What was England like in late 1998/early 1999?

[breaksinthedayforyou]

Interested to know.

I am a late 90s baby and can't believe that was now over 25 years ago

One of my earliest memories is going into Woolworths in Poplar. I was in a buggy and remember feeling cold

It randomly occurred to me that 1998, my birth year, is going to sound ancient to my own grandchildren/great grandchildren. Much like my great grandmother shocking my mum years ago by being born 'in the 1800s' 😃

I was early 20's in the late 90's - just got my first car that l bought off a mate for £500. Petrol was cheap so would just go out driving for the sake of it.

It was also the time when l got into football - Euro '96 - ONG the heartbreak when poor old Southgate missed the penalty.

Went to the pub Thurs, Fru, Sat and then Sun for the quiz.

Happy times!

I bought my first house in 1998. Partner and I had a joint income of £24k, yet we could comfortably afford and three bedroom terrace house in the south east (68k) with a 100% mortgage.

I'm probably looking back with rose tinted glasses, but everything seemed easier then. We had mobile phones, but they were just for making calls. We didn't have the internet at home and didn't use it at work either. We used to go out a lot, either for meals or just to the pub to meet friends as buying drinks was affordable. It was before the smoking ban came in and pubs were always lively with a great atmosphere.

There were loads of clothes shops still so going shopping at the weekend was fun as you there was lots to look at and you could easily spend a whole day browsing and trying stuff on.

Even work seemed less stressful, My job involved calling customers, but I didn't have emails or Teams messages to deal with as well, and we didn't have the endless meetings that we seem to have now. Everyone was in the office and we became good friends and used to socialise together at lunchtime or after work.

I had a mobile phone from work but I didn't know anyone else who had one. There wasn't great mobile phone signal coverage so I used my pager much more.

No texting or social media.

Still had a landline.

Got cable TV installed.

Fax machines were very important at work.

I remember hearing about how phones would soon have cameras and thought it wouldn't take off.

I didn't use email yet.

Great days of New Labour. Referendum to create a Scottish Parliament, peace in Northern Ireland, ban on handguns, minimum wage brought in etc. starting to get over 18 years of the Tories.

No social media so life felt more in the moment and genuine. I remember my parents moaning about the NHS so I think it was pretty fucked at that time too. Life was good though.

Bought a lovely little 2 bed house for £50,000. Wi-Fi was 1p a minute so we barely used it (it also took away the phone line when it was on). Was absolutely brilliant! People weren’t as stressed, partly down to social media - there wasn’t any!

Inspiring leaders - not just political, but from all walks of life - pop culture, the arts, sport, science. Felt like they had integrity. People working to improve society and the world, not for power and money.

Especially women leaders and role models - so many started finally getting the visibility and recognition they long deserved.

Look up if you don’t know her the labour politician Mo Mowlam and the Good Friday peace agreement- finally, an end to a long British war we’d grown up and lived with for decades.

Married at the start of the 90s, by the end of the decade we had 2 DCs with a third on the way.

Professionally my career developed as attitudes to women in the workplace slowly improved.

I do remember the sense of optimism when Blair came in. It did feel like a breath of fresh air after the sleaze of the end of the Conservative government.

The 90's were great. I was just finishing uni around that time. Started going on girls holidays, Ibiza was amazing. It was just such a free time, no pressures of social media. Your money went really far. I was a student working part time and I had plenty of money to go out, go on holiday, buy what I wanted. You could go to the local boozer with a tenner and have a night out. Miss those carefree days.

I think a PP is right and there’s a big percentage of posters here aged 40-45.

The things written are true but they are also true from our perspective, iyswim. There was a dark side, and within five years it would get darker still.

I was 17 so you have to take this with that in mind. It was a hard time for me personally because my parents split up quite traumatically and suddenly when I was about to turn 16. However, there was a counsellor based at my school who I could see pretty much with no waiting list when I needed support. My brother was seriously ill - the NHS saved him. My mum was able to do a return to nursing course and restart her career with no problems after a 20 year break. And I too remember a sense of hope and optimism about the place that we just don’t seem to have now. So even though it was a tough time in some ways for me, it felt like a good time too. I was looking at universities, going out clubbing at the weekend, and saving up for the 6am Next sale trip on January 1st with my friends. I wish we could bring some of that hope back into our politics.

