To think if you live in a London Borough you live in London

[MariahLynn]

Saw this on twitter and thought about it twitter.com/yougov/status/1319226163278057472?s=21

Why does this create such controversy?

Surely If you live in a London Borough you are part of London.

I can’t see how anyone can live somewhere which has red buses, can vote for London mayor, pays council tax to a London Borough and maintain they live in Essex or Kent or Surrey.

Is it about pretending to be posher?

I can’t see how anyone can live somewhere which has red buses, can vote for London mayor, pays council tax to a London Borough and maintain they live in Essex or Kent or Surrey.

I can. As someone who lived in South Harrow, but whose neighbours lived in "Pinner" (where the house prices are higher ....)

Personally (and I'm not really going to argue it) the moment they closed the M25 in 1986, then everything inside it's orbit became "London". Why would it not ? It's one definition that is beyond discussion, unless anyone has a house under (or over) it ...

Certain addresses are still most definitely Middlesex

Watford is in Hertfordshire. It’s a separate town to London, though on the border. I couldn’t care less what others think, though.

Woldingham- inside the M25 and really not in London

But the M25 isn’t the London Boroughs boundary though.

So you can be inside M25 but not part of London and Id agree. But surely a London Borough makes you London.

It's one definition that is beyond discussion - except, DGRossetti, as the OP implies, all definitions are up for discussion, and that's what creates the controversy: some want to have a pedantic definition based on local authority (London boroughs), but others will have vaguer definitions (partly down to whether it "feels" like London). Then everyone who cares about their definition will argue with everyone with a different definition.

I grew up in a London Borough, but my postal address said Kent, and my phone number was a Dartford code. I felt like a Londoner (a bit) and a person from Kent (a bit). I'm not going to criticise others on whether they want to say they are from London or not.

I suppose, like many things, it’s more about what most people think and feel than just about what you think. But I can see what you mean.

Outer London Boroughs often don't have a London postcode, or "London" in their correct address.

In any case these Boroughs were created in the sixties as local government units, and not to define an area to be known as "London".

However all the Boroughs, and The City of London together are "Greater London".

Whether someone living in say Romford is living in London is doubtful, though they are in a London Borough.

Of course they do. It's usually about house prices and/or status.

We have people here who live less than a minute's walk from X town rail station but insist they live in Y town, which just happens to have, overall, better schools, higher house prices and fewer social problems but not in the bit in X town close to X station

I totally get the emotional aspect - having decamped to the West Midlands nearly 25 years ago, I still hear people grumbling about the 1974 boundary review (that created "Sandwell" not Dudley, and pulled Sutton Coldfield into "Birmingham"

But arbitrary lines on a map are one thing (although I suspect you'd find plenty of victims of British Imperialism that would say otherwise). 25 metre ribbons of tarmac in a circle are a somewhat different matter. After all, no amount of bleating from the people of Kent is going to ever put Kent in France. And similarly, I really don't care how English the good burghers of Calais feel they ain't going to disappear 22 miles of sea that easily.

In my mind, outer London boroughs aren't really part of London (except administratively). They don't have London postcodes. They generally have a more defined area/centre (though not always). They usually have more green space (again not always). We live close to two outer London boroughs but ourselves are in Surrey and the border is pretty arbitrary really. So depends on the reason for the question - yes admnistratively they are in London but historically and culturally I don't think they are.

yes administratively they are in London but historically and culturally I don't think they are.

History and culture can change ... remarkably quickly at times.

I like in Croydon and that is definitely not trying to be posher.

Normally if you say Croydon is London everyone laughs. Even though it technically is, we don’t have a London postcode

It’s annoying at the moment because our CV rate is relatively low - way below the national average and below a lot of rural areas - and suddenly we’ve been lumped in with central London etc in Tier 2.

the moment they closed the M25 in 1986, then everything inside it's orbit became "London". Why would it not ? It's one definition that is beyond discussion

Except for the fact it isn't true.

@SoupDragon

the moment they closed the M25 in 1986, then everything inside it's orbit became "London". Why would it not ? It's one definition that is beyond discussion

Except for the fact it isn't true.

Did the quotes not alert you to a personal view ?

Or did I get the date wrong ?

When I lived in an SW postcode I considered that I lived in central London
when I moved to an SE postcode we used to catch the train up to London

Did the quotes not alert you to a personal view ?

Personal views can still be wrong.

@SoupDragon

Did the quotes not alert you to a personal view ?

Personal views can still be wrong.

Try telling a Christian. Or Muslim. Or indeed an atheist ....

Some London boroughs are really far from London. I don't see how Barking qualifies as London. Ilford used to be Essex when I was growing up, Croydon used to be Surrey. Someone said on the TV yesterday that they lived in Hornchurch in "North East London" FFS!

Try telling a Christian. Or Muslim. Or indeed an atheist ....

How is that relevant?

It is an actual fact that "inside the M25" does not equal "London" by any stretch of the definition.

I tend to think of London as anywhere with a London postcode.

You could say "New Zealand is part of Australia" but that doesn't make it true.

I live inside the M25 (just!) but am definitely not London. London is about 2 miles down the road and is a very different place. It has London type street signs, and gets to vote for the Mayor.

I live in what used to be called Essex but they keep trying to call it London Borough of Havering .

To me "London Borough" is posher than Essex

Love Essex TBF

I live and work in Manchester. A couple of years ago I went on a supervised home visit with a patient who lived in London. Or what we said was London, given her address and all that. Her community social worker joined us for part of the visit and commented on the long day, one of us said something about yes, it really was a long day for us driving to and from London either side of the visit and she got quite shirtily insistent that this wasn't really London at all. We were all looking at one another making "wtf?" faces. Who cares? Cities expand, maybe the area very definitely wasn't London once, bloody well seems to be now!