American Couple Reacts: England's EVIL North vs South Divide!? FIRST TIME REACTION! *SHOCKING*

[@TheNatashaDebbieShow]

We have NEVER heard anything about this United Kingdom! We have heard about rivalries with England and Wales, but more just taking the piss. But this! This is a topic no one has brought up on the 3 years of our channel. So is there really a divide between the North of England and the South of England? Is it over or still ongoing? We learned a lot of history in this video but we want to hear from YOU. Please leave us a comment to help us understand just how this really still plays out in current times and everyday life, if at all. Please keep the comments respectful. Thank you SO much for watching! If you enjoy our content, please consider subscribing to our channel, it is the BEST way to support our channel and it's FREE! Also, please click the Like button. Thank you for your support!

[@afuantumi2768]

It’s still ongoing. I am originally from Ghana and did my adaptation as a nurse in Liverpool ( north) and I live in Oxford now yes it’s stark difference.

[@bobbyg1068]

Definitely not over, I have family all over the UK, love the North but in many ways it has more in common with Scotland and Wales, it's London that's the odd place out compared to the rest of the UK

[@felonmarmer]

I reckon that you don't hear about this because most of the media is based in the south and they only like to show the good, cultural, historical bits of the north. And by the north, if you look at those maps you will see the dividing line between growth and decline is drawn somewhere between Birmingham (where I live) and London, so the majority of the country falls into the "north" as described in this video. In simple terms this means London and the South take more than 50% of the economic resources to pull the average prosperity line south of the midpoint geographically as you would expect.

[@neilgayleard3842]

As always it's all about the North of England and London. Which is not true and overlooks the rest of Britain. As a real southerner ( I am not from London) that annoys me. Because it makes it sound simple. It is far more complicated than that. You should dig deeper if you really want to understand. Thatcher has had a huge impact on the country that we all are still living with. I hate her and what she did to me and my country. Britain is a tribal nation and we will always have our differences, that's not a bad thing. One thing a lot of people are as one on is London. It's not a English/ British city anymore.

[@bobbyg1068]

@neilgayleard3842 London is simultaneously the least British city and the most British city, in the same way that NYC doesn't feel like real America and Paris doesn't feel like real France

[@nick_Hfc]

A Yorkshireman here who lived and worked in the South for 25 years, now back in the "friendly North". This guy is a bit of a joke. He talks about Northern accents being used in adverts for trustworthiness then shows an ad with a West Country accent filmed in Shaftesbury, Dorset! Personally I think the real divide in this country is between rich and poor, homeowners and renters, young and old, where the younger generation have been badly let down by policies regarding housing etc. Not all Southerns are posh and not all Northerners are friendly. Historically speaking there were far fewer Normans up here and the Saxon and Viking heritage is still strong - it goes a long way back.

[@michaelstamper5604]

Born in South Yorkshire and brought up in Kent and I agree. The big divide socially is financial more than anything else. East-enders have more in common with ex Yorkshire miners or Newcastle shipbuilders than with Lord Whoever or a Richard Branson type.

[@jeremysmith54565]

Even some elements particularly in the Geordie dialect where Old English is still used, the only one I can remember is gan, means of course run or go in the Geordie dialect, but its directly from Old English.

[@LoneRanger100]

It was NOT a West Country accent, cloth ears! Anyhoo all this is bollocks, no one’s ‘friendlier in the north’ it’s just bullshit. Yorkshire folk for instance. Dour humourless dullards. The phrase chippy northerner exists with good reason. Northern born, West Country raised, live in the South cos it’s grim oop north. Ps I don’t read replies but fill yer boots.

[@jwSN12]

I think these days, everyone in Britain is only divided between British and Londoners!😅 I saw a London hipster post over Christmas. He was shocked that a family in the countryside, allowed their children to drink 'wild water'! (What we country bumpkins call 'spring water'!) 😂😂 He showed a dead pheasant half a mile away in the stream that, to my mind, was filtered within an inch of it's life through chalk and a couple of fields! Londoners are happy to eat a pheasant that's hung up and rotted for 14 days and they will pay £7 for a bottle of manufactured tap water, that they call 'spring water'! 😂😂😂

[@House0fHoot]

@@jeremysmith54565 ‘Aye, gan hyem marra’ is Geordie for ‘Yes, go home mate’.

[@helenroberts1107]

I live in North Wales and there is a north Wales and south Wales divide. I was bought up in Manchester and there is definitely a north south divide in the UK. A lot of it is more, a London, rest of the country divide. Rishi Sunak ripped off the north again with the HS2 train.

[@Arltratlo]

why waste money on the north, if you can bribe the south with the same money!

[@jackielouise7538]

Yes, I think you have a good point there about it being more of a London vs rest of the country divide 👍

[@dave_h_8742]

HS2, Electrified line to Leeds and new trains.

[@janolaful]

Let's see if anyone comes to the aid of Manchester Stockport Wigan leigh after the floods we have had even the Bridgewater canal has burst, I agree with everything you said.

[@HeatherMyfanwyTylerGreey]

My family are both North and South Wales that divide is more tradition than fact. If you are poor north or south it is the same. The Westminister vs rest of the country divide is Fact.

[@MarkmanOTW]

This video did tend to rely on over-simplified conclusions and sterotypes. As always, there's more to this than was covered, and did impact on the prosperity of Britain, with various events happening at the same time. After WWII, when Britain was rebuilding in the 40s and 50's post-war, the country and economy began to recover. 1. In the 60s we applied to join the European Economic Community to continue economic growth and helping international trading - however the French (under De Gaulle) vetoed our application. This impacted on the ability to reduce taxation, so high taxes remained well into the late 70's stifling personal incomes and investment, and only started to reduce with the effect being felt in the 1980s. 2. Unions power restricted industrial changes and often held the Government to ransome as strikes would paralyse nationalised industries (including energy, utilities, transport) and public servies. Also, decades later there's been evidence the certain unions were penetrated by Soviet interference with some officials collaborating to cause industrial and social unrest. 3. The impact of terrorist attacks within Northern Ireland and UK mainland caused by 'The Troubles' in Belfast compromised the attractiveness of the UK for international investment throughout the 1970s and 80s. 4. The global fuel crisis in the mid 70s (which Natasha pointed out) also caused disruption to people lives and industry. 5. In 1979, Margaret Thatcher leading the Conservatives were voted into power becasue many voters were tired of a decade of strikes and high taxes, high unemployment and failing public services (see 'Winter of Discontent, 1978'). Many people wanted a leader that showed strength and the decisiveness to tackle the 'big economic and social problems'. Thatcher took a pragmatic view and was an advocate of the 'prosperity of the individual' over 'reliance on the State' thinking....at the time that's what many people wanted, however over time the impact and outcomes of policies and decisions made by the Conservative led government affected the UK in many ways throughout the 1980s...and not always for the benefit of everyone. Needless to say, Thatcher polarises many depending if you benefitted while she was in power and what perspective you take and 'lens you look through' from a personal, local, national, international, cultural, social, political viewpoint.

