Why is the UK such a bad place to be a child?

[Rantum]

Unicef's survey of 21 industrialised countries looked at 40 indicators including family relationships, health and poverty and the UK came BOTTOM for the well-being of children. We are a country of relative wealth so why are we failing our children?

belgo- really?

The UK has some absolutely stunning landscape, and great culture, making it perfect for holidays.

Could someone send this thread to Mr Blair and Mr Brown purlease!

Belog, those stunning landscapes are being swallowed up daily by greedy developers cramming as many cheap shoddy built houses on them as possible, which will be sold to the higest bidder - sorry but your UK beautiful is vanishing under a load of modern housing estates!

'Belgo'

absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that.

I think the feelings of disgruntled parents are rubbing off on the kids, we are teaching them to dislike what we dislike about living here without even noticing it.

If it isnt a worthy place to exist then why should we bother type of stance.

I cant wait to bog off to France.

where my in-laws live in kent has been a giant building site (widening of A2, building bluewater, building eurotunnelk train link, moving a2 etc etc) since I can remember, certainly the 7 years since we moved away. It is a horror mess of diggers and cones and temporary road markings. The congestion is a nightmare.

I like to come back to visit, but the family not the countra, although I would love to go to london a couple of times with the kids. I get pangs when I see London eye and big ben on tele. Then I wake up and realise I'm going mad, and thank my lucky starts I'm here

I tried to explain this to my expat friend who lives in a particularly beautiful part of California surrounded by mountains and free parks where Dads play softball with their children on weekends and families gather for impromptu cookouts and the local town (where everyone walks to - the parking spaces are always vacant and the traffic minimal) has cafes, independently owned shops and a tiny theatre.

He was homesick and considering moving back to England. I explained to him that the England of his nostalgic memory is just that - a nostalgic memory. My local town is a no-go area on a Friday or Saturday night and Sundays it is full of surly teenage boys on mountain bikes gathering in large groups whilst the shops are closed and protected by vandalised grilles. There are more closed-down businesses than active ones and you can drive for hours without seeing open countryside that does not have some development on it - England is now just a giant suburbia. My DD went for 7 weeks without a school because we had to suddenly move during the summer holidays and no place could be found until mid-October. DH and I, despite earning a decent amount of money, work in excess of 100 hours per week between us to earn it and still could never afford a house. I could go on, but it is depressing me.

all countries have their problems and pitfalls of living there.
I would settle for more genuine effort from councils to provide safe places fr kids to run, play, have fun, etc instead of every little spare inch of land being built on. New houses allow no provacy from neighbours, no sound-proofing etc, no 'outdoos space' so consquently everyone hates their neighbours as everyone gets pissed off with feeling like they live in a shoebaox. this leads to intolerance, antisocial behaviour, alientation, etc etc etc.
I fell in love with Amsetdamw hen I visited cos there was a play area at the end of virtually every street, and every neighbourhood had a cafe/reastaurant (not a frigging KFC) where whole streets of neighbours congregated ona Friday night.
Round here, the only green space is covered in dog shit. And when my friend raised thousands of pounds to build a local playpark (the nearest park is a half hour walk away) in memory of her dead daughter, the council just laughed at her and said 'regulations' meant that no play facilities could be situated within 100ft of any residential proerty and besides, any spare space was designated as housing.

I know this sounds relatively petty, but I am convinced that an awful lot of society's ills could be helped by more community spirit and a sense of belonging and pride which today's society just cannot provide...

I agree filthy minded vixen.

Houses?

This place is literally end to end flats, mostly of the shoebox variety, crammed into a space the size of a golf course.

filthy you are so right.

I would relate it all back to the 80s- the massive overbearing ethic of individualism which Blair still pays tribute to.

We are definitely becoming a sort of dormitory-suburb country which stocks obedient overworking employees for the multinationals. And most of London is a playground for the international rich.

Oh, I love it.

It's hard to develop any sense of community when all the housing is buy to let, overpriced flats, meaning people come and go every six months when their landlords decide to sell up or hike the rents.

here every block of flats (and most housing is flats, but they're all, well everyone I've ever been in, well maintained, clean, well sound-proofed etc, ) every block has it's own play ground & garden, this is compulsory, so in 1 street there may be 4 playgrounds. We have a house, 17 new ones built together in 1 street, so we have our own playground. The neighbours organise various things during the year ( shared meal (at the playground) for August 1 st - national day, santa comes on 6th december with oranges, nuts & gingerbread for the kids, loads of different things) the 2 points I'm trying to make are -

1. community spirit, helping out, regular community events, joining in, looking after each other etc are big, in grained, normal and have a big impact on the feeling of well-being and belonging.
2. children's right and need to play, and be together and be outside is enshrined. It is important, invaluable. It is scandalous that there are so few good, clean and safe places for kids to play.

Where I used to live in London it would take me 40 minues to walk to the park. i could've got a bus only half way, but then there was the hassle of folding up the pushchair etc. It just wasn't worth it a lot of the time. And obviously the kids just couldn't go out and play.

The fear parents have for their children is really tangibla. It's really noticable and striking how much more relaxed parents are with their children, and the freedom they're allowed. A british woman (teacher) I met on holiday in a french campsite was really struck at the difference, bnot just our family, but most of the others (mainly dutch).

There's no way children can play safely outdoors around here.

NONE of the blocks of flats being put here has a play area or garden, they all have car parks instead.

The park over the road is fine if you take them during the day, but get out by sundown when the vice girls come out.

That's good ole' british town planning for you. Pedestrianize the shopping areas (thus making them no-go areas at night) and fire up new houses here there and everywhere without a decent supporting structure for a community. They only think to put rooves over heads - not about leisure, recreation and community (not important).

How many new houses (if they are lucky enough to have a garden)have gardens the size of postage stamps? It's all about cramming as many houses as possible into the space. Any with room are way beyond the reach of any reasonable income.

You rarely see a house at all here. You rarely see any sort of garden, especially in new build flats.

That's true, Fio. We're stuck here.

fio has it spot on as per usual - she usually is right y' know!

so maybe the qwuestion is

is the UK not MC friendly anymore?

i have heard recent reports that sugest its harder for the MCs financially in this country than it wouldbe in another.

The survey said the only place in the developed world that scored worse, according to its measurements, was the US. i think that suggests the problem is partly to do with consumerism, small government and free market economics. Since Thatcher we've been encouraged to think all that matters is ourselves, and to want pointless goods. Spending money on education and other public services is seen as some kind of weakness, and valueing those things is seen as soft by a lot of people. On top of that, there is a culture of children not being seen as people, but as a problem, especially teenagers - there's endless handwringing and stupid laws to attempt to deal with "yobs" but very little public effort and funding to give them things to do and give them some self-respect.

I remember in the 80s I went on an exchange to Germany and was amazed and very jealous to find their high school had carpets throughout, nice bookshelves and pictures, and at break time it was up to you if you wanted to hang out in the hall chatting or reading, do some work in a classroom or go outside. At our school we were basically treated as criminals at break time, chased outside, and banned from entering the building, which was cold, miserable and soulless. Now I was a good kid who would have used that time to read or catch up on my work, and it pissed me off. What does that attitude do to children who already have low self-esteem, learning problems or a damaging family life?

Well if it's not MC friendly that's the working poor totally b*ggered.

true