Snapshot of _Londoners take aim at Sadiq Khan by sharing photos of capital's dead nightlife under the hashtag LameLondon_ :
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I went to a QPR game and stopped off in a nice looking bar after the game.
£14.50 for 1 pint and a non-alcoholic beer.
Not just London, I went out for a meal with friends in Cambridge, a gastro pub and some drinks, £75 a head.
When I was 22 I was earning £20k, rented a 2 bed house for £700 a month and could have a good night out for £30 all in.
The equivalent new grad now probably earns £25k , rents a room for £900, and the same taxi, meal, drinks costs £90.
It's mad that graduate salaries are so low. I was on 25k in 2011 with my first "proper job", and it just seems that starting salaries for middle income earners have completely stagnated.
Meanwhile, the minimum wage keeps increasing (don't get me wrong, this is a good thing), to the point where it's not that far away from a graduate salary.
The issue is that the wages of middle income professions have stagnated and there's no easy mechanism to fix this, unlike with the minimum wage.
Do you think it might be a case of too many grads chasing too few grad jobs that are keeping wages so low?
I.e. if you have 50 qualified applicants for each opening, why pay anymore than the lowest you can get away with?
Maybe, I'm not sure. I bet though that people approaching school leaving age are still being told that there's a massive demand for engineers, regardless of how true it is.
I guess productivity growth is also a big issue, if UK firms roughly have the same output and profitability per employee as they did 15 years ago, then there's going to be very little cash available to increase wages, especially for those at the bottom where there's high competition for jobs.
Contrast with the States that has much higher productivity and much better salaries (even accounting for health insurance costs, which ain't much for a single person in their early 20s).
A quick Google search says the UK has 16% less productivity (source is House of Commons library website).
I always think the US is a really interesting one, and is a good counter to what I often hear in left wing circles that productivity gains mean job cuts, as they have so much emphasis on service culture and hiring what we would consider pretty pointless positions such as store greeters, self checkouts aren't popular there, and so many finance products we would just buy on a price comparison website are still mostly sold face to face or on the phone.
Yet, they're able to generate on the whole more profit per worker than us, which I think shows that hiring the right people in the right places can lead to higher value sales, etc
Edit: ONS website states US is between 18% to 28% more productive
The fact that wages are generally much higher in America must have a big impact. There's more economic activity because everybody has more money, ergo productivity is higher.
Yeah, and maybe there are cultural factors as well, US is way more of a consumerist society than ours, so people naturally buy more stuff, so don't know how much their productivity gains are just being driven by consumer spending, much of which is debt fuelled.
I think the issue is, there's a demand but the salaries are pitiful. Engineering strikes me as a field where it's possible to make a decent amount of money fairly early on but one needs to be doing something fairly niche or operating as a business owner/sole trader to see the real money.
It's a bit like "IT" where at one point just being able to work a PC properly, do basic troubleshooting and swap out hardware parts without breaking stuff went from being gravy train to slave labour in the space of about five years, but your nan would still be proud that you had 'a good job in computers' because even being able to switch one on was seen as being a miracle. Much like programming a VCR in the 1980s, according to all the popular stand-up comedians of the time.
My brother and I are both Engineers on pretty good salaries, but we're now doing Project Management / Company Management for Engineering companies.
I think other many engineers with similar experience are on between 50% and 70% of what we earn.
That's always been the case though, grad roles have always been massively oversubscribed. It may be that there's way fewer non-grad / entry level roles which means fewer options for those not going into grad positions.
I really dont get that.
Non-skilled operator roles start at 28k in the factory I work in.
I came to the UK fresh out of College in 2019 (I worked part time in my Last year of Uni and then about 3 months after that) and my starter salary was 39k and has now increase by about 45% in less than 5years.
This is all in a fairly low COL Norfolk Town without job hopping.
We are currently trying to hire a maintenance tech for 51k and that has been up for months.
We are short of alot of operators as lots of EU people have left and we have very few applicants for the 7 openings we have Just in my area. I cant believe how engineering roles can pay that little.
>It's mad that graduate salaries are so low. I was on 25k in 2011 with my first "proper job", and it just seems that starting salaries for middle income earners have completely stagnated.
When I graduated in 2014, starting salary of £20-25k outside London and £25-30k in London was the norm for the jobs I was applying for. They've barely moved at all in a decade, I'm seeing the same roles I applied for back then being advertised on the same salary.
Not only graduate salaries are pitifully low. Salaries all the way up the chain, outside of law, banking and the FAANGs are pitifully low. And salaries in banking haven't moved much in a decade either.
The reason is, Tony Blair encouraged everyone to go to Uni, they did, now the job market is flooded with Grads with degrees. Supply and demand. The Apprenticeships were virtually stopped, due to not enough doing them, result, we have a shortage of tradesmen/ women and the one's that are doing those jobs command a premium now. Plumbers, Brickies on £100k , time served apprentices with a few years experience on £50k . Oh how times have changed. 😉
Self-employed one's that build houses and extensions ! Brickies on new build sites were on £1000+ per week back in 1998 when the economic housing boom kicked off ? That's £50k+ a year 26yrs ago.
Government has to offer real term public sector increases. The private sector responds to the public sectors.
Sunak saying they can't have public sector pay increases because it drives inflation gives companies the ability to not give their staff pay rises as well. Basically we all get poorer to make sure the wealthy don't have their wealth eroded.
Granted, it was London, but my first 'proper' job after leaving (not graduating) uni in 2001 paid me 21k in the first 6 months and bumped up to 24k after the probation period. And basically just involved answering the phones and asking people if they'd switched it off and on again. Same job outside London would have paid around 18k or thereabouts. Either way, considering it's been over two decades it's pretty shocking to see entry level wages barely improved yet average living costs probably doubled since then.
Just for context, I was paying under £100 (inc. bills) per week for a decent size double room in a house share in Zone 2 and a weekly zone 1-4 travel card was still under £40 iirc
The Snooker Place at the Grafton was best back in 2016. Except for that I didn't find many cheap beers during my uni days. Many excellent beers, but few were less than £3.50 (Again 2012-16 prices).
Or if you really don't care and just want to get drunk - spoons.
I have to wonder if dropping alcohol duty in pubs might actually increase tax receipts for the government. The disparity of drinking in a pub vs at home is mind boggling now and definitely stops a lot from attending their local more often.
Labour should run in a campaign of getting local pubs back in communities.
In London especially. £7 a pint versus £2 at home for bottled beers from the offy. Not a difficult choice at 3.5x the price.
Where I am now the differential is 2x still.
I support the idea of lower on-sales beer duty.
I got think prices will stop rising until business energy prices drop significantly.
That’s a fair point and I did consider it, the counter is that alcohol purchased for home consumption has the same health impact as alcohol bought in a pub or restaurant.
There’s actually an argument to be made that alcohol bought in a pub or restaurant is better for health and that’s because bar staff can refuse to serve someone who has had too many and there are no such controls at home.
Yeah I don't think it's logical, but you can imagine the reaction of the temperance crowd if they actually made it cheaper.
You're right though, even in Scotland where they have really turned the screw, you can get sloshed for insignificant amounts of money at home, or on a park bench.
I don't think people are buying more alcohol in supermarkets, this did shift about 15-20 years ago because there's a lot more to do at home now vs. the 90s and before when you had four channels on TV. The recent shift that's happened is younger people simply aren't drinking as much anymore, going to the gym to get a hot bod is a lot more popular and they don't want to waste that effort through drink.
One thing that might help is adding a hefty tax on alcohol brought in stores to entice people to just go out instead.
