Are things in the UK as bad as it sounds in the news?

[Lolobella]

I left the UK in 2017 and now live in Europe. I obviously still follow the UK news closely and visit, although I have no family left there.

In the last few months the UK news have become increasingly grim and concerning. I can't tell if it is just the news painting the country in a worse light than necessary, or if things are genuinely as bad as the news make it sound.

Obviously this is a tough historical moment for many countries, but the doom and gloom in UK news is just on another level and makes if sound like the country is in free fall. Poverty, strikes, crazy energy prices, failing NHS and public services.. Is it really so bad?!

Ah, yeah would agree they absolutely shit the bed having magic grandpa for the last two.

It is really pretty awful. And I speak as someone with a good income who is comfortable and not in any danger of losing my home and who can afford to have the heating on some of the time (which makes me one of the very lucky ones).

The thing that's really genuinely scary right now is that public services have completely broken down here. The health service is Third World standard at the moment and the prospect of needing to see a doctor in an emergency is genuinely terrifying. And its not just the acute stuff. Transport network in London is creaking. Rubbish collection is shit. It takes hours to get a phonecall answered when you speak to any kind of utility or customer-facing business. It actually seems worse than the 70s. It feels like its survival of the fittest and any kind of social contract by which the state is expected to look after people in vulnerable situations has gone.

I was watching something on TV about Victorian London the other day and it was quite a wake-up call: in previous years I always used to feel that the comparison between now and then was so huge in terms of the social and economic progress that had been made that it was hard to imagine you were living in the same country.

Now I'm acutely aware that levels of poverty and sickness are not far off Victorian times. People living hand to mouth, terrified of losing what little economic security they have, terrified of getting sick and not being able to heat their homes.

I'm sure things will bounce back and while I hate the Tories I don't think its 100% down to them (though they certainly haven't helped). But at the moment things feel bleaker here than at any other time in my 50 years.

Yeah I think this a good point.

the ‘we have a normal income and we’re not struggling’ brigade frequently have a high income and don’t realise it, because it’s normal for them and all their friends. My boyfriend thought he had a normal upbringing. He had a swimming pool in his back garden, while I grew up on a council estate terrace. Normal only means what you’re used to.

They could look at mn for a bit that’d do it

I think things have been pretty bad for a while in most areas of life in the uk but the last few months-especially since the Liz truss debacle-its become more universally felt across society. Now even the middle
Classes so to speak are feeling the adverse effects of everything being a mess, albeit to varying degrees, whereas before it would only have affected the poor (in which case less people and the media didn't especially care).
We are ok-ish. For now. But for the first time in a long time I'm worried about money, and how to afford things. And there is no slack if anything goes wrong. But what unsettles me the most is the NHS. I'm a social worker (which has been fucked for at least 15 years) but the NHS has always been in relative terms better funded and more functional. It scares the hell out of me that if you need one you can't get an ambulance or seen in a and e without a days wait. It's just beyond broken at this point.

Seriously? They wouldn’t have set ridiculous budgets? They constantly over promise at election time. Labour promises us the world, but never provide us with a plan on exactly how they’re going to pay for anything. That’s why we’ve been in the shite whenever they’re in power.

My husband and I are two professionals working full time and we are sat in a house which is currently 11 degrees. I’m sick and can’t get a GP appointment. DS 17, understands that Christmas is going to be significantly smaller this year and he definitely won’t be getting the iPhone he wanted.

We are still classed as the lucky ones.

TBH I think it's a tiny bit harder for a lot of people, there's a subset of people who were already struggling who are now going through hell but the nature of the class system means it's quite easy to live a life where you don't encounter it. Bit like Victorian times, really.

In terms of spirit, I think Brexit, Covid, Tory endless shenanigans, cost of living crisis, strikes and NHS meltdown all combine to make a very toxic mix. Feels like a castle built on sand.

This is the really stark thing I think. In previous recessions there's always been a sense that belts get tightened and everyone has to cut back but it's rarely touched the comfortable classes.

This time around it feels like middle class people are really suffering. Not food bank suffering maybe, but struggling to pay bills/mortgages. You have to be actively rich to feel comfortable.

Not to say that this is about the middle classes, of course its not. It's about people who have to choose between eating and heating etc. But the reason we're hearing about it as much as we do is that its hurting the chattering classes now.

Yes. I can't afford to heat my house because I need to keep the gas for hot water. I will be it on for a couple of hours when kids get home but then we are all under our duvets, dressing gowns. I'm actually wearing my woolly hat right now.

Transport is terrible and when you live in a rural area it's difficult for supermarket deliveries and small local shops prices have had to sky rocket even more. Family owned food places and pubs shutting down because they can't afford the energy bills - I know of 3 over the past month.

