If we are all leaving...

[expat]

When did we all decide that sending criminals to jail for long times was no longer a good idea? Was there a vote on it? I don't recall anyone asking our opinion on it.

There have been several votes on it. They're called general elections.

No, you don't get to micromanage. But you do get a democratic vote.

[gingerjedi]

What about Vancouver? I heard Canada was easier to get into than Australia plus theres not so many poisonous creepy crawlys and skin cancer is less likely.

I quite fancy getting a big truck and going off into the woods hunting, fishing wrestling bears etc... learn to be a man again instead of being force fed all this pc metrosexual new man bollox.... YEEEHHH!

[GreenerGrass]

New Zealand has it's own problems - a lot of the locals are poorly educated, property prices are (relatively) high and wages are low, crime is actually much worse than in the UK but not as much of it get reported etc.

Its way cheaper than the south east. I know a few people who have moved out there.
The UK is very varied in crime, I can't see it being worse than "vibrant" Hackney (which Hannah Pool keeps harping on about how great it is, to be honest it looks like one of the worst parts of London I have ever visited).
Have any of the rest of you noted the use of the word "vibrant" by estate agents and trendy journalists to describe an area you wouldn't go after dark, unless you had Dog The Bounty Hunter, or Andy McNab, and all their mates surrounding you.

[PRC1964]

Uruguay

Great beaches, a town called Fray Bentos and I've never heard of anyone having a grudge against them.

[gingerjedi]

<sing> I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK,
I sleep all night and I work all day <sing>....

You win! as soon as i hit the submit button I knew what was coming!!

[sasguru]

What about Vancouver? I heard Canada was easier to get into than Australia plus theres not so many poisonous creepy crawlys and skin cancer is less likely.

I quite fancy getting a big truck and going off into the woods hunting, fishing wrestling bears etc... learn to be a man again instead of being force fed all this pc metrosexual new man bollox.... YEEEHHH!

How do you fish a wrestling bear?

[Lucifer Box]

It's easier than wrestling a fishing bear. Take my word for it.

[cameraman]

Not down under. Anywhere but there. I did that for a few years and the "sheilas" are all butch with voices like gravel and bodily hair, the blokes are all nambypamby, cry a lot and call things "beautiful" that have no place being called "beautiful" (sausages for instance ).

Weird place where the genders have muddled up. Not good.

[Fungus]

The reality is, IMPO, that a handful of way too politically correct people are ******* the country up for all of us by not putting criminals in jail, by giving criminals everything they seem to want, by giving scroungers lots of money, by deriding all the values that many of us hold dear and which made this country great....

It is THOSE people we should be kicking out.

When did we all decide that sending criminals to jail for long times was no longer a good idea? Was there a vote on it? I don't recall anyone asking our opinion on it.

We are currently releasing people early because there is no room in jails for newly sentenced perps.

I have heard from many sources that the police have masses of paperwork. Basically whenever they stop and question someone, they have to fill out a pile of forms, etc. So they tend to ignore crimes unless they can be sure of a success. And of course minor crimes probably get ignored because it's not worth it. In addition because they spend so much time doing paperwork, the number of crimes they can deal with has gone down dramatically. Lastly, the number of officers on the beat has been cut significantly. Apparently most are now doing back room duties such as checking out CCTV cameras and such like, or so I am told.

So yes, it probably is political correctness. They probably have to record everything so as to avoid accusations of victimising specific groups. It seems mad. There must be better ways to avoid racism etc. Like hiring lots of ethnic minorities.

But I know from first hand experience that the police did use to victimise certain groups. As a student I recall being stopped and searched by two men who claimed to be plain clothes police. They refused to id themselves, and tried to set me up to get a search warrant for drugs in my flat. There were none, though that's not to say that they would not have 'found' some, had they succeeded in their entrapment.

[threaded]

Question. Where is Old Zealand?

That'll be where I am at the moment. It's called Sjælland nowadays.

Originally meant Island of the Seals or Souls, but as seals were thought to be the souls of lost sailors, who can say which it was.