[@highpath4776]

It goes a bit earlier , London was depopulated with successful light industries being prevented in expanding with going instead to new town areas, or to Wales or Scotland , this didnt really work well and while "the city" would grow rich on those "northern" industries such as aircraft building in the Manchester area and TVs in Blackburn and Southampton , the 1950s "boom" didnt last, and eventually coal became costly (and polluting ) to provide energy. There has not been a full re-set . a lot of the north now is the distribution centres for goods imported into UK from ports such as Manchester and Hull

[@SusanTurner-yo9lf]

I live in the East Midlands and am from the North East, so your origins are fascinating Natasha. Northeners are so friendly.

[@maranoblet]

A bit unfair, I don't think the majority of the people of the North truly hate the people of the South (though we really do enjoy the banter!) we're too friendly for that! A lot of them came from the North anyway looking for jobs! They mostly hate the Southern centric Political establishment. It no longer matters who you vote for if you are a northerner as nothing will ever change. There are no political parties interested in properly helping the North or the real working class. Labour is now led by the same elitists as the tories or the lib Dems and hasn't reperesented the views of the real working class since at least Kinnock in the 80's (Corben was too much of a liberal imo so doesn't count). Eventually it will snap and it will lead to serious political unrest if it is left to decline. IMO brexit wasn't about sticking two fingers up at the South, for most people I believe it was a hope that something would change, maybe we could get real investment and our industries might be allowed to be subsidised again and grow, if freed from EU rules. Even labour strongholds were prepared to vote for the (mostly) Southern tories in order to get brexit done. But it was our own elite that was holding everything back just as badly as europe. The few politicians who believed in the project were picked off one by one until we had the same status quo as before. So until the opportunites are grasped we are worse off. With hindsight it was perhaps naive to expect change. Of course we are all vilified as thick racists for voting that way which is patently wrong.

[@janinshirley]

The current political elite also do nothing for the working class Southerner

[@da90sReAlvloc]

​@@janinshirley working class southerners. Haddaway man

[@neilsullivan5777]

What a brilliant post. As someone who is considered neither in the North or South (West Norfolk). My parents were from Dagenham (East London) and Manchester.

[@janinshirley]

@@da90sReAlvloc We used to have shipbuilding, car/van making here which has now been done away with. Most jobs for young people are zero hours contracts

[@janinshirley]

@@da90sReAlvloc We used to have shipbuilding/van building down here but nowadays young people often rely on zero hour minimum wage jobs

[@Jen-Taylor225]

People say it's a 'London thing' as if there are no poverty stricken areas in London, London is huge and has rich and poor areas just like everywhere, it's not all Kensington and Chelsea.

[@damienslade]

Kensington & Chelsea is where Grenfell happened and has countless tower blocks and estates filled with social housing and poverty. London doesn't have rich and poor areas, there is social housing on practically every road. A multimillionaire can literally live next door to the chronically destitute.

[@Jen-Taylor225]

@@damienslade Yes i'm sure you are right its just some places will be seen more desirable to live in than others which happens all over the country.

[@damienslade]

​@Jen-Taylor225 There is an historic preference to be north of the river Thames ironically.

[@Jen-Taylor225]

@@damienslade That's true!

[@LaraGemini]

Exactly. London has 9 out of the 10 poorest boroughs in the country.

[@Eileen_Deva-x]

Ah Thatcher! i think she will always be one of the most talked about (controversial) PM's, but was also viewed favourably by some, ranking quite high despite being seen as a divisive figure. In her time, the poll tax was introduced later abolished because of riots and replaced by the council tax, sold off council houses cheap to council tenants which meant they gained wealth and was on the property ladder (some of my family benefited) but that also meant there was less council house's! the Falklands war, closing the mines! wrongly or rightly which was seen as inefficient, unsustainable, costly and environmentally unfriendly, in the 1970s there were electric blackouts (power cuts) because of coal shortages, but there needed to be something in place. Much more investment is needed in parts of the North, South west, and East, i'm from the East and hardly get any investment where i am, towns are just falling apart and getting worse! shops closing, cost of living etc, a lot of PMs promise things but hardly ever deliver.

[@RichWoods23]

It's been four decades yet the root causes still remain largely unaddressed. Every now and again someone in government (regardless of party allegiance) will have a try at something, but I think politics is now so short-termist that few politicians with an eye on re-election dare to spend political capital on what is seen as a set of tangled and mostly intractable problems. Once the progenitor of an initiative leaves office or gets moved on, the initiative itself frequently becomes the target of an ambitious minister looking to gain votes elsewhere by cutting costs here (you saw HS2 mentioned in the video, a prime example of this). Short-termism isn't going to change until someone has the balls to deal with the client media, who will happily trash anything in politics just to sell more advertising to their target market. In the meantime we've got the growing encroachment of populism to face down, which itself cannot work because it promises the earth based upon wishful thinking and the exploitation of division, just to stroke the power-hungry egos of a handful of wealthy bigots and their cronies.

[@SheenaStandring-qd4kr]

Thatcher did more for this country than any politician apart from Churchill. Without her the Falklands would be Argentinian

[@janolaful]

I had my son in 1973 and I remember sitting in my flat no heat no light except candles horrible times, thatcher was determined to damage the working class restricting union's so much you carnt find one, and saving money by robbing children of milk 😮

[@scotmax8426]

Every house sold was a home lost for a working class family.

[@amy13498]

@@scotmax8426 The right to buy also helped the working class get on the property ladder my mother bought hers, it is still in effect today.

[@keithboult4028]

It isn't just the North anymore, the South West has been left behind now.

[@raystewart3648]

Its the Midlands, its in the name for goodness sake, Mid i.e, Middle. That is the Northern part of the Country, according to my mother, but to me, here in South Dorset, its anywhere North of London, those scums, how dare they come down here................they just love the Sun, because they don't get any up there.