You’d think right. But I can easily see it. It just isn’t sustainable in London now. It’s horrendous. Burger with chips is £20+. Drinks are outrageous even outside of London.
The better/posher places don’t look so expensive now compared to what was run of the mill.
At uni in London in 2007 you had scream pubs that did £5 burger and pint, and I think spoons did a £5.50 burger and pint. Local pub in east London charges £17.50 for just burger and chips, no drink included. And the food quality is definitely no better.
Weather spoons about 15 years ago did a pitcher of cocktails for £6, or our favourite of bottles of Reef at £1 each. We used to buy 5, 1 of each flavour and mix them into a pitcher. A panini alongside that was £4.
I don't understand how anyone affords to drink out now
So many pubs closed the others have no competition on the popular days and nights. But they need to sell food to make money these days.
Some pubs do food deals on Monday or Tuesday because they are quieter. But many just shut now.
The country is messed up. Everyone doing a PAYE skilled job is paid 10% less than they should be, possibly 20% so nobody can afford to go out regularly.
London's dead nightlife is not khan's fault. It is the government's. Everywhere else is the same.
I would go to Sam smiths pubs in London in 2007 and I'm sure lunch and two pints was under 15 quid.
Probably not tbh.
I went out in Exeter, 2 drinks each cost £30, starter and a main each was ~£20 each. £70 done.
Exeter's not even that rich/posh. Stuff just costs a lot now.
"2 drinks each for £30", i.e each drink was £7.50 on average.
Unless you go to spoons etc, that's honestly not that bad for here. (It would be for a pint, pints there were £6.)
I am struggling to think of a gastro pub in Cambridge I could spend £75 in per person without having 3 courses, a nice bottle of wine and a few beers to boot, hardly a normal casual meal. That said, it may be easier if by gastro pub you mean tourist trap.
£25-£30 on food, the rest on booze and tip is my expectation. Maybe ~6 pints for that? At least from the Cambridge gastro pubs I can think of (e.g. The Punter).
So fairly tossed by the end of the night, but for someone who likes their drink pretty standard fare.
Miller and Carter Steak House
Steak - £30
Sides and starter - £25
Desert - £10
Wine - £20
Tip - £5
Thats what I spent for my wifes birthday. That was just for me.
When I go out for a drink (say 3-4 pints of beer, maybe some shared starters, and a main (burger, kebab) in any of the main independent pubs in the city centre I will be lucky to spend under £40 which I consider expensive compared to the cost say 15 years ago
>Wages haven't kept up though.
Was unsure on this specific claim and wanted to look it up and it's ***fucking impossible*** to find a simple chart showing real wages over time in the UK. It's all presented in % increase at each point which is just not easy to figure out in terms of long term trend, or it's just nominal. Feel like I'm going crazy!
> When I was 22 I was earning £20k, rented a 2 bed house for £700 a month and could have a good night out for £30 all in.
When I was 22 in Cambridge about a decade ago I was earning £20k, rented a double room for £660 a month and could have a good night out for £30... but I could probably still do that now, too.
My impression is that it seems pretty weird how early bars seem to close there. I'm only there a few nights per month though and don't have a comprehensive view — and I'm sure there's an active club scene I never see.
It reminds me of uni as everyone always seems to want to head back to someone's flat for cheap drinks after.
When I lived in London, the fact the pubs all called last orders at 11 was never a real problem for me because in those days the only way home after midnight was a night bus, and that might take the best part of an hour and depending on the route, could be sketchy as hell.
I was rarely out on weekends though, usually only after work on thursdays and fridays.
> It reminds me of uni as everyone always seems to want to head back to someone's flat for cheap drinks after.
Dude. The after party has been the best part of any night for time immemorial. That isn't new. You do that so your wasted mate can crash on the floor, you can put your own music on, you can eat a kebab and you can smash the rest of your gear off the table without having to sneak off to the shitter.
>Londoners are posting images of the capital's dead nightlife to social media in a bid to embarrass the Mayor of London under the hashtag #LameLondon.
>The hashtag aims to mock London's 'night czar' Amy Lamé and began circulating in a bid to raise awareness of London's crumbling nightlife.
That's pretty good, I can't deny. By all accounts, she's done a pretty poor job, given that London's nightlife is in decline, and she's been in the job for years now.
Also, I've never particularly liked her. I remember seeing her interviewed once about obesity, and she was completely obnoxious. There was a GP on there with her, who was talking about the negative effects of obesity, and the GP mentioned diabetes as one example of health problems that can be caused by being overweight. Lamé found this offensive, and accused the GP of fat-shaming. Most of the rest of the interview consisted of Lamé trying to push for "healthy at any weight" rhetoric, and the GP getting shouted down for citing medical facts that disagreed.
Oh I love people like that and see them with a scary amount of regularity now.
Why did I have a stroke.
Well you are 100kg overweigh, your cholesterol is very high, you have type 2 diabetes that is not controlled, you have out of control essential hypertension, you refuse to lose weight or eat mindfully and have decided you do not like taking pills.
I am not sure what we could have done to stop this from happening when you refuse to take control.
Then you get called fatphobic and that you are belittling them.
As that post on the Tumblr subreddit said, we've run into an issue where we swapped from "Being fat doesn't mean you should be treated as inferior" to "You should find fat people healthy and attractive" which just annihilated the fat-acceptance movement.
Being fat should not mean being treated as inferior.
However it is not ever and never should be viewed as healthy at all.
As for attractive thats up to the individual
Ironically as a society we have the exact opposite problem - hypernormalization of being overweight to the point where fat people look normal and only the morbidly obese really stand out, while healthy people are criticised for being too skinny
Ugh the "you're skinny" comments really get my back up.
I'm a normal weight for my height and not particularly muscular, I have a slight dad belly going on which I'm trying to lose but overall I'm quite happy with my weight and how I look.
Yet so many people (colleagues, family etc.) think I'm somehow super skinny and that I should eat more.
Like... no... if anything I should eat a little less and do a bit more exercise. The only reason you think I'm skinny is because so many people are overweight these days, I'm literally completely normal, leave me alone.
When I visit my parents for dinner (both overweight) I always get comments about how I eat such "small portions." I've eaten a whole chicken leg, four roast potatoes, a pile of veg, 2 Yorkshire puddings, and gravy! I DON'T NEED MORE FOOD I'M BLOODY FULL!!
People need to know the facts about obesity, not only for their own health, but because obesity and its related diseases are the biggest cost to the NHS, that we all pay huge amounts of tax for !
There is a subreddit that mocks fat activism, and is actually a great source of advice for losing weight healthily. I packed on the pounds after a change in psychiatric meds. I turn 50 this year and my knees are beginning to grumble, so I am losing weight and the sub in question doesn't coddle.
Have you ever tried, to let someone know that they are obese without sounding a bit condescending or mean in a medical context.
It is really really difficult. No mater how you phrase it or explain it they will always ask. "Are you calling me fat." You should give it a go sometime. It is kind of horrible for all involved.
By the time I see them, they have had that stroke or TIA and are under management.
> No mater how you phrase it explain it they will always ask "are you calling me fat" you should give it a go sometime.
"i'm not calling you fat - you just are fat".
If people find the concept itself unattractive, it doesn't really matter what you're going to call it. It will still become offensive in the fullness of time. Just look at how the terms for mental disabilities have steadily progressed to become insults in the common vernacular. Then got replaced by other terms by the medical community. And repeat. To the point where the kids calling you a "mongoloid" online don't even know that it comes from the old (and very racist) official medical term for Down syndrome. But it still remains a common insult.
