Quality of Life Today

[Bugsy]

Now this is not meant to be a party political thing, but I want to know whether people think that life in this country has improved in the last decade. I am feeling particularly hacked off today, hideous commute, crappy project and grumpy toddler pre-work but I think my quality of life is slowly going down the toilet.
Since I started working, some 10 years ago, I've watched the tube service get worse, the train service get worse, local hospitals close departments & wards, traffic congestion increase, parking become more difficult & expensive. One way or another through NI, VAT, road tax my tax burden has increased and I can't help wondering what is going on.
Do other people feel like this, or am I just Mrs Misery today? As I say, I am not trying to get at any one political party but I would be interested to know how others feel about their quality of life in the UK over the last 10 years.

Here, Here Winnie, I too hate to see young girls wearing such t-shirts. My nine year old niece wears them and it looks awful. It can't help her especially as she is quite attractive and has wonderfully long blonde hair. The worst thing is my dd aged 4 likes these tops because they sparkle and asks when she can have one to be like her cousin. At the moment I can get away with, 'These tops are only for big girls' but I am dreading having to face up to this properly when she is older.

I dislike 'pornstar' type clothing too, including shiny mock leather trousers and so on. Yuk. We refer to them as Slut or Slappette Style. I've lost the battle with my almost 15 yr old, though.

I agree that sort of clothing on young girls is awful, but aren't girls maturing earlier and earlier, ie, their periods are starting at a much younger age than in my day (that makes me sound old!)? Does anyone know why this is so, and it can't just be in this country?

I know a few girls of 15 who could easily pass for 18 and they don't try and dress older than their age or wear make-up, it's just how they are.

I agree with what you say about children's clothing.

My 9 year old daughter is still "girly" luckily. Unfortunately, we have difficulty finding clothes she likes in her size as she always picks out "smocked dresses" (yes, honestly) which, for example, in M & S only go up to age 6.

I know one day she will want to start wearing clothes like her school friends, but I am quite happy to see her dressed how she likes to be, rather than following the crowd!

Once she went to a school disco, and all the children (aged 7-9) were dressed in modern "tarty" clothes - my daughter was the only dressed in a "party dress".

I think children grow up and lose their innocence at the ways of the world fast enough without looking like miniature adults.

I also hate seeing babies in "fashion" clothing. I will only dress my 4 month old daughter in what I classify "traditional baby wear", i.e. pretty dresses, all in ones, etc. I will not dress in her miniature fashionable clothing - this is only my personal view but I don't like seeing babies in denim, etc.

Bumblelion, I know how you feel. I was very lucky, my daughter now 15, always wore smocked dresses, summer and winter, until the age of 11! She wore her last one at my mothers 60th birthday, everyone commented how lovely it was to see a girl dressed as a girl, she said, well grandma this is the last time you'll see me in one of these! John Lewis used to do a wonderful range, she happily wore dresses or lovely thick corduroy pinafores from Laura Ashley, with 'mary janes' from Startrite. She had been known to climb a tree with her cousins (all boys) in a tafetta dress with petticoats!

I look desperately for dresses as gifts for people with young girls and can never find anything above age 6 as you say. - Even Harrods was sadly lacking when I was there a few weeks ago.

My son, (much to his horror now,) wore smocked romper suits and tights!! They were lovely tartan Viyella ones! Checked shirts, cords, guernsey sweaters, cricket sweaters, and shorts! I used to get a lot of stuff from the Burberry factory shop, fantastic bargains. They still do smocked dresses up to 12.

I do have the names of a few mail order companies who still mail me who make them, in Liberty fabrics etc and they do up to age 12, but can be a bit pricey. Let me know if you are interested and I'll dig them out.4

I hate seeing small children in black, I wasn't allowed to have anything black until I was a teenager!!

I think iam the opposite of you allibubbes and Bumblelion.
Although i agree i hate to see "Tarty" clothes an little girls,.I do dress my my dd in quite trendy clothes.
I did get her a couple of smocked type dresses last summer, which she wore to parties and her brothers communion but other than that i dress her in the latest fashions.

