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?!

I'm not on a fixed rate. That ended for us in August. We are now on the variable rate (aka price cap) as it was the best deal available (the same is true for most people) So we went from paying £59 per month to £109 per month but with the £66 pm rebate it is currently £43 per month.

My over all point was people like me - comfortably off, low users should not be getting any govenrment support. I would rather more went to low income people and the disabled/very elderly.

IF Labour hadn't had PFI, then Govt borrowing & repayments would now be even higher OR if they didn't build new hospitals, then where would we be now?

Slightly off on a tangent, but actually, opinion is moving towards NOT needing any new acute hospital beds, defunding acute hospitals and putting the money back into community care and health educaiton as that's where the money is best used.

@MarshaBradyo It got dragged out because you kept posting inaccurate information. I will not stay silent when you do that. In 2010 the NHS was independently assessed as the best healthcare system in the world. Twelve years later under a conservative government it is a mess.

I was going to say this - how do you live like this on 50k? Isn’t 50k almost 3k a month take home? Unless your mortgage/rent is absolutely extortionate or you have loads of unpaid debts/unnecessary insurance premiums or are sending £££ to your kids at uni every month, that should give you a lot of disposable income? I had a very good quality of life single on 30k!

Nope. What I’ve posted is mostly from sites with figures. It might not make people happy to see numbers but again that’s not my issue.

Yes it is. Its bad. Out of control energy prices are the worst.

@MarshaBradyo I corrected your figures. Posting from 2019 and claiming it was now. I gave you the correct figures.

The system where ALL Govts borrow inc China, USA, Japn, Germany/EU, what matters is the market belief that the UK can pay it back, they didn't with Truss's plans.

I would increase taxation, overall 38% in UK, 43% in France, who has the better economy and public services, its the only option.

No its not ideal but neither is laying in the road with a broken hip for 11 hours waiting for an Ambulance and then spending 2 days in AE waiting for a bed in a ward, not being able to get an operation for 2 years, having to give up work and claim benefits.

Whats the alternative in your opinion?

I don't think its a shoe in for Labour, 2 years is a very long time in politics, than boundary changes, voter ID plus Labour will come under far greater scrutiny toward a GE.

Whose opinion?

Need all, acute, community beds, social care and health education, vital, we need to reduce demand.

ATM we don't have enough of any of this or the staff.

££55bn in 2019 to £50bn now fine if that sounds great to others not going to celebrate

Also from Schools Week

The total charges are expected to be nearly £30 billion over the lifetime of the 168 PFI projects. This is nearly four times as much as the total capital value of the projects.

School repayments will peak at £1.2 billion in 2024/25. This is for two reasons: yearly inflation rises written into the contracts and the type of repayment schemes agreed by local authorities.

So add that in.

On the other hand when Labour created the NHS the country was devastated by the war and government debt was at its highest level ever, higher even than now. Most of the working class, at that time the majority of the population, lived hand to mouth in poverty that would have been unrecognisable to most of us. Tax revenues would have be lower and the severity of other crises (eg housing) competing for attention higher. If ever there was a time full of compelling reasons to shy away from such an audacious project in the name of prudence, that was it.

We either have the political will to have a decent country or we don't. We need to stop making excuses.

The NHS was independently assessed to be the best healthcare system in the world in 2010. I miss those times.

The argument has been made for years to reduce hospital beds. It causes major issues.

Its all very well quoting PFI repayment figures, what was the alternative?

You are not coming up with anything other than sniping from the side lines.

Had Blair stuck all that on govt borrowing, we'd all be pying it back regardless and borrowing instead of 97% would be significantly higher.

We need to get our heads around that we are going to have to tax more, companies and well off individuals.

Yep may as well enjoy the memories now as they’re still being paid for.

What’s the alternative? Who knows - Labour think it’s £3bn from non Dom. It’ll likely take more to fix the demographic challenges.

An alternative to making healthcare work as we age is a tough one, but I’d start with we can’t just push funding to next generation as a solution. Other than that just talk about the realities of the NHS model would be a start.