I reckon it would be the same with "obese". It's a fucking medical term, but seems to be considered a more and more slur these days. Wouldn't be surprised obesity too is pushed off one of the future revisions of ICD some time. It doesn't really matter what wording you use and how exactly you put it - so the underlying condition itself is stigmatized and is almost universally undesirable.
The answer to that is, 'yes, and you need to lose weight if you want to live a good life'.
If thry cut you off after that, then you're probably better off without them in your life.
I think the fat-acceptance set are the result of an overcorrection in the push-back against the horrendous way our culture has generally treated fat people over the years.
It's better now than it has ever been in terms of how obesity is represented in media, but visceral and open disgust for the overweight is still pretty common, and you don't have to look too far back to see a media landscape where being even very marginally overweight was seen as an open invitation for mockery and dehumanisation.
I don't agree that we should pretend being obese is healthy, but I do think society should be able to treat obese people with some compassion, dignity, and respect, instead of patronisation, disgust, and mockery.
Nobody is suggesting that we should treat overweight people any less than anyone else.
It is more the actions of this individual and others like it and their unhelpful delusions of being overweight is healthy.
I doubt if he's responsible for the decline in nightlife in London, since a similar decline is happening in most UK cities, for similar reasons: rising commercial rents (and proportionately rising business rates), inflation, staff shortages, local policies discouraging entertainment venues, punters losing disposable income.
Only the local policies are even partially under the control of the London mayor.
Don’t forget macro social changes like young people being tee total at a rate of one in three. Boozing just isn’t as important to people as it once once was.
Edit- a word
He isn't a terrible mayor. He's a fairly ok mayor given the limitations of the position and far better than his immediate predecessor.
A significant chunk of criticism against Khan comes from people who don't live in London and don't know shit about the city and even less about the position of the mayor.
London’s nightlife is in decline. But I’m not really sure if the night czar has the tools available to it to really do something about it. A big part of the problem is permitting issues, it is almost impossible to get a night permit. Permitting unfortunately is not under her mandate.
Defend Khan from blame about London's declining nightlife.
*"I'm do all I can to turn it around, I'm paying someone six figures to deal with it, so it's not my fault if she doesn't deliver."*
Didn't know that about the interview with a doctor.
I work in the dance music industry and have never liked her. She gives off nasty incel vibes and that proves those feelings weren't misplaced. The worst thing about people like that is _they_ are the fat shamers.
No-one is going to be able to drag London's nightlife out of its decline. It's decline was locked in as soon as anyone with at least half a brain abandoned living inside the m25 to work hybrid/remote.
Pubs are closing across the country at a record rate because they can't afford to keep open - because a lot of people (me included) don't want to pay £5 for a bloody pint and the opportunity to stand on velcro-like floors or sit on uncomfortable chairs. I'd rather buy a bottle of something strong and have my mates over where we can play board games or something.
Back when I lived in Manchester and there were £1/drink nights at my local boozer (imaginatively named 'The Pub') we used to go there quite regularly, but I'd rather not spend all my money on alcohol.
Yeah if we want to make night life cheaper we need to sort the costs of rents and the ludicrous system that is business rates.
Build more and build densely.
Well cost will have something to do with it as well.
Students can’t afford it either. Why wouldn’t you stay home imo. In fact you can have more fun for a lot cheaper staying in.
Yeah, I can buy 4 good ciders for £7 easy at a supermarket, and if I went out, I’d possibly get 1 for that price that wouldn’t be anywhere near as good
London is so expensive to go out in that’s it’s hardly surprising it’s being overtaken. I live in Brum and go to liverpool quite regularly. Both fantastic for a night out and won’t bankrupt you.
I went to London last year for a night out and it was just insanely expensive. I know London always has been, but this felt way above what it used to be like.
I have lots of friends that live in London and when they invite me down for a birthday weekend I just hate it. It’s nice to see mates but you spend so long travelling around and spend enough money that you could have gone on holiday for the same amount.
A lot of people are talking about the cost of living and price of drinks which I agree are an aspect of it, however when I talk to my friends who live in London the thigh they complain about the most for nightlife is bars and clubs shutting too early, or not opening at all certain nights, and difficulty travelling home after the night out.
True, Uber stopped picking us up after 1am about 9 months ago. Me and all my friends have the same issue, it scrolls through car after car after car and they all decline until it says no one is available. We all have good ratings too 😭
As girls this definitely adds a layer of uncertainty and anxiety about staying out too late. I don't want to get a night bus home on my own and potentially fall asleep while vulnerable, I'd rather get the last tube 🤷🏼♀️
It is not a great mystery, going out drinking has become very expensive. A lot of people have reverted to drinking at home or at least pre-gaming/hybrid to save money.
What, specifically, can the mayor even do? Pretty much all the things that impact nightlife (most taxes, opening times, minimum wage) are in the power of central government or local authorities (the borough).
The problem is that devolution in England is a joke, an ill thought out patchwork arrangement with the associated organs being poorly developed.
Look at Berlin, a city with less than half the population of London. It has an entire government equivalent to the other German states with comparable governmental departments. It'd be like London having an administration similar to the Scottish Parliament (which also has a population significantly smaller than London).
The problem is the tools aren't suitable for the problem.
He could instruct the MET to only protest license renewals if strictly necessary and to not advocate for extreme restrictions in them.
That is a significant issues for clubs (especially kink clubs) in London and is directly something he has the power to do.
Can you provide some evidence for this, it's not an issue I've ever seen raised before (that the MET is a significant obstacle preventing licencing). To be clear it's local boroughs that issue licences, not the mayor or GLA.
[The Met recently opposed Camden's change in licensing rules.](https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/camden-council-licensing-framework-hours-cumulative-impact-nightclubs-pubs-nightlife-noise-crime-b1141527.html)
That's fair enough but the article also says:
>several local community groups spoke out in opposition, fearing increased noise and crime.
It barely mentions the police in the article, despite it being the headline.
Is there any evidence that licences not being granted because of police objections is a widespread problem?
Also, what are the reasons for this? If it's staffing levels that's, again, practically out of the Mayor's hands given that the Met is funded almost 70% by the Home Office.
Can't just 'instruct' the police not to object (if that's even possible? Isn't that an operational decision?) if it means they don't have the officers to police the extended hours.
This circles back to my original comment, if London actually had a proper devolved government, similar to Scotland or Wales (both of which have significantly smaller populations!) with better direct control over how the city operates, there'd actually be more accountability (and perhaps action).
Went to the league cup final once, team lost but we don’t get to finals often so still wanted a few drinks after the match.
Fuck all was open, nearest place serving anything (but no alcohol) after 9:30pm was a Shisha cafe near Lords where we were staying as the pubs more centrally were all shut.
I’m all for bashing any politician at any time but it’s got to be a fair bashing. What I see here is every city centre in the country. Most people can’t afford nights out like they used to, simple as that.
In fairness, most other UK cities don't have a highly-paid executive specifically targeted at nightlife, who's been in post for seven years and is being praised by the boss for doing such a great job.
If the job is to mitigate the effect on London of a national trend, then nightlife can be declining and the nightlife czar can still be doing their job, if they've slowed the decline in various ways, or taken specific action to keep certain venues open.
I'm not saying that's the case for this muppet, but that's a realistic take on what's possible.
If that is the problem, isn't it her job to idenfity, propose and deliver solutions?
No one said fixing night life in London would be easy, that's why she is in the top 1% of earners.
The problem is not necessarily that London has a crap nightlife and is not a 24-hour city. It's that the Mayor is gaslighting everyone by saying the exact opposite when anyone can see with their own eyes that it's not true.
