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?

It's very subjective: I live in an outer borough of London which has at various points had both a London and a Kent postcode depending on where borough boundaries were drawn.

I think of it as being London, only just but still definitely London, not Kent. And if my friends from Scotland or Manchester came to stay with me I'm quite sure they would say I live in London.

But one of my babysitters, who lives five minutes down the road, talks about going "up London", and clearly doesn't think of herself as a Londoner.

But in no conceivable universe could Croydon or Romford be described as being in London. And that's not a snob thing at all, there's no cachet ascribed to living in either of those places. They are just not London.

@Blossomhill123 probably Collier Row or similar!

I am in a London borough that’s “really” Surrey. I don’t think you could make a good case that it’s not actually London, because obviously it is. But you could make a good case that it doesn’t feel like London and is Surrey at heart.

The definition of London is legally defined. I don't understand why there is any confusion.

If you pay your council tax to "London borough of". Some of the London boroughs may have Essex, Kent, middx or Surrey postcodes, or may not even have 020 numbers. These are hangovers from the previous london boundary, which was extended in 1965. The m25 is nothing to do with the boundary of London. That's just wishful thinking!

Blossomhill123 it shouldn't say Essex in your address but a lot of people put it there. It isn't needed, you don't need to include it. The postal area for RM postcodes is Romford - not Essex.
I'm also in Havering and for me it is London - I grew up in Walthamstow and for me, Romford reminds me of home 20 years ago. It's a London borough, TfL rail, red buses, Met police, etc.
For me it's the best of both worlds - I can be at Liverpool Street in 30 minutes, I'm also 5 minutes from the forest.
Judging by the amount of people I end up chatting to who moved here from Walthamstow, Hackney, Bow etc, there are a lot more "born and bred" Londoners living in Zone 6 now than further in!

thepeopleversuswork Romford is in the London Borough of Havering. How is it not London?

AwkwardPaws27

I thought Romford was in Essex?

But Croydon is in London, it's in the LONDON BOROUGH of Croydon! As AntiHop says the area of London is legally defined. Yes some of these places may be on the outskirts of London, yes they may have historical/cultural links to other places which are not in London and yes they may not "feel" like London, but legally it's clearly defined what is London and what is not London.

And yes, TFL run some services beyond the legal boundaries of London and the Met Police may exercise jurisdiction, but these on their own do not mean that an area is within London.

@ AwkwardPaws27
It says Essex on my house deeds . I’m in Hornchurch.

Romforf was transferred from Essex to the London borough of Havering in 1965. It may "feel" like Essex, but legally it's in London and has been in London for 55 years.

@thepeopleversuswork it’s in the London Borough of Havering, so technically London. DH grew up there and thinks of himself as from Essex, although of course we all know intellectually it’s actually London.

His parents grew up in Bow/West Ham, and saw themselves as people who had moved to Essex.

That should be Romford of course!

AwkwardPaws27

I stand corrected: I always thought Romford was in Essex.

Technically it may be London but it doesn't feel like London to me. Ditto Croydon.

In my experience born and bred Londoners understand why, gentrifiers/outsiders don’t

Someone needs to sort this out seriously.

Why don’t they just reclassify the postcodes. I mean they kept the postcodes to avoid confusion but at this point I think it’s more confusing.

All areas in London Boroughs should be given a London postcode.

So Rompford, London

There was a super interesting post on here once about postcodes. Apparently they got rid of the NE and S London postcodes but didn’t tell the residents for years!

londonist.com/2015/08/why-is-there-no-ne-or-s-london-postcode-district

I voted YABU Because I live in Greater London not London.

@DGRossetti

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 ...

Pinner and Harrow are in Middlesex. If a resident of these places tried to tell me they lived in London, I would laugh at them.

Blossomhill123 was your house built before 1965? I imagine that's why but if not I'm stumped 😂

@AwkwardPaws27

thepeopleversuswork Romford is in the London Borough of Havering. How is it not London?

I went to school in Romford. It's ESSEX.

As an ex native of Havering (waves to locals) who now lives in Bexley (another London borough that's not exactly London), this always gets people's backs up.

Unless you're local to Havering, no one has a clue where it is - people know Romford, but Havering they all look blank. You can't say London, or even East London, although it's a London borough, because people then ask where and expect you to say Bow or Stratford (which are classed as London) rather than Elm Park or Hornchurch, which are not.

It's worse in Kent the part of London I now live. We have a Dartford (not London - Kent) postcode, but London 0208 phone numbers! And again I could never call it London. I live a mile from the 'Welcome to Kent' sign but sadly for current purposes I'm the Tier 2 side of it.

Sometimes I say Greater London but feel a bit of a div. Often I just say 'near Dartford' and leave it at that without getting into the Kent/ London shizz!

But Middlesex doesn’t exist anymore. Harrow is a London Borough. It has multiple tube stations.

To me that’s London and I grew up very central in Camden.

Surrey, Kent, Essex etc aren’t part of postal addresses. Just for the record.

I do agree that outer and inner London are different in character. Outer London takes up about 80% of the area of London but some people don’t seem to understand what most of London looks like: suburban.

MariahLynn the postcode is to do with postal area though (although I agree it adds to confusion!).
The "London Borough" naming should surely clear up the issue without the added expense of changing all the postal areas, but I think some people just prefer to pretend it's still 1964

But Middlesex doesn't exist anymore and both Pinner and Harrow are in the London borough of Harrow.