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?!

You all need to get a grip

This is not dreadful (and yes the media are sensationalising it)

Many of us here have lived through the 70's and no, it's not as bad as that.

Recessions happen, stuff goes wrong, but this isn't bad by any means.

The NHS is rubbish, but it has been my entire adult life so that's not surprising.

12 years ago in 2010 common wealth fund scored the U.K. highest for healthcare next to other rich countries. In 2010 under Cameron and then May the NHS had the lowest annual increases above inflation since its inception 74 years ago. Also not enough nurses or doctors were trained and Brexit lost lot of overseas NHS workers. The NHS had been weakened by this under funding and wasn’t in a strong position when covid happened.

Tbh nobody I know is struggling and I don't know any wealthy people. I know people who have jobs, some fairly well paid, some less so.
We all complain about prices going up (petrol has affected us more than anything else) but
There is a lot of hyperbola in the media - talk of things collapsing, etc. It's not that bad. Someone posted there is no functional rail service earlier - I must be catching fictional trains then.

One thing about this government though - we are always told that strikes are something that happens when Labour are in charge. I can't remember a time when there were so many strikes apart from when I was in school in the 80s, which was also a Conservative govt. So why does everyone think we'd have strikes if Labour were in?

Manufacturing depended on immigrants. Immigrants require schools, hospitals, houses.

You mean that immigration that is at an all time high?

You don’t need to go far to find better access to healthcare, better and cheaper public transport, better housing stock.

Many of us here have lived through the 70's and no, it's not as bad as that.

That is a low bar you are setting for the U.K. In the 1970s the U.K. was known as the sick man of Europe. We the. joined the EU and our economy and standard of living improved significantly. Now we returning to the nadir of the 70s.

Posted before I forgot to add. I used to live overseas too, about 20 years ago.
Looking at the UK from the outside (UK news sources) made it look horrific! I thought I would have to buy a gun when I returned, but it turned out to be nothing like it was portrayed when I did return.

YES @Bakeacaketoday73

Its the fucking state of our media that's got out of control, not the country. Its like listening to a hysterical child whenever you listen to the main news or read the papers.

Look at the summer, we were all doomed because it was too hot, Now we're all doomed because its too cold. The NHS will collapse every winter, one month we are being 'invaded' according to the Tories , the next month tumbleweed about migration in the news because we've all rushed to the next big thing. Absolute bollocks.

Reality and news/social media are two completely un-related things.

I'd disagree that the NHS was wonderful 12 years ago. Possibly the only grounds we might agree on was that it was terrible then and it's atrocious now.

I experienced the NHS 12 years ago. It was harrowing and they had a good crack at killing me despite only having appendicitis. Any encounters since then haven't been much better or worse. I couldn't get an NHS dentist then either. I suppose I did used to be able to see a GP though.

Yes, it is bad and it makes me very angry indeed - twelve years of Tory government decimating public services and lack of any meaningful strategy for improving the infrastructure of the country. We shouldn't been in this position re energy - we should have sorted out our own energy security like France.

We're personally ok really but it feels precarious because of the problems in the NHS - so unsure whether an ambulance will turn up or you'll be able to get timely treatment. I worry about my grandson and what sort of country it will be by the time he grows up. Very depressing indeed.

But to speak of "widespread collapse" is nonsense, and fed by the catastrophising, click bait headlines adopted by most of the media today.

I agree.

I've actually seen a air few widespread collapse/imminent collapse headline applied to a few different countries all now months later are still around soldiering on.

Life is a bit harder for most than it been in previous years in UK - for increased percentage a lot harder - but most people are still fine.

Yep Covid sent it into overdrive and now it delivers the daily doom fix. Get off the news cycle.

Oh grow up.

Someone posted there is no functional rail service earlier - I must be catching fictional trains then.

I’m guessing you’re not in a Transpennine Express area then. Our trains seem to be mostly fictional these days (and TPE have found a loophole so that if they cancel them the day before rather than on the day they don’t have to count in the statistics.)

To give you an example, trains used to be hourly on Sunday morning from my town to the nearest city. When I had to travel recently all but one was cancelled for the whole morning.

@Pascor Except the OP doesn't live in Switzerland, as an eagle-eyed pp found out, so OP does seem a little confused about where she is.

Yep Covid was the tipping point, media hysteria overdrive.

I will never ever forget the site of two young policemen telling an elderly man he wasn't 'allowed' to sit down in a park when we were allowed an hours walks, due to lockdown rules, while our PM was getting pissed at parties.

That level of hysteria never went away with the media, Covid was a gift, and the journo's have been desperate for the next big awful thing since then.

You saw a glimpse of it when those rockets strayed into Poland, within minutes we were about to enter World War Three...

At the moment I'm seeing a bustling town centre full of people eating, drinking, shopping. Friends are living in houses heated to a normal temperature, living as normal. These aren't super rich people, I guess you'd say normal middle class. It remains to be seen how much of that is stacked onto credit cards but so far I'm not seeing anything change in any drastic way.

People talking about other countries massively subsidising fuel, food etc. I have no idea what the right answer is but that will all have to be paid for one way or another eventually, so it's going to be painful in those countries too in terms of tax burden

I think it is very bad at the moment. But I don't blame the Tories - I don't believe for a second that any party would have done any better.

I'm totally apolitical. I'll vote for whatever I think is best for the economy as I think that will produce a result that is ultimately best for everyone.

But at the moment, I think we are truly fucked. I think unless we can get someone to come in and build 10 old people's homes in every major city and staff them up, you can't even begin to start to solve the problem that is the NHS. And that's just not going to happen. Which is a shame because I think at least it would start to ease the bed crisis. They also need to do something about GPs because that system is also on its ear in most places.

I run companies in lots of different countries and the lack of staff is the same everywhere. Particularly support staff like nurses, people who will work in care homes, people who will work in restaurants etc. It's a global issue now and not one we can solve quickly.

I’m in a very sparsely populated part of the north and it’s not affecting us that much. Obviously energy prices have risen but we use our own wood. Food prices rises will mean more grow our but we are lucky as low household income but plenty of resource.

@MissPoldark - last time I looked Switzerland was in Europe. And no, Europe does not equal EU.

So, how are food prices and fuel costs in your EU country, OP? Has it got a stable admirable govt? Are you having a cold snowy winter or summat else?

But I don't blame the Tories

Why not? They've had the reins of government for 12 years. External factors aside, they've decimated the country to such a grave extent that we have atrocious societal and economic resilience to face them.

Why are the party of power for over a decade not to blame for this?

I very much am in the TPE area.
I'm not saying there isn't huge disruption, especially at the moment.
But that's a far cry from non fucntional.

So which is true OP, do you life in Bristol or Switzerland? Or neither?

You think any party would have handed donors and peers lucrative contracts during Covid for pieces of shit kit so they could buy a private jet?

Really ??

You think any party would have attempted to push through billions of tax cuts for the rich and corporations when it wasn't happening anywhere in the developed world , and create a black hole of billions of sterling, nearly crippling the pensions market and causing millions to be fucked over on accelerated interest jumps ( yeah they were rising, but they didn't need to spike like that).

DO you honestly believe that could be done by any party??

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