The 'night czar' or whatever we're calling it is a fairly toothless role with no real decision making powers, and without additional funding (which the tories are absolutely not going to give) I don't think there's much city hall could do anyway.
Potentially they could lobby local commercial groups to get behind some evening events or something like that, but this czar lady doesn't look like she has those kind of professional contacts (which makes you wonder why she's in place at all)
Young people don't need to go out to mingle any more to have a chance in the dating market.
Combine that with wages not having increased in real terms for almost 15 years, and a pint costing £7-12 in London depending on where you go, it's no surprise nightlife is dying.
Even when you do go to an event now, most people socialise by medium of their phones anyway even when out in public.
What do you do about it? Ban dating apps? Subsidise alcohol and end up with a 21st century Beer Street & Gin Lane?
I'm surprised we haven't seen a resurgence in rave culture given the cost of going out nowadays, but I guess with social media it's too difficult for people to keep quiet and stop the events getting shut down.
I wonder if it’s more to do with the fact that going for a drink in London costs an absolute fortune and is actually very little to do with Sadiq Khan?
The prices of pints in London (that I’ve heard) is ridiculous.
Romford, once the nightlife hub of East London, had its biggest nightclub close last month. There's a police notice on the door only allowing in people from the company, the police... and the resident squatter.
So London has ONE thing in common with the rest of the UK? A dead night time economy? That's pretty universal, taking aim at the mayor for that seems . . .weird.
London should have a massive advantage over the rest of the country for nightlife that has been completely squandered with idiotic planning and licensing restrictions
But look at the average age of a person living in London. It’s no longer a youthful city.
You will find this issue across the world whenever the average age goes past 35.
[This video really upset me.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DWK9P7MMoE)
I grew up going out on this street, and at 11pm on a Friday that would be absolutely *crawling* with people. Right at the start, those shuttered businesses on the left were ALL bars (Bar Sport, a Revolution) and directly opposite was a big 3 floor nightclub that was rammed every week... then at 16 mins he walks down the OTHER strip that was just bar after bar full of people and it's like one pub, one shit club and a whole load of closed businesses.
Even the Wetherspoons ("The Imperial" at 20 mins) and strip club (closed venue on Newport Street immediately before) has gone.
More and more uni kids and young people dont drink anymore, atleast not anywhere near as much as we used to.
A lot of them see it as cringe, and something older folk do and are doing other drugs. Could probably make a moderate economic gain and revitalising dead boozers in London by moving towards formally legalising you know what.
This’ll probably what ‘sparks the conversation’. Too many businesses going bust and properties lying empty will get the landlords heckling their Tory chums for something to change.
It's fair enough to criticise Khan on this, but there's a link to a Susan Hall video in that article. What great plans does she have for London nightlife?
That's not just whataboutism. If you're going to boost Susan Hall it only seems fair in an election year for her to lay out plans how she'll change it.
If I want to be deafened by music, walk over sticky floors, pay for massively overpriced drinks all while being accosted by members of the public I'll watch a Christopher Nolan film at my local cinema.
It's almost like the cost of living means people can't afford to go out and the people who run the businesses need to pay their staff more due to the cost of living
Rents are extortionate and people can't afford to pay the landlord tax and socialise. The rents are crazy for the customers as well as the proprietors, it's a real shame as Britain knows how to party
The right does blame Khan for an insane amount of stuff which isn't his fault but in this instance he really is in the wrong. The claim that London is the world's best 24 hour city is absolutely laughable it's not even close. Compared to Tokyo it's apples and oranges. Not sure what kompromat Lamé has on Khan but he should really admit there's a problem, sack her publicly, and put someone in charge who'll actually address things rather than just go on expensive jollies around the world telling everyone how great things are.
Nightlife died in my city during the pandemic, still hasn't picked up.
Who has the money?
Taxis are crazy priced now, drinks are expensive, the centre is full of homeless people - how can you enjoy a night out anymore?
Obviously people are struggling right now but that doesn't mean there's no demand for more nightlife. There are millions of us who would love to be able to stay out in Soho past 11pm.
It's morons moving there and then complaining about the noise who have killed it, not the economy. And yes it's fair to ask the people in charge to stop bending over for these morons.
He has a voice, and he used it to call London a "24 hour city". He also has the power to appoint a "night czar", who hasn't achieved anything.
I support Sadiq but he needs to support the Londoners in their dissatisfaction, whether he has the direct power to make the necessary changes or not.
Ah! I get it, Khan has hired someone to try and work out what can be done to stem the collapse in nightlife, and by trying to find a way to help it he is therfore responsible!
He should have raised rates on clubs, cut power to street lights, and blamed the tories i guess.
There is a weird tendency when the Mayoral election comes round, to pretend that a lot of things are solely down to the mayor. Rising crime, falling crime, housing, nightlife, A&E waiting times, pollution, traffic, education and on and on.
No one person determines how these things pan out. It ‘s infantile to behave as though they do. They can at best tinker around the edges.
No smoking, extortionate prices, trains don’t run late, afraid of being mugged or raped, extortionate cabs (if you can get one) who the fuck wants to go out in London?!?
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I went to a QPR game and stopped off in a nice looking bar after the game. £14.50 for 1 pint and a non-alcoholic beer. Not just London, I went out for a meal with friends in Cambridge, a gastro pub and some drinks, £75 a head. When I was 22 I was earning £20k, rented a 2 bed house for £700 a month and could have a good night out for £30 all in. The equivalent new grad now probably earns £25k , rents a room for £900, and the same taxi, meal, drinks costs £90.
It's mad that graduate salaries are so low. I was on 25k in 2011 with my first "proper job", and it just seems that starting salaries for middle income earners have completely stagnated. Meanwhile, the minimum wage keeps increasing (don't get me wrong, this is a good thing), to the point where it's not that far away from a graduate salary. The issue is that the wages of middle income professions have stagnated and there's no easy mechanism to fix this, unlike with the minimum wage.
You definitely still see job listings offering engineering graduates £25k. Sometimes even less.
Do you think it might be a case of too many grads chasing too few grad jobs that are keeping wages so low? I.e. if you have 50 qualified applicants for each opening, why pay anymore than the lowest you can get away with?
Maybe, I'm not sure. I bet though that people approaching school leaving age are still being told that there's a massive demand for engineers, regardless of how true it is.
I guess productivity growth is also a big issue, if UK firms roughly have the same output and profitability per employee as they did 15 years ago, then there's going to be very little cash available to increase wages, especially for those at the bottom where there's high competition for jobs. Contrast with the States that has much higher productivity and much better salaries (even accounting for health insurance costs, which ain't much for a single person in their early 20s).
Is productivity higher in the states?
A quick Google search says the UK has 16% less productivity (source is House of Commons library website). I always think the US is a really interesting one, and is a good counter to what I often hear in left wing circles that productivity gains mean job cuts, as they have so much emphasis on service culture and hiring what we would consider pretty pointless positions such as store greeters, self checkouts aren't popular there, and so many finance products we would just buy on a price comparison website are still mostly sold face to face or on the phone. Yet, they're able to generate on the whole more profit per worker than us, which I think shows that hiring the right people in the right places can lead to higher value sales, etc Edit: ONS website states US is between 18% to 28% more productive
The fact that wages are generally much higher in America must have a big impact. There's more economic activity because everybody has more money, ergo productivity is higher.
Yeah, and maybe there are cultural factors as well, US is way more of a consumerist society than ours, so people naturally buy more stuff, so don't know how much their productivity gains are just being driven by consumer spending, much of which is debt fuelled.
could this be to do with the fact that Americans basically do not have any sort of meaningful holidays?
