The UK is fine, honestly.

The Tory saga was mostly caused by Brexit and poor handling of Covid. Theresa May was ousted by Boris Johnson over Brexit, Johnson was ousted for hosting parties at number 10, whilst Covid lockdowns were in-place, and poor party management (ironically). Liz Truss tanked the UK bond market by thinking she could present an unfunded budget full of tax cuts for the rich, she didn't last as long as a lettuce. Rishi Sunak only had a short time before the next election, so didn't really get a chance to bed in, but he was seen to be grossly out-of-touch.

Now we're into the Labour saga: Kier Starmer seemed to actually be doing OK, but he didn't tell anybody about it. Then had a number of U-turns that made him look weak to the country and especially his back-benchers. He was a decent technocrat, but it's clear someone like that can't exist in this modern fast-comms world. The online vitriol against him was unbelievably disproportionate to his performance.

Now we have Andy Burnham, who seems to know how to flood-the-zone (Trump style) without being a bigoted, corrupt, criminal, paedophile. So his communications seem to be carrying a honeymoon period, for now. But the press in the Uk is mostly right-wing biased, so you can expect the attacks to start soon.

In many ways you could argue all of those prime ministers deserved to go and it actually shows 'The UK' will get rid of you if it's not working. They weren't good enough and our main parties have mechanisms to get rid of you if it's not working out.

Outside of that, the UK's biggest problem is its debt and the fact we left the EU. Which is tightening the budget and making it difficult for any government to put money into things that are visible to the average voter. This makes governing especially hard right now.

Oh, and the clear targeted propaganda from hard right-wing organisations, Elon Musk, Russia, and Iran are clearly trying to destabalise the UK on the beloved free-speech platforms of America. It's absolute poison day-in, day-out. And unfortunately, some people fall for it, and end up voting for assets like Nigel Farage. But that isn't real life. Or, at least, the beloved free-speech platforms of America don't represent the the UK in any true form.

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robbomacrae 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

“Kier Starmer seemed to actually be doing OK” as someone who voted for his Labour I was immediately regretting it when they tried to force Apple to open a backdoor and they are still trying! https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/10/uk-still-trying-backdo...

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rcxdude 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Privacy concerns have pretty broad opposition in the UK, unfortunately.

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vkou 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Your single-issue concerns are valid, but most people view an executive office's performance as a holistic union of their stances on issues.

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robbomacrae 11 hours ago | parent [-]

I’m not a single issue voter but the sheer incompetence of this particular decision is just too damning. It rightly caused friction with our 5 eyes partners. I would expect readers of hackernews to appreciate how dumb and impossible the request was.

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louthy 11 hours ago | parent [-]

> "It rightly caused friction with our 5 eyes partners"

That is such a weird take. "It rightly caused friction with Privacy International" might be a better position to take ;)

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robbomacrae 11 hours ago | parent [-]

We were demanding the ability to spy on the citizens of our closest allies.

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mrguyorama 10 hours ago | parent [-]

That is the entire point of FiveEyes. That is a feature.

The US is technically not allowed to spy on it's own citizens. However, legally speaking, if the UK spies on your citizens and forwards whatever is interesting, it's not the US spying on it's own citizens.

You say this like the FBI hasn't asked Apple for a back door before here in the US

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robbomacrae 9 hours ago | parent [-]

Then why (and I'm not saying I like the guy) did JD Vance come out so publicly against it? I mean you could certainly argue that was all theater and the UK was indeed doing the US's bidding but at some point you have to apply Occam's razor. The end result is Apple don't offer Advanced Data Protection (encryption) to UK users iCloud backups so its not like that "feature" has worked out.

	▲	louthy 8 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> I mean you could certainly argue that was all theater It was all theatre.

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8note 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Is the UK actually doing fine? as far as ive read and heard the quality of life has been on the decline since 2014 at least

	▲	louthy 11 hours ago \| parent [-]
		And what are you reading and listening to? It's the fifth-largest economy on Earth. Considering the ridiculous self-harm incident that was Brexit, that's not exactly a bad position to be in. The rest is governance (and debt payments). What happened in 2014? Nothing of note. Quality of Life for most people is how much free cash they have at the end of the month to enjoy life (the UK has low crime, good employee protections, decent education system, universal healthcare, childcare provision and pretty good public services, therefore QoL is mostly about spare cash). So, what has reduced the cash in the pocket? Increased property values up to around 2020. They've been steadily reducing since (in real terms). Inflation: post Global Financial Crisis, the UK government was quantative easing, trying to inflate their debts away, which reduces the value of everybody's wage. Then the oil spike because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. And then there's the debt, which reduces government spending (GFC again and Covid). And finally, Brexit, knocking 6% off GDP. So, yeah, that's reduced the spare cash for many, which increases the stress for many. But it's also not really a UK problem (other than Brexit, which could have been avoided). I'm sure the decade after the Great Depression was tough for many too. But I'd definitely argue that the UK is not really in a bad position. It's a grown up country, with grown up institutions, life isn't bad in the UK. It only appears bad if you live online. I spent my 20s in late 1990s and early 2000s London. It was fucking awesome. I wasn't earning much at all (£19,000) when I first moved, but I lived in Highgate and was out every night of the week, enjoying life in London. The main difference I see between then and now: cost of housing, UK debt levels, and the UK was in the EU. To 'fix' the current issues, it seems we need: * To build many more houses. It could do this by starting a government funded house builder. It is clear the main house-builders are sitting on land banks and not building enough housing. So we should start our own and use compulsory purchase to acquire land-banks for building. The additional supply should help reduce house prices over time. It could also go along with a massive trades apprenticeship programme, improving employment, and reducing the astronomical costs of getting anything built. * Ban foreign ownership of residential property and all companies that own residential property must be based in the UK. With all taxes from companies holding residential property to go directly to government funded house building. * Rent pricing control: yearly rent rises to be capped by inflation. So, over time this will start to feel a bit better for the average renter and they have more confidence in future costs. * Pay down the UK debt as quickly as possible. This is harder to solve when there's no spare cash in the coffers. My suggestion: rejoin the EU and use the 6% of additional GDP to pay down the national debt to more manageable levels as quickly as possible. * There's a political debate over mining the remaining oil in the North Sea. In reality it won't be economically realistic in about 12 years. So, put all North Sea oil revenues into a Sovereign Wealth Fund asap. * Transition to a fully renewable/nuclear grid asap. The price of energy is too high and the quicker we get there the better, even if there's some short-term pain. We have got to stop being in-hoc to the whims of megalomaniacs like Putin and Trump. We, of course, don't have the post-USSR peace dividend. And the electorate will still have their minds poisoned daily by the beloved free-speech platforms of America. So, it won't be exactly the same as the 90s, but people would be in a better position to enjoy life more. Still, on the whole, I think it's over-egged. Life is more difficult than it was in the 90s, but the country is still better than most in many regards.