We all have to wear a wristband that tracks activity levels and something else that monitors what we eat and then we are assigned NHS points accordingly
I'd vote for that✅

TBF we are still paying via Govt borrowing, for roads rail defence housing, benefits, pensions Energy support, Hinkley C etc etc

UK owes £2 Trillion, 90 billion on PFI is small beer as we got new hospitals and schools.

We borrow ie pushing repayment to next generation on an awful lot of things.

You seem to want to stop Govt borrowing, good luck with that.

Thanks for the understanding, helpful input. Very constructive and not judgy at all.

Not that it's any of your business, I have DC at uni who doesn't qualify for anything above minimum loans of £4k per year (because of my amazing salary) , which doesn't even over half of the accommodation costs. I support my pension aged mother and mentally ill sibling (who cannot work, as much as they'd love to) so they can live, as opposed to exist.

I am frugal. Very.

You're missing the point though.

What I was sharing is that, for most of my life, I've never had to worry about money apart from when I first left home at 18 and then again when I went to uni. The past 2 years however, I've had less and less spending power and the last few months have been very difficult.

If you know of a way that I can come up with £25k (lowest quote) to make the kitchen safe and usable, please do share as I'm losing sleep worrying how l will ever have the money to do this. I've looked at loans and I don't think I can afford the minimum payments required to have the loan.

My current situation is that my outgoings are nearly the same as my income. I've never been in this situation before.

Whether people are on UC, pensioners, earning <£10k, £50k or £80k is not the point really. The point is that unless you're comfortable financially, with savings, little or no mortgage and maybe someone who could help you financially through this current difficult time, we are all struggling and having to make significant adjustments and choices.

Or maybe, as you suggest without saying it out loud, I'm totally crap with money and spending it on things I shouldn't. Whatever it is, I'm sitting at my computer with 3 hot water bottles, a hat on, 3 layers of clothing about to make a sandwich with filling I got for free via a food waste app which I use regularly.

You are avoiding what Blairs alternative to PFI was, i guess thats because you don't know what else he could do.

Preventative is vital, i don't know why Govt has cut public health funding & its not just on health, people have so many falls and end up in hospital needed v expensive treatment because roads and paths not gritted, bit more joined up thinking.

I'm pleased that you're enjoying your time in Sweden, a shame that they have higher levels of suicide an alcohol abuse plus rapidly rising crime.

yep you got it Labour won’t be able to borrow much more - hence the small fry changes that will do very little. Maybe it’ll be grand and everyone back to 90s..

Improving population health is a good idea though. Hard to do - changing unhealthy behaviour isn’t easy and we are unhealthier unfortunately than many other countries.

The UK like the rest of the world is in recession mainly due to bad covid policy and printing money without considering the effects, many of us warned what was going to happen, but many of you thought banging saucepans and watching nurses in empty hospitals, dancing on Tiktok was a good thing.
Time to face reality, the only way out of this current recession is via growth, not going to be achieved by even higher taxes, if you need an example of a potentially wealthy country which is being impoverished by socialism then look at Venezuala.
An example of why liebour should never trusted is Gordon Brown when he claimed to abolished boom and bust.

So you're too lazy to study history, says more about you than me.

As i said, taxation, as was done after WW2 is the only alternative, every country in the world is going to have to redistribute and many already are.

Still no alternatives to PFI i see.

We either have the political will to have a decent country or we don't. We need to stop making excuses.

Honestly what I get is that no-one does have the political will - so its much more about who is more competent and has less bat shit pet projects and minor tweaks in directions.

Though Browns recent constitutional suggests did sound promising but they aren't yet policy and NHS, aging population and social care everyone seems to shy away from same with house - it's tweaks because what we need is more and better housing stock but no-one wants new builds near them or the hassle and expensive of huge overall.

There are so many circles that need squaring and little political courage - I've seen some serious suggestion that may get worse as population ages and becomes ever more risk adverse.