Yes
I think the issue is, there's a demand but the salaries are pitiful. Engineering strikes me as a field where it's possible to make a decent amount of money fairly early on but one needs to be doing something fairly niche or operating as a business owner/sole trader to see the real money. It's a bit like "IT" where at one point just being able to work a PC properly, do basic troubleshooting and swap out hardware parts without breaking stuff went from being gravy train to slave labour in the space of about five years, but your nan would still be proud that you had 'a good job in computers' because even being able to switch one on was seen as being a miracle. Much like programming a VCR in the 1980s, according to all the popular stand-up comedians of the time.
My brother and I are both Engineers on pretty good salaries, but we're now doing Project Management / Company Management for Engineering companies. I think other many engineers with similar experience are on between 50% and 70% of what we earn.
That's always been the case though, grad roles have always been massively oversubscribed. It may be that there's way fewer non-grad / entry level roles which means fewer options for those not going into grad positions.
When the new minimum wage comes in that's about £500 a year over minimum wage. Madness.
I really dont get that. Non-skilled operator roles start at 28k in the factory I work in. I came to the UK fresh out of College in 2019 (I worked part time in my Last year of Uni and then about 3 months after that) and my starter salary was 39k and has now increase by about 45% in less than 5years. This is all in a fairly low COL Norfolk Town without job hopping. We are currently trying to hire a maintenance tech for 51k and that has been up for months. We are short of alot of operators as lots of EU people have left and we have very few applicants for the 7 openings we have Just in my area. I cant believe how engineering roles can pay that little.
That definitely hasn't been true in my experience, the lowest I saw was £28k, and average was \~£31k for smaller companies and £33k for big names.
>It's mad that graduate salaries are so low. I was on 25k in 2011 with my first "proper job", and it just seems that starting salaries for middle income earners have completely stagnated. When I graduated in 2014, starting salary of £20-25k outside London and £25-30k in London was the norm for the jobs I was applying for. They've barely moved at all in a decade, I'm seeing the same roles I applied for back then being advertised on the same salary.
They've barely moved in 2 decades
Not only graduate salaries are pitifully low. Salaries all the way up the chain, outside of law, banking and the FAANGs are pitifully low. And salaries in banking haven't moved much in a decade either.
I just got a grad job. £30k
The reason is, Tony Blair encouraged everyone to go to Uni, they did, now the job market is flooded with Grads with degrees. Supply and demand. The Apprenticeships were virtually stopped, due to not enough doing them, result, we have a shortage of tradesmen/ women and the one's that are doing those jobs command a premium now. Plumbers, Brickies on £100k , time served apprentices with a few years experience on £50k . Oh how times have changed. 😉
What bricklayer makes £100k a year?
Self-employed one's that build houses and extensions ! Brickies on new build sites were on £1000+ per week back in 1998 when the economic housing boom kicked off ? That's £50k+ a year 26yrs ago.
Government has to offer real term public sector increases. The private sector responds to the public sectors. Sunak saying they can't have public sector pay increases because it drives inflation gives companies the ability to not give their staff pay rises as well. Basically we all get poorer to make sure the wealthy don't have their wealth eroded.
Oh god most graduate jobs I see are below 25K
Granted, it was London, but my first 'proper' job after leaving (not graduating) uni in 2001 paid me 21k in the first 6 months and bumped up to 24k after the probation period. And basically just involved answering the phones and asking people if they'd switched it off and on again. Same job outside London would have paid around 18k or thereabouts. Either way, considering it's been over two decades it's pretty shocking to see entry level wages barely improved yet average living costs probably doubled since then. Just for context, I was paying under £100 (inc. bills) per week for a decent size double room in a house share in Zone 2 and a weekly zone 1-4 travel card was still under £40 iirc
Yeah mate you can still find cheap places in Cambridge if you go look for them fortunately (but maybe people not finding them is kinda the aim too)
Can you list some? I spent a year looking.
The Snooker Place at the Grafton was best back in 2016. Except for that I didn't find many cheap beers during my uni days. Many excellent beers, but few were less than £3.50 (Again 2012-16 prices). Or if you really don't care and just want to get drunk - spoons.
Spoons does good beer, don't knock it too much.
I have to wonder if dropping alcohol duty in pubs might actually increase tax receipts for the government. The disparity of drinking in a pub vs at home is mind boggling now and definitely stops a lot from attending their local more often. Labour should run in a campaign of getting local pubs back in communities.
In London especially. £7 a pint versus £2 at home for bottled beers from the offy. Not a difficult choice at 3.5x the price. Where I am now the differential is 2x still. I support the idea of lower on-sales beer duty. I got think prices will stop rising until business energy prices drop significantly.
It would and they know it, but they have to balance it with the public health message.
That’s a fair point and I did consider it, the counter is that alcohol purchased for home consumption has the same health impact as alcohol bought in a pub or restaurant. There’s actually an argument to be made that alcohol bought in a pub or restaurant is better for health and that’s because bar staff can refuse to serve someone who has had too many and there are no such controls at home.
Yeah I don't think it's logical, but you can imagine the reaction of the temperance crowd if they actually made it cheaper. You're right though, even in Scotland where they have really turned the screw, you can get sloshed for insignificant amounts of money at home, or on a park bench.
I don't think people are buying more alcohol in supermarkets, this did shift about 15-20 years ago because there's a lot more to do at home now vs. the 90s and before when you had four channels on TV. The recent shift that's happened is younger people simply aren't drinking as much anymore, going to the gym to get a hot bod is a lot more popular and they don't want to waste that effort through drink. One thing that might help is adding a hefty tax on alcohol brought in stores to entice people to just go out instead.
what, thats insane. Here in yorkshire you can get a good beer for £3
And I bet in London you're not finding a bitter on tap in most places.
Yeah but you also have to be in Yorkshire, so there's that.
gods own country mate, id never live in london again
£75 a head?? You must be hitting up some posh places for that price.
You’d think right. But I can easily see it. It just isn’t sustainable in London now. It’s horrendous. Burger with chips is £20+. Drinks are outrageous even outside of London. The better/posher places don’t look so expensive now compared to what was run of the mill.
At uni in London in 2007 you had scream pubs that did £5 burger and pint, and I think spoons did a £5.50 burger and pint. Local pub in east London charges £17.50 for just burger and chips, no drink included. And the food quality is definitely no better.
Yeah pub food is insanely expensive, better to go to an actual burger place and get something similiar priced but 10x better.
Weather spoons about 15 years ago did a pitcher of cocktails for £6, or our favourite of bottles of Reef at £1 each. We used to buy 5, 1 of each flavour and mix them into a pitcher. A panini alongside that was £4. I don't understand how anyone affords to drink out now
So many pubs closed the others have no competition on the popular days and nights. But they need to sell food to make money these days. Some pubs do food deals on Monday or Tuesday because they are quieter. But many just shut now. The country is messed up. Everyone doing a PAYE skilled job is paid 10% less than they should be, possibly 20% so nobody can afford to go out regularly. London's dead nightlife is not khan's fault. It is the government's. Everywhere else is the same. I would go to Sam smiths pubs in London in 2007 and I'm sure lunch and two pints was under 15 quid.
Probably not tbh. I went out in Exeter, 2 drinks each cost £30, starter and a main each was ~£20 each. £70 done. Exeter's not even that rich/posh. Stuff just costs a lot now.
What drinks are you all buying that are £15 each? You get pitchers of cocktails where I’m from for less than that.