[@Goddessmother47]

Well I must be a Northerner then, now living in Lincolnshire but a southerner originally. Lincolnshire is One of the driest and sunniest counties! You’ve made my day though! I would be far more proud to say I’m a Northerner than a Londoner now as in my humble opinion, there is definitely a huge difference when it comes to ‘friendliness’ 😉

[@mightbeanybody]

I'm a southerner that talks to people. My grandmother was from Yorkshire and a bit quiet, my grandfather was a Cockney and very outgoing. So much for stereotypes. Oh, and I should mention that this video was somewhat selective with it's statistics, a balancing view is needed.

[@MarkWhitter-qm6ef]

The Midlands is different from both, but even here, there are massive differences between various areas of the Midlands. eg. Stoke-on-Trent is nothing like Birmingham, which in turn is nothing like Northampton. Essentially, regional peculiarities and accents exist on an almost tribal basis every few miles, although the movement of people has diluted things in more recent years. London is a cosmopolitan city, and the “posh” areas of the South generally refer to the more affluent Home Counties. “Posh” accusations essentially refer to fairly wealthy people, rather than the aristocracy (who are filthy rich, and very few in number).

[@SteveParkes-Sparko]

I was born and raised in the Midlands, very near to Birmingham - so I would DEFINITELY say that there are THREE divisions in England, even though people ignore that for the sake of "keeping it simple". "The South" includes the South-East (London and 'The Home Counties') and the South West (where I live now) - including Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Dorset & Wiltshire. Then it gets a bit blurry until you get up to the definite Midlands: Shropshire, Staffordshire, West Midlands and Liecestershire. North of there, it gets a bit blurry again until you reach Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cumberland and Northumberland, which are 100% "The North"!

[@jdred1950]

I’m a Northerner (Lancashire - now residing in Kentucky), and always say that you can always tell when you are in the Heathen South when they don’t have gravy in chip shops.

[@keithboult4028]

I vote Labour too, even though I am in the South, so we are not all Tories.

[@UmpireStrikesBack]

As a foreigner(Australian) who lived in England for 8 years I always saw it as a London/Not London divide rather than a north/South divide.

[@dianehodgkinson7113]

I'm a proud Northener, brought up in the South West (mostly) - I still took every opportunity to 'go home' Visiting my Grandparents and cousins etc in the North. Thatcher is a very drawn out story - You really need to see what life here (in the South) before she came to power and 'sorted-out' the trade unions!

[@FSboy70]

Where does the divide between north and southern England begin? Some latitude between Manchester and Birmingham?

[@mattbentley9270]

Great choice of vid! Love Jimmy the giant please do more of his not all are as depressing .. bit pf a sad vid, but all true ! bit crap isn't it ! xx

[@MawganRogerson]

Tbf it’s more London & the Commuter Belt vs everywhere else. Cornwall is more deprived than anywhere in the UK other than south Wales (according to EU data from a decade ago), and we’re as far south as you can go! You can pretty much draw a quadrilateral with corners in Cambridge, Eastbourne, Winchester, and Oxford. That’s where the money and power is.

[@andrewbutler7681]

The trouble with videos like this is that they always stress the points that they agree with/make their case and ignore or gloss over the ones that don't, so you never get an unbiased opinion. If you agree with them, you will think they are great; if not, you will think they are rubbish (or worse!); if, like you two, you didn't previously know, you may get an incorrect impression... I lived through a lot of the stuff in the 1960s-80s and think a lot was deliberately left out and what was stressed was done unfairly.

[@lolsaXx]

Where are you from?

[@andrewbutler7681]

@@lolsaXx Originally Devon, but have lived in Yorkshire and Greater London.

[@ruthholbrook]

I was there too - in the (forgotten about) Midlands - yes we exist and we are neither north nor south. Agree that this video was biased, a lot are. There was a whole decade of the 70s and Thatcher only came into it towards the end and in a context that had taken years to build up. If you look at the whole, you see what exactly she was trying to fix. I remember how the country was held hostage by the unions. I remember the 3 day week and the planned power cuts. I remember the Winter of Discontent. I also remember how Maggie Thatcher was voted in again twice with a strong majority.

[@RichWoods23]

@@ruthholbrook As he said, you never get an unbiased opinion...

[@helenwood8482]

I've lived in the north and thd south, so I can annoy both by calling them delicate southern flowers or feather-bedded northeners. It's really just banter.

[@Bazk01]

You have to remember three things: 1: There's more people in the South of England, because that's where the work is. So it's the South that decides who wins the UK elections. - Therefore it's to the governments benefit to make them happy first. 2: Scotland and Wales where the places were Thatcher piloted all of her schemes that screwed over the North. Most of our people moved to England or Emigrated. (My own family had half my uncles and cousins following shipbuilding work to England. Another quarter emigrated to the US, Canada, and Australia. The rest of us moved into other lines of work and needed to commute to work. There are only a small number of Rangers and Celtic social clubs outside of Scotland. They can be paired to places where you build ships.) 3: When Scotland got our independence referendum in 2014, there was a petition with millions of signature's asking Scotland to take the North of England with them. The latest idea is: Split the North of England up into regions and give them some devolved powers like Scotland and Wales. Sounds good, but it's essentially to dilute their voice and start them fighting each other for the scraps from the South, who will still hold the purse strings and decide which region gets which budget to work with.

[@philroue]

There is also some irony that one of the talking heads in this video was Ed Balls, who was initially an economic advisor to the Treasury, then an MP and government minister, all under the Labour government of 1997 to 2010. So although this video riles against Thatcher, it totally ignores that Labour were in power for 13 years with an initially prosperous economy yet didn't do much for the North, despite Tony Blair having grown up in County Durham and Gordon Brown being Scottish, nstead leaving a mess (both economically and politically regarding the EU) for the Tories to inherit in 2010.

[@mgrimble3975]

The problem with new Labour is the bought into the same economics nonsense that thatcher did, she her self said that Tony Blair was her greatest achievement. We’ve had nothing but varying degrees of tories in power since the start of the 80’s. The only time we were offered an actual Labour gov was from 2015 to 2019 and that caused the mother of all establishment smear campaigns to destroy.

[@YAMR1M]

Then the tories did nothing for the next 14 years... Its not just a labour or conservative government thing, it really is a north south divide.

