To be depressed about how expensive but shyt the UK is

[OptimismvsRealism]

God it's expensive God it's shit

Please regale me with examples of how other places are also shit and it's not just here

Waiting time is much shorter here, fill out a right to choose form and send it to your GP https://psychiatry-uk.com/right-to-choose/

People always think the grass is greener. It never is. I work in the NHS (gasp) with an incredibly diverse range of people from all over the world. Plenty of them are from “desirable” countries (Aus, NZ, etc) but love it here and don’t want to return ‘home’. Costs here are fantastic to other parts of the world. We don’t have extremes of weather. We are taxed a lot but ultimately benefit from the NHS through it; the alternative is spending thousands on health insurance per month. We have no gun crime. Generally speaking our schools are safe. We have fantastic LGBT rights. Far right movements are generally frowned upon by the majority.

I would take living here over most places and I’m pretty well traveled.

@BigSkies2022 I can't read that. Can you at least copy and paste so I can check you are not misunderstanding the article? The budget set by Hampshire Council which is publicly available, looks very different to your figures. Thanks.
Statutory social care is only for those who can not afford to pay. Or continuing health care for medical needs, and that is very hard to get.

Agree with your post, young dc do more now at school, it's outside school where there can be more effort put in

Spain doesn't have extremes of weather. I lived in Spain for two years. And it just had nice weather all year. There was no heatwave in the summer

I know this makes sense for an individual, but it simply increases costs in our taxes. Mainly middle class families get private assessments paid for through taxes. Whilst people with very severe mental health issues who have no family to fight for them get poor services. It is things like this that affect services negatively.

Totally agree. Many decades ago I started school at 4.5 and sat at a desk from day one. But outside school I was incredibly active. We walked everywhere as a family and I played outside in the garden or later the street for hours at a time.

It’s shit - I have no idea why people keep on saying it’s great…

NHS is no longer fit for purpose - 6 months for a cancer diagnosis, half in the mind to claim compensation! And do not tell me it’s free I pay for it via my shit load taxes…

You have a bunch of clowns running the country lining their own pockets both Labour and the Tories

No investment in schools, infrastructure health and social care…

The cost of living has grown so much exponentially that even earning double what I did 10 years ago means I still have fuck all.

The weather is awful always grey and rain!

Just waiting to see how much more fucked I will be next week when they announce the budget 🤷‍♀️

Id happily fuck off to Sweden/the EU but some idiots voted to leave the EU so the UK is classed as a 3rd world country to them and getting a visa is nigh on impossible…

Spain isn’t free of problems at all, same as anywhere else in the world. Youth unemployment and poor wages for example. My ex was Spanish. Like loads of other young Spaniards they leave in their droves as it’s still very conservative there.

The school system badly needs to be updated

So move then? France is even worse!

Yes of course Spain has problems.
But so does the UK

Ive lived in both places. And I felt so much happier in Spain.

How can she just move to France, after Brexit?

The UK doesn't have the right to move to EU countries anymore.

Okay. Let's think about the States for a moment. I have rich, British born friends who live there and like some of it. BUT a family member who would be classed as middle income lived there for years. His wife was diagnosed with a life limiting illness that brings diabetes in its wake. They were insured. Fine. But the insurance company would only pay for a very basic drug to control diabetes, but not the sort of diabetes she has. This affected her health so much that she had to take time off work (an otherwise blameless work record). Work wasn't happy so they 'let her go'. So now she's ill and jobless. Because she's jobless, she has no insurance as the insurance came with her work package. To fund her prescriptions and treatment, they'd have had to sell their house. This is not a wind up. So they moved to Europe. Otherwise they'd have ended up in one of the tent cities springing up in the States. And this is a normal couple, leading normal lives earning a modest but perfectly acceptable wage. Thankfully their children have left home.....Our NHS is on its knees. Some of us have to self fund to avoid long waiting lists. But nothing's as bad as what is happening in the States.

And that’s ok. I’d love to retire to somewhere like Spain, that would be a dream. I wouldn’t like to be a young working professional with kids over there as it’s not my vibe.

TBF I've paid £3 for a single apple at a greengrocers in Primrose Hill

Apart from all the obvious complaints, which I agree with.

What I dislike about the UK is all the rows of tiny little terraced houses, that are the same colour, and look exactly the same.

It's like a prison formation of prison units.

Other countries have a much larger variety of housing. Different styles and different colour of houses

Visas

If I didn't have the lovely neighbours and supportive friends that I have, if I had no money (like in the past), I would agree with you because this country can be bleak in terms of weather and financially and lack of connection. I hate the dank weather at the moment but what I just mentioned makes it better.

Which are not easy to get!

You can't just pick up a visa when you want. You have to meet certain criteria. And for some visas the employer has to sponsor you.

I know an English girl who was trying to get a job in Spain.

She couldn't do it as it was too hard for her to get the visa.

Many people do it, there's lots of countries in the world and lots of different criteria. If she's that bothered and hates it here so much then it is an option.

If you think food is expensive here, try a supermarket shop in France. Eating out in Australia /New Zealand requires a 2nd mortgage.

The weather here (North of England) has been lovely the last couple of days, and is forecast beautiful next week.

I believe wages are much higher in the States, though.

Maybe it's the area of the country you are living in. Shift 300 miles and where does that put you?

Could she speak fluent Spanish, fluent enough to work in a professional environment with technical language?

We have lots of European staff in our team, they had no issues getting visas but had to prove their level of English to do so.