I admit it is an obssesion of mine and dd has easily more clothes than myself.

I do hate though black on a child or those horrible tops that show midriff. Anything even slightly tarty is a definite no no.

i shop a lot at baby gap and love DKNY and Kenzo.
Iam afraid Iam going to be a soft touch when she is older on the clothes front.

Agree with all the comments about clothing for girls. Does anyone feel the same as me about ear piercing? I wasn't allowed mine done until I was 16 and these days girls seem to have them done at about 10! Am I an old fogey?

WWW, i agree! I hate to see children with there ears pieced. There is one little girl who goes to my playgroup she is the same age as my dd[22mths] and she has had her ears piearced for about 5 mths now. She also wears a gold chain and a ring.
Apparently she got the gold chain for christnas. She must have been delighted on chistmas morning!!
i just think it is so cruel. i hate putting my poor baby through the pain of immunisations but to think some parents put there babies through the pain of piercings....I just can't understand it.

I agree batters, with the cultural aspect! But i don't think this is the case with the baby in my playgroup.

Batters, unfortunately yes I have seen an eight year old with the aforementioned t-shirt (although it was sometime ago now)! The reason it is at the forfront of my mind is that I am playing wicked witch of the north, east, west & south at the moment as my daughter (12) came home from a shopping trip in half term with a t-shirt with Kinky (and various other words) written on it. She had the sense to show me at the same time as telling me she was taking it back to exchange it. Basically she was with all of her friends and they thought it was 'cool' so she purchased it all the while knowing she'd never be allowed to wear it! Am I unreasonable? Possibly... but I simply believe that she is still too young for this kind of thing. Maybe i am being naive but I don't think she has any idea about the meaning of several of the words! I felt a little disappointed that she'd given in to peer pressure in this way although I am glad that she had the sense to suggest returning it herself. I don't usually comment on her choice of clothes now as we more often than not like very different things (infact she has more in common clothes wise with my mother ... but that's another story) the point is I've learnt to relax about clothes I don't like issue (children in black was one of them... and yet black is the staple colour in my wardrobe)...there are only a few things I put my foot down about and this was one of them, the other is 4 and 5 inch heels on shoes!!!!!!

We seemed to have veered off "Quality of Life Today", but another pet hate of mine is those horrible jelly (plastic) shoes with heels. Absolutely disgusting. The only time I let my children wear jellies is when we are on holiday and the sand is too hot and even now I prefer those surfing shoes that are now so readily available.

Going back to Bugsy's original post, the Government has four themes they use as Quality of Life Indicators, under which are various headlines.

The four themes are:

Maintaining high and stable levels of economic growth and employment.

Social progress which recognises the needs of everyone

Effective protection of the environment

Prudent use of natural resources.

The various headline indicators cover economic growth and job opportunities; poverty, crime reduction; reduction in greenhouse gases; reduction in air pollution; improvement in transport; access to education; reusing previously developed land to protect the countryside and waste minimisation, recycling and recovery.

Each of these headlines makes up a quality of life barometer and is asessed to see if it is moving in the right direction.

If you want to know more than have a look at www.sustainable-development.gov.uk under Quality of Life Counts. Its very interesting. I work for a charity and we are directly responsible for one of the headline indicators. To me it indicates that issues are recognised and are being addressed, though we aren't perhaps as aware as we should be of action being taken on our behalf.

EmmaM, that is really interesting... I will have a look. I have to say that my perception (although in reality I may be wrong) is that the environmental responsibilities and sustainability are far from improving...as for 'Social progress which recognises the needs of everyone', what on earth does that mean? It seems to encompass everything and nothing at the same time (if you know what I mean)... why does that word 'spin' suddenly come to mind?

On the subject of quality of life today, I am curious to know if others feel that having a social conscience seems to be about 'image' rather than substance today... or maybe I am just looking at the past through rose tinted spectacles

EmmaM, maybe you answered my final point in your last line... "To me it indicates that issues are recognised and are being addressed, though we aren't perhaps as aware as we should be of action being taken on our behalf."