[@Isleofskye]

Tru Say,Mu Bredda. Preach those words,Bredrin....

[@kes0287]

Some of these comments are becoming ridiculous 😂

[@LukeCaddyUK]

There is so much wrong with this video I can’t even finish it, he played a clip of a “Yorkshire accent” which was in fact a West Country accent. Bristol is by far NOT the rudest place, in fact you can strike a conversation with almost anyone, yes we’re not as out there and confident in that respect but a true Bristolian will do anything for anyone. He said there was only “posh or poor” accents in the south, which is completely untrue, there a load of different accents. He also mentioned everyone up north pronounces Bath as Baff, which we also do in Bristol and the city of Bath in south🤦🏻‍♂️ also “taking the mick” is a more polite version of taking the piss. You’re welcome😂

[@valeriejackson7659]

I've never heard any Northerner pronounce Bath as Baff nor do we say Barth.

[@LukeCaddyUK]

@ how do you say it then?

[@scotmark]

@@LukeCaddyUK "Bath". 😼 Unlike the southerners...

[@scotmark]

Perhaps we should address the great Bristol east-west divide, otherwise known as The Cleavage. 🙀 Also, let's not forget how shitty Bristol's charts are. 😺

[@LukeCaddyUK]

@@scotmark if the City of Bath pronounce it the same as Bristol, Somerset and northerners then I would say it was “unlike the Londoners/south east” as opposed to the south in general. You’re right, our charts are a bit shitty… I stooled while trying to work that one out 😂

[@keithboult4028]

I hate Thatcher, when she died, a record came out, and went to number 1, but the BBC wouldn't play it because it was called Ding Dong The Which Is Dead.

[@andyt8216]

A very interesting video for sure. I do find the guy presenting the video a bit unappealing. Not to mention he called Westminster, “Westminister”. It’s also rather simplistic to make out that the mines = the whole north, or “norf” as he’d say. I’m from East Yorkshire where there were never any pits and now live in York which also has as much connection with pits as Kent did. Rural East and North Yorkshire have been exceptionally pro-Conservative voting and even in the last election, Labour was never in the picture. This picture of the North he presents is not representative of everywhere. York and Harrogate here in Yorkshire and Cheshire etc are as affluent, if not more, than many places in the south. It’s not as completely black and white as he makes out.

[@ironblu4110]

The Tories certainly have a stronghold in rural areas for some reason. Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Northumberland and Aberdeenshire are all Tory strongholds, despite being in the north/midlands.

[@Keith-b4r8o]

"Westminister" is the way some real Londoner's pronounce Westminster. Of course it's not as "completely black and white as he makes out". Things rarely are.

[@MarkWhitter-qm6ef]

Unusually for the South, Kent had plenty of coal mines, unlike York.

[@derrickworthington7351]

There is rivalry between the working North and the money South This really dates back to the Industrial Revolution when the real power house was in the North with its factories, coal mines etc. But the real divide is in the North between Lancashire (me) and Yorkshire. This dates back to the Wars of The Roses which ended when Richard the Third king was killed at the style of Bosworth in 1485. But we still have a Duke of York and a Duke of Lancaster (H.M. Charles 3. The reigning Monarch has another title Duke of Lancaster) Strangely the rivalry between Yorks and Lancs is just really jocular name calling because at heart we are Northerners. When I was in the Army I was the only Sgt in the Sgts Mess from Lancashire out numbered by 5 Yorkshire men. But if any other person especially a Southerner ganged up against me then look out, they would have 5 rabid Yorkshire men snarling at them. It was us and them 😢😢 15:03

[@vogonpoet5860]

delorean was a con from the start, a high tech body using an under powered french engine, and budget shelf electronics . there was a story going round at the time that delorean was taking £30,000 per car built from the labour government, selling them for £10,000, while they cost £2000 to build and were worth £500. and when police found delorean he was in a hotel room with hookers and piles of cocaine. the costings were correct, the latter rumours. as for Maggie, she did some good things but surrounded herself with shabby people like her chancellor who invented POLL TAX and her industries minister who closed mines and her defence minister who got into shady dealings over westland helicopters, then when the SHTF from these , they skillfully side stepped and blamed the ideas squarely on Maggie before the same shabby MPs called a vote of no confidenco, knifed her in the back and the real architect of POLL TAX took over as PM and plunged us into 1st gulf war and 4.2 million unemployed.

[@RichWoods23]

Well, that's an opinion, I suppose. You forget that ministers can't introduce new policies without the PM's approval, which may or may not equate to Cabinet approval, but that's a matter of leadership style and ultimately the PM chooses the Cabinet. Given that Thatcher was only in favour of Cabinet collective responsibility when it suited her (see the famous Spitting Image sketch), it's only fitting that she was -- either way -- the author of her own downfall.

[@TerenceDixon-l6b]

Delorean asked for a grant to build a desperately needed factory in Northern Ireland to help create jobs and reduce the violence. At the time, as standard practice, they gave the grant for the DeLorean Motor Company of Detroit to build the factory, as many governments have done in the UK to attract business (e.g, Honda, Nissan and Airbus Industries among many others). It started production in 1981 under Thatcher, who gave the grants. And it was she who gave the orders to basically destroy British manufacturing industry, (and in so doing the Unions who she hated) and her ministers complied, much as Trump's people do these days

[@thomasbrownriggholden3395]

The situation is alot more complicated than is made out in this video and no mention of why the economy was in diar straights in the 1970s .Somethings I think that Mrs Thatcher did to rectify this in the 1970s was hard but needed on other things she made mistakes. Also no doubt in size wealth and investment when it comes to London and the rest of the country then there is a huge gap . Also there are pockets of wealth in the north and pockets of relative poverty in the south . I say this as a northerner.

[@jeremymerrifield7244]

You should try living in Devon or Cornwall. It's always forgotten about by those in power.

[@neilgayleard3842]

True, but that same can be said about everywhere in British.

[@lolsaXx]

​@@neilgayleard3842everywhere but London...

[@jackd9928]

You want to try living in a working class Northern town. Devon and Cornwall don't come close in terms of "being forgotten".

[@CiciColino]

Cornwall, literally the definition of posh, but go on.

[@DarthBill-h6f]

@@CiciColino Posh to holiday in or if your a second home owner from up country. Cornwall in the second most deprived aria in Northern Europe and the average wage is about 80% of the national average so it's not posh to be Cornish.