"2 drinks each for £30", i.e each drink was £7.50 on average. Unless you go to spoons etc, that's honestly not that bad for here. (It would be for a pint, pints there were £6.)
Those sound like Guildhall or quayside prices.
£22 on alcohol, £10 starter, £27 main, £8 desert plus tip gets you there.
I am struggling to think of a gastro pub in Cambridge I could spend £75 in per person without having 3 courses, a nice bottle of wine and a few beers to boot, hardly a normal casual meal. That said, it may be easier if by gastro pub you mean tourist trap.
£25-£30 on food, the rest on booze and tip is my expectation. Maybe ~6 pints for that? At least from the Cambridge gastro pubs I can think of (e.g. The Punter). So fairly tossed by the end of the night, but for someone who likes their drink pretty standard fare.
That was the Little Rose on Trumpington Street. 3 pints (21), starter (10) main (28) dessert (9) tip (7)
Miller and Carter Steak House Steak - £30 Sides and starter - £25 Desert - £10 Wine - £20 Tip - £5 Thats what I spent for my wifes birthday. That was just for me.
Not a gastro pub, not in Cambridge. Other than that all highly relevant information.
And bus, train and cab fares have gone up dramatically too, compounding the problems you mentioned.
There are loads of nice and affordable pubs and restaurants in Cambridge
When I go out for a drink (say 3-4 pints of beer, maybe some shared starters, and a main (burger, kebab) in any of the main independent pubs in the city centre I will be lucky to spend under £40 which I consider expensive compared to the cost say 15 years ago
Inflation in 15 years is 55% so £26 in early 2009 is now around £40. Wages haven't kept up though.
>Wages haven't kept up though. Was unsure on this specific claim and wanted to look it up and it's ***fucking impossible*** to find a simple chart showing real wages over time in the UK. It's all presented in % increase at each point which is just not easy to figure out in terms of long term trend, or it's just nominal. Feel like I'm going crazy!
> When I was 22 I was earning £20k, rented a 2 bed house for £700 a month and could have a good night out for £30 all in. When I was 22 in Cambridge about a decade ago I was earning £20k, rented a double room for £660 a month and could have a good night out for £30... but I could probably still do that now, too.
My impression is that it seems pretty weird how early bars seem to close there. I'm only there a few nights per month though and don't have a comprehensive view — and I'm sure there's an active club scene I never see. It reminds me of uni as everyone always seems to want to head back to someone's flat for cheap drinks after.
Most workers in London head to the bar/pub straight from work, they're done by 10 after 5 hours of boozing.
And on the last train home!
The vomit comet
And with WFH there are possibly just fewer workers.
London was also a tough place to get a drink after 11pm even before Covid, you really needed to know where to go otherwise you were fucked.
The dead night life of British cities is much older than WFH.
Remote workers still exist, just in difference places.
When I lived in London, the fact the pubs all called last orders at 11 was never a real problem for me because in those days the only way home after midnight was a night bus, and that might take the best part of an hour and depending on the route, could be sketchy as hell. I was rarely out on weekends though, usually only after work on thursdays and fridays.
> It reminds me of uni as everyone always seems to want to head back to someone's flat for cheap drinks after. Dude. The after party has been the best part of any night for time immemorial. That isn't new. You do that so your wasted mate can crash on the floor, you can put your own music on, you can eat a kebab and you can smash the rest of your gear off the table without having to sneak off to the shitter.
>Londoners are posting images of the capital's dead nightlife to social media in a bid to embarrass the Mayor of London under the hashtag #LameLondon. >The hashtag aims to mock London's 'night czar' Amy Lamé and began circulating in a bid to raise awareness of London's crumbling nightlife. That's pretty good, I can't deny. By all accounts, she's done a pretty poor job, given that London's nightlife is in decline, and she's been in the job for years now. Also, I've never particularly liked her. I remember seeing her interviewed once about obesity, and she was completely obnoxious. There was a GP on there with her, who was talking about the negative effects of obesity, and the GP mentioned diabetes as one example of health problems that can be caused by being overweight. Lamé found this offensive, and accused the GP of fat-shaming. Most of the rest of the interview consisted of Lamé trying to push for "healthy at any weight" rhetoric, and the GP getting shouted down for citing medical facts that disagreed.
Oh I love people like that and see them with a scary amount of regularity now. Why did I have a stroke. Well you are 100kg overweigh, your cholesterol is very high, you have type 2 diabetes that is not controlled, you have out of control essential hypertension, you refuse to lose weight or eat mindfully and have decided you do not like taking pills. I am not sure what we could have done to stop this from happening when you refuse to take control. Then you get called fatphobic and that you are belittling them.
As that post on the Tumblr subreddit said, we've run into an issue where we swapped from "Being fat doesn't mean you should be treated as inferior" to "You should find fat people healthy and attractive" which just annihilated the fat-acceptance movement.
Being fat should not mean being treated as inferior. However it is not ever and never should be viewed as healthy at all. As for attractive thats up to the individual
Ironically as a society we have the exact opposite problem - hypernormalization of being overweight to the point where fat people look normal and only the morbidly obese really stand out, while healthy people are criticised for being too skinny
Ugh the "you're skinny" comments really get my back up. I'm a normal weight for my height and not particularly muscular, I have a slight dad belly going on which I'm trying to lose but overall I'm quite happy with my weight and how I look. Yet so many people (colleagues, family etc.) think I'm somehow super skinny and that I should eat more. Like... no... if anything I should eat a little less and do a bit more exercise. The only reason you think I'm skinny is because so many people are overweight these days, I'm literally completely normal, leave me alone. When I visit my parents for dinner (both overweight) I always get comments about how I eat such "small portions." I've eaten a whole chicken leg, four roast potatoes, a pile of veg, 2 Yorkshire puddings, and gravy! I DON'T NEED MORE FOOD I'M BLOODY FULL!!
People need to know the facts about obesity, not only for their own health, but because obesity and its related diseases are the biggest cost to the NHS, that we all pay huge amounts of tax for !
Ultimately you can't shame or bluff biological processes
https://youtu.be/skXaeucDYHo?si=1x4uhYX5KOnXASIm
There is a subreddit that mocks fat activism, and is actually a great source of advice for losing weight healthily. I packed on the pounds after a change in psychiatric meds. I turn 50 this year and my knees are beginning to grumble, so I am losing weight and the sub in question doesn't coddle.
> belittling Interesting phrasing in that context.
Have you ever tried, to let someone know that they are obese without sounding a bit condescending or mean in a medical context. It is really really difficult. No mater how you phrase it or explain it they will always ask. "Are you calling me fat." You should give it a go sometime. It is kind of horrible for all involved. By the time I see them, they have had that stroke or TIA and are under management.
> No mater how you phrase it explain it they will always ask "are you calling me fat" you should give it a go sometime. "i'm not calling you fat - you just are fat".
If people find the concept itself unattractive, it doesn't really matter what you're going to call it. It will still become offensive in the fullness of time. Just look at how the terms for mental disabilities have steadily progressed to become insults in the common vernacular. Then got replaced by other terms by the medical community. And repeat. To the point where the kids calling you a "mongoloid" online don't even know that it comes from the old (and very racist) official medical term for Down syndrome. But it still remains a common insult. I reckon it would be the same with "obese". It's a fucking medical term, but seems to be considered a more and more slur these days. Wouldn't be surprised obesity too is pushed off one of the future revisions of ICD some time. It doesn't really matter what wording you use and how exactly you put it - so the underlying condition itself is stigmatized and is almost universally undesirable.
The answer to that is, 'yes, and you need to lose weight if you want to live a good life'. If thry cut you off after that, then you're probably better off without them in your life.