I am going to go away and ponder this some more ...

EmmaM, thank you for your post. I'm going to go off and check out the site you mentioned and see what I think.

OK EmmaM, I've just been scouring through the Sustainable Government website. It was very interesting but I thought that alot of the indicator information seemed very out of date. I don't know if I was looking in the wrong places but there were lots of fine sentiments expressed in press releases and outline strategies but I couldn't see much evidence of concrete projects. I also thought some of the indicators were slightly lacking in clear definitions.
Obviously, I haven't spent hours looking through the site, so I could have missed stuff. Given that your work is connected with these indicators, what do you think about it?

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Hi Bugsy. The indicator I am most interested in is the effective protection of the environment, particularly the element of population of wild birds. I know the intensive work going on to reverse the declines in farmland and woodland birds and the huge amount of research involved. Because of my particular involvement, I know the timescales attached to these indicators are very long. I believe the reversion in decline of birds is set by the Government for something like 2020, however, we have our own timescale for reversing decline in some species which is much much shorter. There are also many organisations working on all these indicators that are not government related.

There are no quick fixes to any of the problems/solutions in these indicators. However, if we seek the answers for our particular concerns then I do think we will see progress. Unfortunately, most of our daily sources for information is via the media and links are not made to these quality of life indicators. I agree the sustainable development website does not make it easy to find out the work in progress.

Its knowing where to look and the level of your interest/concern to get the answers you want. Working for a non-governmental organisation I am hugely aware of the considerable work carried out by charities that perhaps the general public aren't aware feed into wider scale projects and government objectives.

Just had to put a fashion comment in (sorry folks, if this is misplaced now the conversation has gone all intellectual again) but my 2 little girls wear lots of black, including fantastic black embroidered "smocked dresses" from H&M and various black velvet numbers from Monsoon and I think they look gorgeous - like baby beatniks. Maybe I should coin a new phrase - Romany chic or something?

Robin w. Please don't be concerned about bad behaviour from mumsnetters!! I really don't know why you keep bringing this up on various threads??
On another one you said that certain people on mumsnet were probably badly brought up and that explained a lot of things.
I may be being paronoid here but as we have locked horns in the past I can't help but feel as if you may be talking about me??
I apologise if Iam way off mark here but to honest your the comments you keep making like below have upset me to the point I actually didnt even switch the pc on yesterday.
I know its probably just my preggo hormones making me feel worse but i feel I just have to ask if it is me you are talking about?
Iam just feeling a bit uneasy posting on mumsnet at the moment ,I feel a bit like a stalker is taking digs all the time. I honestly from the heart never mean to cause offence, I realise some of my posts might have but again I'll have to blame my hormones!!
I could really do with posting here lately as hubby works away and I have a young toddler and am newely pregnant and there is so many wonderful women here who have given me great advice and company.
Anway, again I apologise for any offence robin w and I know Iam probably over exaggagerating here[i seem to be in tears at slightest thing at the moment]
Just wanted to clear the air.

Iam sitting here now worrying if my post below comes across as i intented[told you i was paronoid] please it is with the best intentions!

Callie please don't worry about being in tears at the slightest thing at the moment and generally feeling sensitive - only eight more months to go and if you are anything like me it will probably get worse! You have my sympathies.
I just got an email from my midwife saying "what a pity you did not have the baby last night as we had NO patients" and that sent me into tears! I have been miserable all day. Whereas yesterday I was full of the joys and even went for a drive in the snow at midnight, singing at the top of my voice.Yesterday dh was the world's most wonderful man...today I am planning the divorce....
Argh! They definately don't mention this aspect in the pregnancy magazines.

Dear Callie, if you look on the 'bereavement and death' thread, you will see that Robinw is coping with some rather difficult issues at the moment. I didn't want you to be upset if she doesn't see your message, or for you to think you were being ignored, especially when you're feeling so fragile. And DON'T stop posting; if you need us we are here.

Thanks Mooma!! I hadn't seen that thread, of course I understand!! Thanks for pointing it out.