Five REAL reasons to leave Britain

Brits who box clever know there's more to life outside the UK

There’s a hilarious debate brewing in Britain right now which goes a little something like this: Bulgarians and Romanians are planning a ‘mass invasion’ into the UK once transitional arrangements that have limited their working rights expire in January 2014.

Classic Little Englanders – of the type who believe the world was a far better place when the Brits were in charge and the savages knew their place – are fearfully battening down the hatches (read: writing ill-informed rants on the Daily Mail website) in preparation for this inevitable influx.

Lefties, on the other hand, are denigrating these British right-wingers, accusing them of racism, xenophobia and ingrained prejudice. Meanwhile the government is muddling through, trying to keep an EU-friendly poker face while surreptitiously planning a number of weird and wonderful campaigns designed at discouraging the Romanians and Bulgarians from even thinking about moving over.

Which is all delightfully farcical. Perhaps scared by a recent census that has revealed that Polish is now the second most widely spoken language in the UK (with 560,000 people claiming it to be their primary tongue), the coalition government’s politicians have embarked upon an anti-charm offensive. Their aim? To convince the Romanians and Bulgarians that there is no ‘Great’ in Britain. There have been reports that a concerted advertising campaign in these countries will show that the UK streets are not, in fact, paved with gold and that the weather is a bit, y’know, grey and drizzly.

This is not only spectacularly arrogant, but also rather condescending. The assumption in the government is certain: once there are no laws stopping Romanians and Bulgarians from working in the UK, they will most certainly come. A naïve and pompous attitude, for a start.

But the fact that Britain’s government thinks that it has to educate these eastern European types that hey, guess what guys, it’s rainy in the UK, is spectacularly blinkered. Everybody knows that the British climate is damp, drizzly, drab and grey. People do not move to the UK in the hope that they will spend nine months of the year sunning themselves in Margate.

They do, however, view the UK as a land of opportunity, of structure, of style, of fairness, openness, maturity and societal organisation. And so these recent campaigns by the UK government have probably had the desired effect, but just not in the way they intended. Why, indeed, would Romanians and Bulgarians want to move to a country that has not only made it clear that they are unwelcome, but has spectacularly damaged its own credence in the process?

The government’s emphasis really should be geared towards convincing Brits to stay. After all, they are the ones who have to put up with such bureaucratic, xenophobic, pseudo-scientific posturing by the ones in charge. The ones who really, truly, just don’t get it.

So with that in mind, here are five REAL reasons to leave the UK…

1. The ‘Nanny State’ is less ‘caring nanny’ and more ‘authoritarian nun’ – there is very little individual freedom left in the UK. You can’t park there. You can’t drive there. You must fill in this form. You must shop here. You cannot do it this way. It must be done this way. And for what? ‘Your own good’ comes the response. But it’s not, anymore. It’s always for the good of big business. In Spain, the government treat you for what you are – an adult.

2. Everything is sponsored. Every TV programme, bus, train, radio show and taxi is ‘brought to you in association with…’. Brits are bombarded with increasingly slick advertising for every waking hour. And the worst thing is, most people don’t recognise it – the marketing ‘white noise’ hits you as soon as you land at Heathrow, and it’s almost imperceptible. Escape to Spain, however, and you’ll feel like a weight has been lifted.

3. Rush, rush, stress, stress, hedonistic release, hedonistic release – so goes the rhythm of life in the UK. Defenders of the faith call it ‘competitiveness’ or ‘productivity’ or ‘a good work-life balance’. I prefer to call it for what it is – a culture so repressed and overworked that the only way people learn to have fun is to sink ten pints of tongue relaxer on a Friday night, followed by 20 shots of fist clencher on a Saturday. That’s socialising, UK style. Spaniards, on the other hand, are taught to show their emotions without the need for Dutch courage, and it leads to a mightily more mature society.

4. Film it on your mobile. Go on, film it. Share it on Facebook. Wait for the ‘Likes’ and comments to roll in. Job done – you’ve just interacted with the world, UK style. But don’t dare actually, you know, to enjoy it. Don’t talk to anyone about it. Don’t sit and contemplate it, question it or challenge it. Just consume it, and tell your friends. People as sheeple – that’s the normative way of being in Britain.

5. Oh, go on then – the weather IS terrible. And not in a I-want-to-lie-in-the-sun-all-day kind of way. But in more subtle ways. In the depths of winter it’s not even that cold. But what’s worse – a crisp, bright winter’s day with snow on the ground? Or a blustery, grey day filled with swirling rain and ‘mild’ (it’s always mild) weather? And in summer too, you don’t need scorching temperatures, just a bit of settled reliability – four seasons in a day is a classic British refrain. You never know what the weather’s going to do. Sometimes it pleasantly surprises you, yes, but for a climate you can set your watch by, head to Spain.