The 90's were the best decade there's ever been IMO.

I get this. The generation gap seemed huge then, my parents seemed a completely old generation. I don't think the generation gap is a big in any way nowadays.

I'm in Scotland but they were good days. I was at Uni and life was cheap, full of music festivals, cheap booze, planning travel...just optimistic. I took off to Oz in 1999 and travelled around on next to nothing. Less than a tenner for a night in a hostel. I've got kids now and can't imagine their early 20s being quite the same.

Ah, it was fabulous!! I was at college age 16/17. Had a mobile but you could only text and the text could only be a certain length long.
People weren't sat on their phones at all.
The 90s fashion is definitely coming back as I went in Urban Outfitters with my daughter last weekend!
The Rachel haircut was around then, I had it and then it went into the dead poker straight hair with chunky highlights like Geri Halliwells.
Lots of nights out clubbing
Great music
Was there the Euros around then snd the 3 lions song etc?
No problems getting dental or GP appointments, you didn't feel unsafe.
High streets were booming.

That period of the 90s was the best!

Labour government, Cool Britannia with interesting music, art, films and the country had a good reputation around the world.

House prices and rents were lower (I paid £500 a month for a flat in a lovely, leafy part of London for a decade) and life was so much easier and the cost of living in general more affordable.

London especially just felt less crowded and angry with knife crime not being such an issue as it is now.

The conservative governments after that really brought us back to the dark ages and destroyed our quality of life...

We bought our first house around then. A three bed detached with a large garden for £67,000.

I needed to go back to work because my contract had been terminated due to having a baby. Of course it would have been illegal to fire me for this, but the fact I was absent for 6 weeks meant my 'duties had been absorbed by the rest of the team'.

I had a temp job by the Friday and a part time permanent one by Christmas. Never got paid holiday because the boss closed the office when he went on holiday, so my leave entitlement was swallowed up by his.

500 quid a month rent though, so not all bad, and 30 for council tax, plus 10 each to get ahead on gas and electricity. And my bus pass was £15 a week.

I was only eleven at the time but this was but my favourite time period. I remember the optimism of the time when Labour got in. My parents bought their house and we were all very happy. Music was amazing. My friends and I would call "party chat lines" where you left messages for other callers (hilarious when you are eleven). We used to tape the top 40 and also make our own voice and song recording on tape. I'm so glad we didn't have social media. We also used to prank call the lady in the phone box who reversed the charges for you. Also, remember the talking clock?

Another one in my early twenties, and it felt as though I had been an independent adult for years; hadn’t lived with a parent since I was 17.

I also have fabulous memories of that time. I was living in London in the mid nineties, with heatwaves and Euro 96 and Britpop; smoking numerous spliffs at the mixed swimming ponds at Hampstead Heath. By the late 90s, I had moved to another large UK city.

I had no mobile or internet, some better off friends did but that was a way off for me. Analogue TV and recording things off the telly. Big Breakfast. No reality TV, Big brother was the start IIRC, in about 2000. No Kirstie and Phil either
! 😂 Channel 5 started.

Labour getting in was huge! Everyone I knew was really into politics and election night was electric - ringing friends ‘ OMG did you see see Portillo’s face etc). Politicians did not appear to be quite so corrupt - the big deal was sex scandals and MPs always resigned.

Wages were crap but rent was cheap and everything else was cheap. You could go into a travel agent and get a last minute deal for a couple of hundred quid. Bars and pubs were abundant and we went after work a lot! Everyone smoked everywhere including in the workplace. We used to buy black market baccy from under the counter in the pubs. Pub lock ins.

Lots of greasy spoons around, full breakfast for a couple of quid. Stewed tea from a big pot and instant coffee. I remember going into my first Costa and feeling very sophisticated.