[@keithboult4028]

You should watch The Mash Report, it was funny, but it has been taken off of the BBC because the Tories didn't like it, they were offended.

[@martintabony611]

I don't think it matters anymore. Class is more important As a Geordie I've got more in common with a working class Cockney than the Duke of Northumberland. We'll still take the piss out of each other though, banter is a tradition that we all keep alive.

[@Isleofskye]

Just mak sure you reward The Toon Army and win The Cup..

[@RobertLloyd-f3p]

Not quite as clear cut as it sounds, as an example many people wanted the first new rail link to be a cross Pennine route from Manchester in the west to Leeds in the east, and not London to Birmingham which already had reasonably good services. London has become such a melting pot of cultures that many Brits outside London do not genuinely feel any attachment to it as our capital. Wales has Cardiff, Scotland Edinburgh, Northern Ireland Befast, then theres Greater Manchester. Yorkshire has Leeds etc. This is not a new thing, during the second world war Hitler yhought he could break the spirit of the British people by Blitzing London (and other cities), he did not understand that though we would fight for all of Britain, London was not that importsnt to Welsh. Scots, Northerners, Midlanders, West country etc.. 37:35 There is a line in Shakespesres Henry V "Let them know of England, that only England know". Ssid as a barb against the French amassador, who had presented the King with tennis balls.

[@PLightstar]

It's is more like North Vs South East. us in the South West don't get involved and are content listening to the Wurzels and drinking Cider.

[@frednerk8366]

As a Southerner who moved up to Yorkshire 12 years ago, I can honestly say that I would never go back down South. Everything is better up here.

[@Arltratlo]

if Scotland joins the EU, you can relocate faster...lol

[@brian9731]

I'm originally from the North (Leeds) but have lived in the Southeast and mostly London for 26 years, a little under half my life. The capital is where there is all human life - different human activities and Nationalities, races, religions in much greater evidence than anywhere else in the country and in fact, the world.

[@monty2005]

It’s real. I’m from the north Midlands, I live about 4 miles south of the Trent, which is the river that traditionally is the border. Most Midlanders are north of the divide,and I certainly wear shorts in the winter, but I also shop at Waitrose 😂 Midlanders are usually ignored in this debate. But I’m definitely a northerner (although most of my family’s ancestry is Yorkshire.

[@suzannebessent-rothwell5813]

The South /South divde exists too. Those with money are fine the rest of us who can just get by and those who are struggling down here have other issues. Commuter belt towns where people have disposable income to spend in pubs that are now bistro style or independant boutiques and high end stores v those in council or housing association homes who can't afford to shop local probably without transport and for whom nail bars, barbers, estate agents and coffee shops are unecessary! Kids getting caught by county lines gangs because nothing provided for them and so on

[@helenwood8482]

DeLorean annoyed the fairies. That's why he lost everything.

[@rob27dap26]

So there is a North South Divide, but its a bit more nuanced than the South being Wealthy and North Poor, it runs true until you head towards the South West of England wants you get past London poverty locally within the South West gets worse head past Bristol and Poverty actually begins to get as worse as it is up North with Plymouth and Cornwall locals experiencing extreme poverty on par or greater than some of our Northern cities and towns. The real North South Divide is better described as a London divide, the closer one is to London the wealthier you tend to be the further out from London either North or South there is some seriously shocking deprivation and poverty. I'm a Plymouthian and our Poverty is on par with and greater than some of the Northern cities infact in the South West we actually have a lot more in common with our Northern cousins than we have the wealthier parts of the South that are closer in to London. The other issue we have i we have a lot of wealthy people who purchase second "holiday" homes and so we can have parts of Plymouth that are like a microcosm of this London divide with areas that displace so much of the local population or have high turn over of short term lets of wealthy people renting out their second homes during the non holiday periods. In reality the UK divide is a problem of the poor and the wealthy and as I say its actually more a London versus the rest of the Country divide

[@di_tattoolover]

There is definitely a North/South divide. I live in the north and the differences are so apparent, especially financially, Any new money gets spent down south, then we get the little thats left.

[@cassandramcfadyen1988]

Pubs have bars too.

[@richards200]

Nobody in the south knows anything exists above the Watford gap, everyone in the north thinks the people in the south are all southern ponces 🤣

[@monty2005]

Nottinghamshire is a county with 5 Dukedoms. Most counties don’t have a single one.

[@raymondberry9482]

I’m a Londoner by birth so I go with the whole “north of Watford” is the north. I work with a lot of northerners and I have to say they are a lot friendlier and easier to talk to. I love how northerners are very “to the point” which I’m like, southerners are generally more reserved and “polite” and take a lot longer to get to the point of what they’re trying to say.

[@steveh5230]

💟Natasha wasn't born Debbie a sweet little girl and I was there when the photo of the miners at the power station gates (19:59) was taken at ferrybridge west yorkshire. the miners leader was forced into industrial action. then the leader of the goverment of the time assett striped the country. and the north south divide got much bigger.

[@The-Underbaker]

Draw a horizontal line through half of Cheshire across to Lincolnshire, essentially above that is the North. A friend of mine from Cornwall says everything above Cornwall is "the North" though! lol The Midlands is where it's at. The best of the North and the South! Before Labour were voted in last year the UK was the largest growing economy in the G7, even outpacing that of the US. Now? Zero growth. Hilarious that Terry Christian was used at the end of the video. He doesn't know his arsehole from his elbow!

[@keithboult4028]

Because the government is based in the South, they don't spend as much money on the North, causing a bit of a rift, and we take the kids out of each other, and I am from the South West.

[@paulclark6458]

75% in home county's so right

[@keithboult4028]

Why does he say Minister instead of minster?

[@Mex1c070]

The North/South border is Banbury. Have you ever heard of The Banbury Cross? It lies about 30 miles North of Oxford. Fact.

[@vaudevillian7]

Just to correct a small error, East Germany was not part of the Soviet Union - it was part of the Warsaw Pact like Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary etc.

[@lovelifeandcrafts5003]

Then thwre's me who was born in the south (Essex), lived in the North 10 years (scotland from the age of 3-13) , lived in the south again for a year (essex) and now in the west midlands (worcestershire 3yrs + stoke / staffordshire 11yrs , though my sister and mum stayed in stoke the whole 14yrs) lol. I will say, i love the scots more but you get arseholes in any country : same with good"uns. Xx

[@martinhoult]

it is a real thing from the Norman invasion of england and then later the UK ? The saxons had a strong hold over the north of the country and the welsh had a separate community as did the scotts and Irish and many other regions had the samething ? The Normans conquered every part of the country but where very brutal in their surpresion of the north known as the desolation of the north total war and the destruction of land by salting and burning this went on for years along with conquest in Scotland and wales etc The population power and people were totally destroyed in this period which went on for centuries ?

