As a frenchman living in London for 10y+, I am always shocked when I go to medium sized cities in the UK. I love the country side though. Joke is that UK is a third world country bolted onto London, obviously exaggerated but if you look at numbers and you go there yourselves there is some truth in it.

The profits derived from privatisation and the policies of de-industrialisation were concentrated in one city…

Unfortunately the British elites know how to colonise and extract, they’re just terrible at administering and building anything sustainable

Brighton was not like that at all though to be honest, felt more continental, affluent and modern

there's a chance that London money flows down there though, like Nice and the Riviera for France, I don't know