I wasn’t into shopping, but ‘town’ (the city centre) was rammed on a Saturday. No empty shops and all really bustling. The Pier, Woolies, Chelsea Girl/Tammy, BHS, C and A, Miss Selfridge, Athena. I wore Levi 501s men’s or combats with DM boots and ribbed vests, or short dresses over jeans. Glitter on nights out. No one checked ID - I would still travel for half price on trains and buses and then go to pubs etc. I was in my twenties by then, but did this from about 15-25 with no trouble.

Mainly I remember hours whiled away in the big city parks with a group of friends, lots of spliffs and booze being consumed and chatting before going and getting cheap food and chilling round someone’s house. I didn’t know anyone who lived with their parents, and few came from the city I lived in and didn’t see their parents very much. Parents visits were considered a bit of a drag because it involved cleaning up and hiding the dope!

My DD was born in the same year as you OP. In 1999, we bought our current 4 bed house for £127,000 and moved in just before Xmas. We had a massive millennium party that new year’s Eve. Happy days!

Houses were still affordable. There were still decent jobs around. British industry hadn’t been fully dismantled yet, jobs hadn’t yet been exported abroad. Zero hours contracts hadn’t been invented yet. Young people had hope that they could get an education and work hard and succeed. Medical and dental care was freely available as needed. You could even walk safely in the dark. It was just a very hopeful time when people expected to have a decent future.

Of course, at the turn of the century all of our manufacturing and service industries were exported with a corresponding decline in quality. Low paid workers were put on zero hours contracts in order to deprive them of benefits like pension and maternity pay. Student loans were introduced and education slowly became prohibitively expensive. House prices soared and many people had no hope of ever being able to own a home. Medical waiting lists went through the roof and dental care became non existent. The world is much less safe. We didn’t expect things to get worse like this, I think it contributes a lot to depression in the 40-ish age group.

At the risk of sounding like my 11yo: It was absolutely peak, OP. Everyone seemed happier then. Less argumentative and less black and white thinking. Music was fantastic. Lip colours were excellent. Some worries about the ozone but all still living in fairly blissful ignorance about the true extent of damage.
Woolworths was great! Shopping on your high street was great!! 915 was a separate shop and it sold tiny watches that you could wear as a ring. I was doing my GCSEs and I’d wear my tiny watch rings, snog boys, debate the musical integrity of Oasis and work Saturday afternoons in a shoe shop for £3 an hour!
I feel like it was always sunny.

There's a lot of 'it was so cheap for young people ' but there was no minimum wage. My part time job paid £2.20 an hour.

That said work was normal. We all had weekend jobs which we got ourselves to.

At 16 I was quite independent - and my mum knew little of what I was up to.

That said, there was also a lot more teenage pregnancy. I think about six of my form has left to have babies by the end of school.

It was the start of tuition fees for university. Call box in the hall, essentially left to it until Christmas.

It was harder to keep in touch with friends unless you lived very near by. I went to a big sixth form so we were quite spread out. Went off to different unis and didn't see a lot of them again.

I worried about nothing except my love life! Houses were cheap. I think there was a property crash early 90s and it wasn't recovered. I had bought my own flat a couple of years earlier in 1996 for 63k in the first stop in zone 2 (I sold it in 2005 for 180k). Plenty of spare money for going out.

Oh yes, Cool Brittania and the supermodels, esp Kate Moss.

Thursday night drinking after work then Friday we basically did very little at work (Covent Garden... Media!) other than have a fry up with a massive hangover, followed by more drinks free at work on Friday pm then an Indian. Snogging in alleyways.

Oh yeah, casual sexism at work. Men made comments, including bosses. Men made passes on the younger females which was considered totally normal.

I'd just graduated. The euro was coming in and y2k bug was on the horizon so there was loads of work in tech.
Phones were starting to get smaller, Texting was just starting. People spent money on ring tones. Internet was still mostly dial up in the home.
Mortgage interest rates were coming right down and house prices were starting to zoom up.

Friends reunited was the closest thing we had to social media. Amazon had come to the UK and internet shopping was beginning but the high streets were still bustling.
Chain pubs were multiplying like weeds.

Had my first Nandos, and greggs started popping up down south.