[@keithboult4028]

He was on about Thatcher then.

[@liukin95]

I know this video was about the UK, but him saying that East Germany was in the Soviet Union really got my head spinning in all directions lol

[@ianwilkinson8664]

Would it be fair to say that the US has it's own North/ South divide? Although leaders; governments and politic don't help, our richer South is closer to Europe and so most trade transits the South and you North is closer to Canada and the trade routes to Europe whilst the South is closer to poorer South America. I believe geography plays a bigger part than people like to admit.

[@claregale9011]

They do I watch a lot of videos regarding the southern states and the poverty is unreal you'd think it was a third world country .

[@zoeroscoe9013]

Have you thought about taking a trip to the UK..?

[@lindadoswell9396]

I was born in London moved to various parts of the south and then saw the light and moved to Lancashire! The people are more outgoing and never say anything nasty to me even though Ive been up Here for 35years I still have a southern accent!! London is not what it was when I lived there and when I went back it was like an alien world!!

[@carolineskipper6976]

The trouble with identifying the location of the North/South Divide is that it ignores the existance of The Midlands. Here we are less northern than full on northerners, but we have less in common with southerners. It;s like one big Venn Diagram with The Midlands in the centre.

[@Pilot.0101]

The historical north/south divide is marked in Sheffield. There is a monument to the point at which King Ecgbert and King Aeadred's armies met in 829AD. The border point runs through the woods there and is known as the Mercia line. That was the old mercia/Northumbria border and the official north / south divide.

[@dave_h_8742]

As with a colour gradient it's not a line of north south but a slow change through the midlands or further south.

[@jopearson3022]

Probably the best natural and cultural divide between north and south is the River Trent.

[@carolineskipper6976]

@@jopearson3022 Although that puts Derby in 'The North' whenDerby is definitely in the East Midlands, and then north of Newarke it runs South to North up to the Humber, dividing places West/East rather than Norht and South.

[@centrasseptyni8277]

@@jopearson3022 Because is very litlle or no bridges in England?

[@DylanArmitage-lo5vs]

There's no north or south, there's London + home counties, then there's Britain

[@isabelmagee447]

We are over all a happy nation iam scottish we all get along

[@charlesfrancis6894]

There really is a Midlands which is roughly in the middle . Nprth is just after the Midlands.

[@Pilot.0101]

Anything south of Sheffield and North of south Birmingham is the Midlands.

[@gillfox9899]

For the most part over the timescale from the 1960s to today the northern middle class (white collar worker, professionals etc) have not suffered as much as others, but I think this is true for the south as well. His comparison using a southern middle class woman and a working class Northern man was biased

[@daviddavid2890]

I always think draw a straight line from the north coast of Wales, west to east, and that's fairly close to the divide

[@vaudevillian7]

Yeah your ancestry matches where I'm from Natasha - East Midlands and Yorkshire

[@cliffordwaterton3543]

there is some truth to this - lived in 'the North all my life - but I've seen other videos from this guy and he has his own agenda. the real 'divides' in this country are much deeper and complex.

[@EdwardDeane-fp4bw]

The south took taxes from north and used them for the south more, rather than give fair share of investment to North. Even in more modern era oil and gas found and worked by north and northerners. Most of the money though was invested in London and the South.

[@keithcorbett-butler8916]

Same in all countries all over the world. Investment in the capital and key cities, and the rest neglected.

[@AliceLucindaBronte]

Natasha if your DNA came back as Yorkshire / East Midlands that means you have Viking blood. As that is the main genetic difference between that area and the rest of England because of how long that area was occupied by the Vikings.

[@AussieDaveok]

Vikings are not a nationality who do you mean Danish Swedes or Norwegian

[@UKJesterVids]

@@AussieDaveok for most of the UK (assuming the family line has been here a while) it'd be Danish

[@claregale9011]

I live in Kent one of the first kingdoms

[@Delicious_J]

And the norse thing is simply broadly norther, not only yorkshire, im from lancashire and about half of the surnames in my family r all of norse origin, the Danes founded Dublin - they had to travel across the land from eastern coast to the western coast and the Irish sea through northern england and my theory is many simply settled in the existing settlements coming or going along the way

[@beewalk2653]

Living in the North, it does seem that bad to me.

[@richardbrown7153]

Good Morning Girls I live in the South, but I'm not rich, I'll talk to just about anybody and I don't vote Conservative. If it makes any difference, I think, going by your comments, I'm nearer Debbie's age than yours Natasha, but are is just a number. As far as politics is concerned, if you think of the Conservatives as being the Republicans and Labour as the Democrats, you'll get the General idea. No more politics, I promise! We used to have a saying that the 3 subjects to avoid in conversation are Money, Politics and Religion because it causes arguments and I go along with that! As far as ordinary people like me are concerned, we don't hate each other, we might take the pics out of each other about various things, but we're not having fights on the street just because of where we might live. At a safe a nd Happy both of ou, !and I'll see you on the next video 😘

[@PaulJonesy]

I’ve lived in the southern UK for almost 60 years - in my experience there IS a divide - there’s London and “the Home Counties” Surrey, Sussex etc and the rest. If you go to places like Dorset, Cornwall etc the attitudes and friendliness are similar to what you get in the North, and they are definitely friendlier in the north. There are plenty of pockets of austerity in a lot of the south too, and plenty of well-off areas up north.

[@Goddessmother47]

I’m from Surrey but now in Lincs and I agree with your statement totally.

[@Arltratlo]

the Tories dont wanted the north connected to HS2, because the north isnt worth it for Tories!

[@davidwhite5800]

I'm from Dorset and I always find Northern comedians to be absolutely spot on with my family and friends whereas London may as well be another planet.