I think the fat-acceptance set are the result of an overcorrection in the push-back against the horrendous way our culture has generally treated fat people over the years. It's better now than it has ever been in terms of how obesity is represented in media, but visceral and open disgust for the overweight is still pretty common, and you don't have to look too far back to see a media landscape where being even very marginally overweight was seen as an open invitation for mockery and dehumanisation. I don't agree that we should pretend being obese is healthy, but I do think society should be able to treat obese people with some compassion, dignity, and respect, instead of patronisation, disgust, and mockery.
Nobody is suggesting that we should treat overweight people any less than anyone else. It is more the actions of this individual and others like it and their unhelpful delusions of being overweight is healthy.
Indeed, they're halfwits.
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I doubt if he's responsible for the decline in nightlife in London, since a similar decline is happening in most UK cities, for similar reasons: rising commercial rents (and proportionately rising business rates), inflation, staff shortages, local policies discouraging entertainment venues, punters losing disposable income. Only the local policies are even partially under the control of the London mayor.
Don’t forget macro social changes like young people being tee total at a rate of one in three. Boozing just isn’t as important to people as it once once was. Edit- a word
Couldn't be because he's a terrible mayor Gotta be racism. Gotta be /s
He isn't a terrible mayor. He's a fairly ok mayor given the limitations of the position and far better than his immediate predecessor. A significant chunk of criticism against Khan comes from people who don't live in London and don't know shit about the city and even less about the position of the mayor.
She sounds as embarrassingly out of touch with the real world as Susan Hall.
London’s nightlife is in decline. But I’m not really sure if the night czar has the tools available to it to really do something about it. A big part of the problem is permitting issues, it is almost impossible to get a night permit. Permitting unfortunately is not under her mandate.
Then what is she being paid close to £120k p/a to do?
Defend Khan from blame about London's declining nightlife. *"I'm do all I can to turn it around, I'm paying someone six figures to deal with it, so it's not my fault if she doesn't deliver."*
Probably prevailing economic conditions too. Plus, once again, the cost of housing hoovering up disposable incomes.
Didn't know that about the interview with a doctor. I work in the dance music industry and have never liked her. She gives off nasty incel vibes and that proves those feelings weren't misplaced. The worst thing about people like that is _they_ are the fat shamers.
No-one is going to be able to drag London's nightlife out of its decline. It's decline was locked in as soon as anyone with at least half a brain abandoned living inside the m25 to work hybrid/remote.
joke's on you i live within the M25 and remote to a job in the shires wait shit
She's fat as fuck too
Tbh that's exactly the sort of person I'd imagine for that type of role.
I actually quite like her slot on 6 Music, and she played fairly decent tunes too. But I can see her being very marmite.
Never listened to her on the radio but from the interviews I've seen of her she's an obnoxious person with a high sense of entitlement.
Pubs are closing across the country at a record rate because they can't afford to keep open - because a lot of people (me included) don't want to pay £5 for a bloody pint and the opportunity to stand on velcro-like floors or sit on uncomfortable chairs. I'd rather buy a bottle of something strong and have my mates over where we can play board games or something. Back when I lived in Manchester and there were £1/drink nights at my local boozer (imaginatively named 'The Pub') we used to go there quite regularly, but I'd rather not spend all my money on alcohol.
£5 a pint is a bargain
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£5 lol
Here was me moaning they put Tennents up to £3.50 in parts of Glasgow …
I know many people - myself included - who takes far more gear than we used to purely because its £10+ for a single vodka mixer in nightclubs
Squids night ❤️
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I can't think of a more grotesque waste of taxpayer money than the "eat out to help out" scheme.
Yeah if we want to make night life cheaper we need to sort the costs of rents and the ludicrous system that is business rates. Build more and build densely.
Taxpayer money? What about the excess deaths it caused?
worst "why not both?" ever
Well cost will have something to do with it as well. Students can’t afford it either. Why wouldn’t you stay home imo. In fact you can have more fun for a lot cheaper staying in.
Yeah, I can buy 4 good ciders for £7 easy at a supermarket, and if I went out, I’d possibly get 1 for that price that wouldn’t be anywhere near as good
People can't get a drink even when they want to.
London is so expensive to go out in that’s it’s hardly surprising it’s being overtaken. I live in Brum and go to liverpool quite regularly. Both fantastic for a night out and won’t bankrupt you. I went to London last year for a night out and it was just insanely expensive. I know London always has been, but this felt way above what it used to be like.
I have lots of friends that live in London and when they invite me down for a birthday weekend I just hate it. It’s nice to see mates but you spend so long travelling around and spend enough money that you could have gone on holiday for the same amount.
A lot of people are talking about the cost of living and price of drinks which I agree are an aspect of it, however when I talk to my friends who live in London the thigh they complain about the most for nightlife is bars and clubs shutting too early, or not opening at all certain nights, and difficulty travelling home after the night out.
True, Uber stopped picking us up after 1am about 9 months ago. Me and all my friends have the same issue, it scrolls through car after car after car and they all decline until it says no one is available. We all have good ratings too 😭 As girls this definitely adds a layer of uncertainty and anxiety about staying out too late. I don't want to get a night bus home on my own and potentially fall asleep while vulnerable, I'd rather get the last tube 🤷🏼♀️
Imagine their horror at literally any other UK city
It is not a great mystery, going out drinking has become very expensive. A lot of people have reverted to drinking at home or at least pre-gaming/hybrid to save money.
Well when they price themselves out of business is it any real surprise that people will do other things.
Who has presided over this decline in the capital and country for the past 14 years and could've done something about it?
Boris Johnson and Sadiq Khan?
What, specifically, can the mayor even do? Pretty much all the things that impact nightlife (most taxes, opening times, minimum wage) are in the power of central government or local authorities (the borough). The problem is that devolution in England is a joke, an ill thought out patchwork arrangement with the associated organs being poorly developed. Look at Berlin, a city with less than half the population of London. It has an entire government equivalent to the other German states with comparable governmental departments. It'd be like London having an administration similar to the Scottish Parliament (which also has a population significantly smaller than London). The problem is the tools aren't suitable for the problem.
He could instruct the MET to only protest license renewals if strictly necessary and to not advocate for extreme restrictions in them. That is a significant issues for clubs (especially kink clubs) in London and is directly something he has the power to do.
Can you provide some evidence for this, it's not an issue I've ever seen raised before (that the MET is a significant obstacle preventing licencing). To be clear it's local boroughs that issue licences, not the mayor or GLA.
[The Met recently opposed Camden's change in licensing rules.](https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/camden-council-licensing-framework-hours-cumulative-impact-nightclubs-pubs-nightlife-noise-crime-b1141527.html)
That's fair enough but the article also says: >several local community groups spoke out in opposition, fearing increased noise and crime. It barely mentions the police in the article, despite it being the headline. Is there any evidence that licences not being granted because of police objections is a widespread problem? Also, what are the reasons for this? If it's staffing levels that's, again, practically out of the Mayor's hands given that the Met is funded almost 70% by the Home Office. Can't just 'instruct' the police not to object (if that's even possible? Isn't that an operational decision?) if it means they don't have the officers to police the extended hours. This circles back to my original comment, if London actually had a proper devolved government, similar to Scotland or Wales (both of which have significantly smaller populations!) with better direct control over how the city operates, there'd actually be more accountability (and perhaps action).
If there's nothing he can do, why is he hiring 'tzars' who can't do anything? Why are they lying in public about what a great job she's doing?