I don't know how the government sleep at night (although I'm guessing it's in a warm house!).

How can anything be more shite than now?😲

No nhs
No trains in the North
schools falling apart, teachers leaving in droves
Terrible poverty and wages
Half the country on strike.

How could it be worse? Just how?

@Livelovebehappy We seem to be quite deeply in the shite now though, right? The Tories have not exactly been excellent with the economy. New Labour actually did really well with the economy, the financial crash was a global one but gets pinned on them.

It's unrelentingly awful, I used to think that it would have to get better, things ebb and flow in life but I have never known anything like this. There seem to be so many young people with mental health issues, I have friends with kids who are self-harming, one of them took an overdose a few weeks ago. The future must look bleak for then and it is for them that I want to see positive change and a general election sooner rather than later. This lot will hang on like grim death though, lining their pockets while people freeze and starve

I’m well off and I and my social circle are well insulated from the price rises etc. The only thing that I have seen really make my friends and acquaintances really sit up and take notice is the complete break down of ED, 999 and the ambulance service. They (and I) pay for private health care and private GPs but we all acknowledge we’re totally stuffed if we slip over on the ice with an open fracture and need an ambulance. You now have to wait over 24hrs for a private GP appt (used to be a couple of hours) because of the massive demand from people who can’t access nhs gp service.

And we are not in the shite right now and for the last 12 years because of the Tories?!?

"Staff shortages hitting education in England, says Ofsted
Nurseries forced to close and class sizes growing in schools and colleges, finds inspectorate"

Bethan Staton in London 4 HOURS AGO
FT.com

Staff shortages mean pupils and students in England are not getting the quality, care and stability in education they need, according to a report by Ofsted that found recovery from the pandemic remained a “work in progress”.

The annual report by the education inspectorate, published on Tuesday, found “workforce and resourcing challenges” had forced nurseries to close because they could not retain staff and had led to larger class sizes in schools and colleges, as well as disruption to activities such as drama and sport, mental health interventions and support for special needs children.

The analysis echoes problems with staff retention and quality of care and services across the public sector, which is suffering a wave of strike action as workers, who have suffered real-terms pay cuts over the past decade, struggle with the mounting cost of living crisis."

Yeah it’s pretty shit. UK is probably worst place in Europe to be in right now and government offer no long term plans for improvement in the future

Really? I was at my craft group today and it was the main topic of conversation other than Christmas.
A lot of the people who go are retired or part time workers and not on the breadline but perhaps don’t have much elasticity in their budgets.
We meet in a cafe which was absolutely bloody freezing today as they have turned the heating down as many places have to try and save money.

Look on the bright side.

Rees-Mogg says we should be over the worst of Brexit in 50 years.

Yes, it really is that bad. I was trying to explain this to my friend in Europe.

The most worrying part for me is that we no longer seem to have a functioning healthcare system or emergency services. Basically, you’re lucky if you can get an ambulance to show up.

The problem with public services is that for many of the 'lucky ones', its too late by the time you need it. I know someone who claims that he does not need any government services as he is well paid and has lots of money. I pointed out to him that even private health insurance does not completely cover all medical expenses; in fact they often hike up their premiums when you get sick so that you end up paying tens of thousands, perhaps even up to a hundred thousand anyway if you get cancer. He accused me of being morbid and defeatist and claimed that even if he was sick and undergoing chemotherapy, he would still be able to think up of 'brilliant' ideas and earn millions even on his sick bed. I guess he can protect his home from burglars without the police and put out any fires without the firemen as well; in addition to chartering his own private ambulance service. Ok.

\this is probably not an atypical viewpoint which is why the government has gotten away with cutting public services for such a long time. A lot of comfortably off people have a great belief in their own capacity to solve problems and therefore think they can use money to cover up deficiencies in public servicies - private tuition/private school to cover up deficiencies in state school, private healthcare to supplement NHS, buying houses in the countryside to escape from 'crime', private cars to replace poor public transport, WFH to mitigate impact of unreliable rail services, solar panels to mitigate high cost of gas. You don't necessarily need a super high income to access the following tbh- often the people I know who are able to do so don't have the highest income- they are above average but they often did things like buying at the right time, having family support, working in jobs that allow remote working without much impediment to career growth. But at some point growing poverty and bad government policy would come back to bite. After all, private ambulances are in the same queue as NHS ambulances. Yet at that time, it would be too late...

Omg. That’s awful. Was the girl ok?!

This is the kind of response the OP was craving

Yeah it's pretty bad (and I remember the 70s)...feels like we are in a kind of free fall at the moment following the disastrous mini budget…and I agree with PP that the situation with ambulances and A&E is frightening.

Still, just ignore the news eh and cling to the fact that Waitrose looked busy when you walked past!