[@JohnRoberts-pt8cu]

When Thatcher died, the people who were affected by her politics went into the streets and cheered. That's how hated she was. The problem with Thatchers politics was that it was instant, there was no gradually going away from coal, which the north was dependent, our industry was still using steam in some factories, we still had machinery from the first world war in the 70's, where in Germany they had to start from scratch, so by the 60s German industries took over the industrial world, England was left behind, we lost the coal mining, and we lost our Auto industry through poor management and investment into new machinery and quality control, the old saying, if you want money you have to spend money, and seeing the government didn't invest in the north after destroying the car and coal industry, which tore families apart, with the trained workers going overseas, like Australia and New Zealand, even Germany, England lost two generations of hard working and knowledgeable people, you have to build a infrastructure to make things work, and be ready to change the infrastructure slightly to adapt for the future, this is where the british government failed in the 60s and 70's, they didn't set the tracks for the future, they came with a big hammer and smashed everything, without thinking about what comes next, England became the banking industry in Europe, now we see the results of their short sightedness, with banks going bankrupt, and having to be baled out with tax payers money, we have seen this in the USA how many times now, and still we have not learned, if you want a stable environment, you have to invest in the people, they are the future.

[@rayclarke9959]

Well said

[@chrisallen19821982]

I am from the Midlands we on the whole hate the north just as much as the south 🤣🤣🤣

[@MarkWhitter-qm6ef]

The 1984 Miners Strike wasn’t about pay, it was about protecting jobs and communities. At the time, there was still 300 years supply of coal available to mine.

[@2011littlejohn1]

Before I watch this I will say how the people in the North feel. They think that they did all the work that made the money but the people in the South spent it.

[@briankenny3690]

Nothing new here then it's been like that since the roman empire pulled out the south Well if they are all right ..that's all that matters is intended that right ..sir starmer. Sir.😢

[@philipjamesarmstrong1364]

Hilarious how he goes on about how Southerners supposedly sound more intelligent, then says 'Norf, Sahf' 'Norvern' and 'Indushtry', I can pronounce my 'th' and 's', so how thick are Northerners, eh???

[@vogonpoet5860]

most accepted rule is, draw a line from east to west across england through the midlands just under Birmingham and Nottingham and thats the divide. North of the line is historicaly the industrial England where mining, ship building, steel foundries, cotton mills etc were based, while south was the home to agriculture, academia (though the north had some farming and colleges and south had some manufacturing), and of course the seat of government. northerners tend to be open, blunt and welcoming while southerners seem guarded, off hand and duplicitous. most animosity is founded in the fact that a man in the south working 8 hrs will earn £160, but a man in the north working the same job, same hours will earn £80. they pay the same tax rates but house prices are higher in the south due to higher wages and vice versa. academic southerners are seen by physical working northerners as soft southern .....(expletive) , and southerners see northerners as thick, brutish and uncultured. these are of couse generalisations and all apply north and south. like saying people from Tennessee are redneck hillbillies, dumb but friendly while all New Yorkers are rude , aggressive and self obsessed. while both most certainly exist, all traits can be found in both states in some form or other.

[@darrentoon5332]

what about the midlands

[@paulhmann]

I am a Yorkshireman so from the North but I remember once visiting a customer in Glasgow Scotland. I was told that I was a southerner.

[@archiebald4717]

It is about culture, not dislike.

[@rbweston]

The joys of being a Midlander, I'm neither a stuck up Southerner, or a Northerner with a huge chip on my shoulder. :D

[@DGLUK1]

Greetings from a snowy Yorkshire 😊

[@LilMonkeyFella87]

Theres a video on here from 1970 interviewing people from the North and South of England, asking their opinions on each side. That is fun watch. Quite a few people have reacted to it "1970: England's NORTH-SOUTH divide | Man Alive | Voice of the People | BBC Archive"

[@stuartfitch7093]

Hi ladies. I'm from an industrial northern town that is classed as "left behind". The trouble is many of these northern towns only existed because of the presence of the one industry. So, when you take that industry away, you virtually remove the entire local economy. Local unemployment in a northern industrial town would go from 10% to 90% overnight night just because they closed one coal mine, which employed all the male workers of the town. There were much further reaching effects, though. Because there was no alternative employment in an industrial town built to serve one industry that was now gone, those people made unemployed had very little opportunity to get another job elsewhere in the town because jobs outside of that one industry were very few. So many of those coal miners in northern towns never worked again after they were made unemployed. There are, in fact, many northern towns where local families have experienced multi generational unemployment. So grandfather lost his job in the coal mine when it closed, as a consequence father has never had a job and now son has no job. This is because after closing, such as the coal mines, no alternative source of employment was created to compensate for those job roles lost in that coal mine. So even today, if you visit many northern towns around where I live the job opportunities are few, the jobs there are, are minimum wage low skilled jobs, usually manual jobs. This results in things like my 3 bedroom semi detached that is worth 130k where it stands would probably be worth 800k in London. Somebody I know from London recently told me that in London I would get 1 million for it. These values show the discrepancy in the local demand on housing. People all want to be in southern cities where the high paying, professional jobs are and not be living in a poor northern town with poor public transport, poor wages and low quality jobs. I'm personally lucky that I'm one of a small few in my northern town who earns over 30k per year which is probably similar to earning 100k per year in London. To give you a better understanding, I have studied the US a lot and visited a couple of times and would say it is similar to comparing places like Orlando in Florida to some small towns in Appalachia in the US.

[@Britabroad877]

I’m a northerner (from Durham) who lived. In the south (Kent, near Folkestone) for 25 years and now live back in the north close to the Lake District. As a professional engineer, degree educated I fully enjoyed my time in the friendly south. London is an exception. It is not a friendly place to live or to visit. I too, have said hello to people in the street much to their annoyance. Back in the north, life is much more relaxed and friendly.

[@carolfranklin]

I'm from north London my Mum was from Lancaster she talked different but we got genuine Lancashire Hotpot! I love going up north & Scotland it's beautiful & the people are incredibly friendly, which I never get used to. On the other hand I hardly ever go to south London 🤣

[@happyhedgehog6450]

I'm a yorkshireman who lives in Wales and it's like living in the past 😂.

[@ChloeAndBetty]

London has little to do with the rest of the South of England, most Southerners are friendly too.

[@Arltratlo]

how many times you went to Kent??? i think i never met more racists beside in the USA!

[@saxon-mt5by]

For most people there is no north/south divide, but there is a major divide between London (and possibly the Home Counties) and the rest of the country.

[@claregale9011]

​@@Arltratloyes we have an issue with immigration. Especially when housing is in short supply . We need to stop the boats coming over with god knows who on them , do it the legal way and we're all good . But now I'm a racist ? I work along side a Polish and Bangladeshi lady we all get on very well

[@S4f3ty_Marc]

@@Arltratlo You've never been to Wales then.