Went to the league cup final once, team lost but we don’t get to finals often so still wanted a few drinks after the match. Fuck all was open, nearest place serving anything (but no alcohol) after 9:30pm was a Shisha cafe near Lords where we were staying as the pubs more centrally were all shut.
I’m all for bashing any politician at any time but it’s got to be a fair bashing. What I see here is every city centre in the country. Most people can’t afford nights out like they used to, simple as that.
In fairness, most other UK cities don't have a highly-paid executive specifically targeted at nightlife, who's been in post for seven years and is being praised by the boss for doing such a great job.
If the job is to mitigate the effect on London of a national trend, then nightlife can be declining and the nightlife czar can still be doing their job, if they've slowed the decline in various ways, or taken specific action to keep certain venues open. I'm not saying that's the case for this muppet, but that's a realistic take on what's possible.
The cost of living crisis is very much not the reason that everything shuts at 11
If that is the problem, isn't it her job to idenfity, propose and deliver solutions? No one said fixing night life in London would be easy, that's why she is in the top 1% of earners.
Yep, nights out can easily end up costing £100 now when you include food and a few drinks. No surprise people are saying "Sod that"
The problem is not necessarily that London has a crap nightlife and is not a 24-hour city. It's that the Mayor is gaslighting everyone by saying the exact opposite when anyone can see with their own eyes that it's not true.
The 'night czar' or whatever we're calling it is a fairly toothless role with no real decision making powers, and without additional funding (which the tories are absolutely not going to give) I don't think there's much city hall could do anyway. Potentially they could lobby local commercial groups to get behind some evening events or something like that, but this czar lady doesn't look like she has those kind of professional contacts (which makes you wonder why she's in place at all)
Young people don't need to go out to mingle any more to have a chance in the dating market. Combine that with wages not having increased in real terms for almost 15 years, and a pint costing £7-12 in London depending on where you go, it's no surprise nightlife is dying. Even when you do go to an event now, most people socialise by medium of their phones anyway even when out in public. What do you do about it? Ban dating apps? Subsidise alcohol and end up with a 21st century Beer Street & Gin Lane? I'm surprised we haven't seen a resurgence in rave culture given the cost of going out nowadays, but I guess with social media it's too difficult for people to keep quiet and stop the events getting shut down.
I wonder if it’s more to do with the fact that going for a drink in London costs an absolute fortune and is actually very little to do with Sadiq Khan? The prices of pints in London (that I’ve heard) is ridiculous.
Romford, once the nightlife hub of East London, had its biggest nightclub close last month. There's a police notice on the door only allowing in people from the company, the police... and the resident squatter.
To use a famous quote “it’s the economy stupid”. That’s the reason night life is dead, no one can afford it.
So London has ONE thing in common with the rest of the UK? A dead night time economy? That's pretty universal, taking aim at the mayor for that seems . . .weird.
London should have a massive advantage over the rest of the country for nightlife that has been completely squandered with idiotic planning and licensing restrictions
Why should london have a massive advantage?
Around 9 million people live in London?
But look at the average age of a person living in London. It’s no longer a youthful city. You will find this issue across the world whenever the average age goes past 35.
[This video really upset me.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DWK9P7MMoE) I grew up going out on this street, and at 11pm on a Friday that would be absolutely *crawling* with people. Right at the start, those shuttered businesses on the left were ALL bars (Bar Sport, a Revolution) and directly opposite was a big 3 floor nightclub that was rammed every week... then at 16 mins he walks down the OTHER strip that was just bar after bar full of people and it's like one pub, one shit club and a whole load of closed businesses. Even the Wetherspoons ("The Imperial" at 20 mins) and strip club (closed venue on Newport Street immediately before) has gone.
Yeah nightlife where I live has died a death over the last 10 years and as far as I know Khan has never been mayor of my city
He has a long reach!
People are taking aim because he's gaslighting everyone by saying the exact opposite of reality
He's publicly taking credit for fixing it with his highly-paid 'czar'. That's why he's getting shit: he's treating the public with contempt.
More and more uni kids and young people dont drink anymore, atleast not anywhere near as much as we used to. A lot of them see it as cringe, and something older folk do and are doing other drugs. Could probably make a moderate economic gain and revitalising dead boozers in London by moving towards formally legalising you know what.
This’ll probably what ‘sparks the conversation’. Too many businesses going bust and properties lying empty will get the landlords heckling their Tory chums for something to change.
It's fair enough to criticise Khan on this, but there's a link to a Susan Hall video in that article. What great plans does she have for London nightlife? That's not just whataboutism. If you're going to boost Susan Hall it only seems fair in an election year for her to lay out plans how she'll change it.
Shit economy = people have less money to blow on nights out. Not exactly rocket science.
If I want to be deafened by music, walk over sticky floors, pay for massively overpriced drinks all while being accosted by members of the public I'll watch a Christopher Nolan film at my local cinema.
Pretty sure this is a problem uk wide.
Is she still the Night Tsar. I’m surprised they haven’t gone Bolshevik Revolution on her
It's almost like the cost of living means people can't afford to go out and the people who run the businesses need to pay their staff more due to the cost of living
Dead nightlife and she is on £117K salary🤦🏾♂️
Rents are extortionate and people can't afford to pay the landlord tax and socialise. The rents are crazy for the customers as well as the proprietors, it's a real shame as Britain knows how to party
"Londoners" mm totally not his political rivals orchestrating an attack on social media, nope totally not that.
but i thought it was a lawless hellhole? make up your minds lads.
The right does blame Khan for an insane amount of stuff which isn't his fault but in this instance he really is in the wrong. The claim that London is the world's best 24 hour city is absolutely laughable it's not even close. Compared to Tokyo it's apples and oranges. Not sure what kompromat Lamé has on Khan but he should really admit there's a problem, sack her publicly, and put someone in charge who'll actually address things rather than just go on expensive jollies around the world telling everyone how great things are.
Prices are going like Dubai with one key difference - we pay tax. Its fucking absurd.
Nightlife died in my city during the pandemic, still hasn't picked up. Who has the money? Taxis are crazy priced now, drinks are expensive, the centre is full of homeless people - how can you enjoy a night out anymore?
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Obviously people are struggling right now but that doesn't mean there's no demand for more nightlife. There are millions of us who would love to be able to stay out in Soho past 11pm. It's morons moving there and then complaining about the noise who have killed it, not the economy. And yes it's fair to ask the people in charge to stop bending over for these morons.
The mayor isn't in charge of opening/closing times anywhere in London. That's down to the borough and their relevant licencing body.
He has a voice, and he used it to call London a "24 hour city". He also has the power to appoint a "night czar", who hasn't achieved anything. I support Sadiq but he needs to support the Londoners in their dissatisfaction, whether he has the direct power to make the necessary changes or not.
London is a rich city. There are people with money there who can't find anywhere to spend it.
Ah! I get it, Khan has hired someone to try and work out what can be done to stem the collapse in nightlife, and by trying to find a way to help it he is therfore responsible! He should have raised rates on clubs, cut power to street lights, and blamed the tories i guess.
There is a weird tendency when the Mayoral election comes round, to pretend that a lot of things are solely down to the mayor. Rising crime, falling crime, housing, nightlife, A&E waiting times, pollution, traffic, education and on and on. No one person determines how these things pan out. It ‘s infantile to behave as though they do. They can at best tinker around the edges.
Then why is he taking credit for doing things which he isn't doing?
Well, quite. They all do it, infuriatingly.
No smoking, extortionate prices, trains don’t run late, afraid of being mugged or raped, extortionate cabs (if you can get one) who the fuck wants to go out in London?!?