He might have had a point 50 years ago but it's genuinely one of the safest cities in the UK now, while from what I hear (I know I'm just doing the same thing as the Londoners here) London doesn't exactly seem safe, you are statistically a lot more likely to get stabbed or robbed there than here.
Having said that, my accent does give me a slightly better chance of scaring off any would be attackers in London, so the reputation can work in our favour at times.
Chidoribraindev@reddit
OP, have you lived here long? Talked to many locals? Everyone talks shit about their hometown. It's kinda wild but it's just British sensibilities. Self-deprecation is part of what makes British humour the best.
You can always read right-leaning websites if you want to learn how awful London is and how similar to war-torn countries we are.
Remote-Pool7787@reddit
Birmingham. It’s a fantastic city
_Spiggles_@reddit
The country would be better without London
thelowenmowerman@reddit
Reddit answers it's own questions.
Glittering_Habit_161@reddit
Rugby is never listed as one of the worst towns in the UK on social media and I'm happy about that.
Boroboy72@reddit
We actually propagate this as best we can. Keeps those London wankers in their place, that way, we don't have to deal with them face to face (or should I say faces?).
HeverAfter@reddit
Remember that your social media feeds are based on algorithms. So if you look at these type of posts then more will pop up. That's why people get caught in a never ending spiral of crap.
I_ALWAYS_UPVOTE_CATS@reddit
Birmingham gets shat on to the point that it's basically a meme. In reality, the centre is perfectly pleasant, and the shitty areas are no worse than the equivalent in other cities.
ShingledPringle@reddit
It has existed as a fault for years int he UK. My wife got culture shock when I told her certain things originate from my home town, and that there is a world outside of London.
1600037@reddit
I grew up in Birmingham and it was a great place to live. Doesn’t deserve the infamy it has
humph8181@reddit
It depends on what she being compared . Try finding art galleries, museums, concert halls, theatres, transport system, job opportunities, etc., comparable to those in London in those cities and you won't find the comparison unfair at all. London is objectively much better than say Coventry, Leeds or Bristol in these respects, and to say so isn't unfair at all. Now, if you were comparing say rents and prices of restaurants and bars, that would be another thing altogether.
HumbleOwl6876@reddit
The feelings mutual. Many people in rural areas and small towns/cities feel Londoners are running the country into the ground.
screwfusdufusrufus@reddit
Have you been to London? Apart from a handful of streets, it’s a fucking armpit
Teembeau@reddit
I always say that I'd live in London if I could do it properly. Live in Kensington, dine at Helene Daroze, shop at Berry Bros. If you're just going to watch Marvel movies, eat pizza and get wine at Tesco, you might as well live somewhere slse.
Extension_Drummer_85@reddit
Honestly without London there wouldn't be enough money to keep the very few other cities that are nice at that standard. There are undoubtedly cities in the uk that are much nicer than London, notably bath, oxford and Cambridge but this is in no small part due to the economic power of London.
KonkeyDongPrime@reddit
That’s odd. Most of my feed is populated with people and articles slagging off London and parts of London, written by people who have never spent any time there.
IGLOO_BUM@reddit
You couldn't fucking pay me to live in London. I'm all for keeping the myth going if it keeps bellends away from everywhere else.
Combination-Low@reddit
It's because the biggest news companies are based in London, so you get London journalists talking about places they've never lived in and don't really now.
It's a kind of elitism.
smash_1048@reddit
I think it just about amenities like shops and restaurants being open late at night.
The other cities I lived in used to close shopping centres at 8 and 5 on Sundays which was dull.
Shiv788@reddit
I work with a girl from Wakefield, I've never been but the way she talks about it, she makes it sound like the best place in the world but Ive not heard of it until I met her.
Mysterious-Fortune-6@reddit
I recommend you do the place version of never meet your heroes
RegularHovercraft@reddit
Leading question. I don't think it is particularly more maligned. Everywhere gets negative views at some point and London takes its fair share. Knife crime capital, for example?
Ok-Importance-6815@reddit
because the press are all based in london
JuckJuckner@reddit
Unfortunately, A lot of cities/town outside London haven’t received the attention and investment they have needed over the last 30+ years.
There are good bits in some towns/cities as well as bad parts.
You even see it on threads here on AskUK, where some will try to outcompete on which town/city is a shithole. For various reasons whether it’s crime , demographics or something else.
A lot of our media (maybe with the exception of local area news sources ) is written by people that have grown up in places where issues/problems have been insulated from them. There is an element of classism, possibly racism as well, when some opinions are expressed.
Commercial_Tank5530@reddit
GROOMING GANGS
Shoddy-Computer2377@reddit
The Eleventh Commandment is "Thou shalt not criticise Edinburgh no matter how legitimate"
nj813@reddit
A majority of the press and media are based in/around london, especially with how much local news has declined. There is a massive London bias in the UK and it's reflected in the most widespread media
Acerhand@reddit
Its the same in most countries lol
ExternalAttitude6559@reddit
I'm from Bristol & currently live in the Cotswolds. Both hyped up (mainly by outsiders) way beyond reality.
unclear_warfare@reddit
Welcome to Britain, our national sport is complaining about Britain :)
pine_soaked@reddit
Some of it is banter, a lot of it is the medieval classism that is sadly holding back the country’s potential.
SingerFirm1090@reddit
All towns and cities have areas that are 'run down shitholes', but for the most part many UK cities have their strenghts and weaknesses. Cardiff, for example, is a centre of TV productions and the associated services supporting them. Likewise Liverpool has a growing film industry, Newcastle an electric vehicle manufacturing facility.
Soggy_Cabbage@reddit
Fucking Stabistan lording it over us now lol.
ElactricSpam@reddit
Oh don't worry, London gets slagged off plenty as well!
TryToBeKindEh@reddit
Where are you seeing this kind of thing and what specific claims are they making about other towns/cities?
Sim0nsaysshh@reddit
As someone who lives in a small rural town but works in the city, this might be to discourage people from London from moving to the towns.
ryanmurphy2611@reddit
As with any city there are good and bad bits. If you look hard enough you’ll find lovely places in any major city. The smaller ones take even less looking. Birmingham for instance has a great food scene, some beautiful architecture and lovely people.
poptimist185@reddit
London is absolutely maligned on social media, as replies to this post already demonstrate.
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