[@Arltratlo]

@@S4f3ty_Marc no need! its outside my normal drives to Italy, France or Sweden.... so why make a detour via silly island?

[@wendyfield7708]

"taking the piss".....teasing is what I wouldsay!

[@alisonlinnell8943]

There are surface differences, but it’s more of a class thing where the problems lie. I’m originally from the Midlands and most folk day to day are equally fine. The thing is like humans everywhere people tend to band together and look for differences. Someone from Manchester would probably make snide comments about someone from Liverpool, but put them in a room with someone from the south, and it’s suddenly northerners together. It’s a shame the video conflates cultural differences with political and class issues. The stereotypical warm hearted northern working class salt of the earth and the posh elitist southerner are equally untrue.

[@aledwilliams1929]

Happy new year to you both, great vlog as usual xx

[@TheNatashaDebbieShow]

Thank you ♥️

[@simplysplendid6064]

You must understand this is a very heavily biased take on a very complex problem. When he talks about Atlee as saving the UK from fascism, and that everyone was doing well over the next thirty years as a complete and total nonsense. The biggest question you have to ask in these sorts of matters is why Thatcher won three stonking election victories and is the longest serving PM in 200 years, and why Labour 1997-2010, was the most right wing iteration of Labour. It is fine to have a hard left view of the world if that is what the presenter is into but a subject as difficult as this needs to be considered more academically than in a very politically partisan manner.

[@JackulaHD]

Agreed

[@bobbyg1068]

It is complex, you're right, but let's not forget that Starmer won less of the vote share than Corbyn but won overall anyway because the Tories are unpopular right now, or that Liz Truss tried to implement hard Thatcherism and became a laughingstock overnight. Unless Musk makes a complete hash of things I expect Reform to do very well in the next election, but if Labour attempt to be Reform Lite or rebrand themselves as the sensible home for ex-Tories, you can positively guarantee they'll take an absolute thrashing Jimmy has his biases, for sure, but for those of us who've been following his journey he's at least considered his positions carefully and is looking at the bigger picture. Sometimes he misspeaks or gets sloppy with his examples but he's definitely not just reflexively left-wing, he started out pretty squarely hard right

[@simplysplendid6064]

@@bobbyg1068 That is interesting to know about the guy narrating as I have never come across him before. I therefore find it very odd that he glossed over the consensus era in a minute flat as that is precisely where the north-south divide was born, and give no reflection on the policy making of the era. He also made the cardinal sin of simply stating it was 'the 70s' that brought in Thatcherism when the 60s had devaluation that was just as crippling, the beginning of containerisation in the ports that was the killer blow for the docks in Liverpool etc.

[@SpenceJS87]

Elections are decided by the media, who are overwhelmingly pro-business and right wing.

[@Varksterable]

You two ladies would definitely love the Map Men videos. (Which also covered this topic.) Happy new year to you both!🎉❤❤

[@TheNatashaDebbieShow]

We've reacted to all the map men vids

[@Varksterable]

@TheNatashaDebbieShow My bad. 😳 I channel hop a lot. Is that a plausible excuse? 😬 And a search only shows two reactions to Map Men. You claim to have reacted to "all" Map Men videos. But you also say on this video's description you had no idea there was a N/S divide. Very confusing. I missed Christmas due to illness, and I'm totally out of sync. Hence I got a bit drunk on new year's day. Even tough it's already the 5th. Tripply admire Natasha for giving up drinking. I need to aswell. But my list of new year's resolutions I'm going to break is already _Soooo_ long..

[@susanpearson-creativefibro]

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say it is not North vs South but London vs the rest. I am from Yorkshire and I find myself perfectly at home in Cornwall and you couldn’t get more south. You can’t just look at money either, often aristocrats can get along well with poor working class. In comparison, people who have gone from poor to wealthy in two generations or so may distance themselves from the working class because they may feel the shadows of it. These of course are all theories that apply to some. There is the bigger universal truth that there are decent people and unpleasant ones in every area of the country and walk of life. Humble people and those with less than a chip and more than a sack of potatoes on their shoulder. Not that we talk politics here but there is also a huge sway of people throughout the country who agree with elements of left and right views, but increasingly don’t trust politicians from either side.

[@eddisstreet]

Thatcher was born in Grantham - she was a Northerner

[@johnritter6864]

People forget their roots when they get rich and powerful

[@by_the_bonfire]

Lincolnshire is absolutely not northern, it's midlands and the midlands doesn't exist, so it's southern.

[@johnritter6864]

@@by_the_bonfire Anything south of Middlesborough is south, lol

[@christaylor4441]

Grantham is South Lincs its an hour and 10 mins on the train it is the north pal.

[@by_the_bonfire]

@christaylor4441 Lincolnshire is in the North... of the south. It's absolutely not the North, neither are Derbyshire, Staffordshire or Nottinghamshire and neither is most of Cheshire.

[@paulcarey2482]

I’m from Kent and I don’t know anyone who hates northerners but I’ve travelled all over and I can tell you there’s a lot of hate coming the other way

[@paulclark6458]

true lot family from

[@paulclark6458]

am Kent costal not rich

[@lauraburnett9320]

I am from Derby in the `Midlands', we have a proud heritage of manufacture, Railway rolling stock, Rolls Royce, Denby pottery, Royal crown Derby porcelain, Metal foundry and castings, and many more. Much of this countrys industry has been sent to China as it is cheaper to produce and shipped back here, so many jobs gone he di, dn`t even mention immigration and the vast numbers of people trying to make a home here. There is no more space for us, let alone all the others. We have no infrastructure to support the North in their endeavours to make a good living, and cancelling the HS2 has wasted billions of £`s, ...so much for `levelling up'....I have pretty much voted Labour all my life, 73 now, but am disgusted with this government, and please no more Thatcher!!!!!!!!!!!...we have so many food banks now dotted around our towns for people struggling, it should not be happening.

[@malsm8892]

The situation is slowly getting to a point were the South hasn't got enough land that is not on a Flood Plane to build housing. The water supply situation in the south is getting so bad that rationing may have to be introduced more often in hot weather. The South gets three times as much money spent than the North Cross Rail in London area nearly three times the cost of HS2 for instance as it was a giant new underground extension over budget yet still finished.