Is this close to the truth?

[stewey]

Firstly, let me say that I am not "throwing this in your face". I am just wondering how true a picture of England has this columnist painted. As he was,I was born in England and moved to Canada many years ago as a young boy, and I have never been back. If I returned for a visit would I be shocked at the changes? http://www.torontosun.com/News/Columnists/Core n_Michael/2008/07/05/6071306.php

[Panic Button]

By the way, is Toronto paradise?

[naomi24]

No it's not - but that's not the issue.

[milliezoe]

Its still a great place to live what the british people need to do is boycott completely the next general election until the MPs start to listen to us which at the moment they do not

[stewey]

No, Toronto is not 'paradise': we have gangs, fights, stabbings, shootings, and other undesirable incidents. However not to the extent of what is happening over there.

[DrFilth]

Ah Dr. Filth I presume, you should read my answer more carefully,
walk in the park at 2230 without a gang........THEN..........

you'll see gangs of teenagers ...........

perhaps next time you walk down scotty road you will not see a gang but a group of smilling teenagers

as i have stated most of my work went to china ,two of my work colleagues went to china and stayed several months to help start up production. they must have taken the wrong bus routes or perhaps they were in a different part of china

[123everton]

I don't know which part of China your work went to, but it was British businesses that relocated there, you can't blame the people for that. Can you?
If you want to get hung up on the definition of a "gang" then fine, young people (throughout the world) have a tendency to congregate in groups, in China these groups constitute no trouble to anyone, whereas on Scotty Road (if you've been there) it's somewhat different but the same as elsewhere in England.
In China the people have a real sense of family, the family is everything, they have identity and they are comfortable in their own skin. You don't see Government ministers trying to define what it means to be Chinese (don't forget China has a large ethnic minority roughly 10%) they have high levels literacy. I can walk around China late at night and people say hello noone stands there and shouts "hey gualau (pronounced gwaloo) fcuk off!" whereas a walk through town with a Chinese girl friend will result in numerous stupid snidey comments and I mean the afternoon.
I work with the public neither the imigrants or the ethnics give me grief, you're scratching where it does'nt itch if you want to blame them.

[DrFilth]

everton my friend has just left he was a bus driver for many years. the people he had the most trouble with in gangs or groups or even when on their own were asian or other immigrants who did not want to pay their fare.
retirement could not come soon enough.
as for china , the rivers near the factories are full of dead fish from pollution, nice article in the guardian paper last year about it.
as for people shouting abuse at you there are plenty of places around the world in different countries were this
could happen.
i will have to say ta ta i'm off for a chinese. ribs and chips

[123everton]

Well firstly Chinese don't eat chips, secondly one job that can't be exported is driving (you can import staff, but that's another story), thirdly after nearly 20 years in the saddle I can say categorically that I've never had trouble off an Asian (sub-continental or otherwise) I've had 3 incidents with blacks (although I accept that other cities are different), fourthly I accept that pollution is an issue in China (it's also an issue for America and India) because they make things, we don't (thanks to Thatcher), China is starting to address it's pollution problems (it has to they need to eat) if you'd watched the B.B.C documentary on the subject you'd understand this, fifthly it was'nt that long ago that Britain only had 2 or 3 "Blue Flag" beaches due to pollution (I remember very polluted beaches in my childhood.
You should visit China (you might learn something) it has come a very long way in a very short time you have to bear in mind that the Sino Viet war of 1979 (I think) heralded the end of the cultural revolution and from there a mainly rural economy became industrialised and consumerised in a heartbeat.
I envy the way the average Chinese live their lives, quiet polite (a tad sarky), smart, disciplined, respectful yet fun loving, family oriented people, the B.B.C documentary "Chinese School" was likened to Britain in the 50s, I would'nt know about that though.

[birdie1971]

naomi24 - Eloquently put, and I agree with every word. Have you ever thought of being an MP? We desperately need eloquent, honest, straight talking people to represent us as a nation.

[birdie1971]

naomi24 � I�m going to renege on my previous post, just a tiny, tiny bit. You said that �we're way past the point of no return.� I don�t think we are � not quite yet anyway. None of the three main political parties can drag us out of this quagmire. We desperately need another party to stop the rot. I don�t know if any such party exists at the moment but, by God, we need one. The depressing thing is that even if such a party was created, the three main parties political ties to the media would ensure that they were discredited before they even got their names on the voting forms. I�m so utterly, utterly sick of living in a country where none of the major parties seem to grasp the enormity of the threat from our own criminal population and just make vacuous statements which have absolutely no effect whatsoever on the criminals. My own solution, and I admit that this may not be to everyone�s liking, is to build more prisons (or refurbish existing disused military installations) and throw criminals in there. No TV, no pool tables, no PS3�s, no nothing except minimum rations, hard labour and enforced education. Prisons should be a place where, after you�ve served your time, you should come out thinking, �Jesus, I never want to go back in there ever again�.

[terambulan]

In Toronto do u have:

1. football
2. english breakfast
3. marmite
4. pork sausages
5. pork pies
6. curry
7. Amy Winehouse, George Michael, Jamie Cullam
8. Annual Proms at Royal Albert Hall
9. Glastonbury
10. Free concerts in the parks by pro-artists
11. Free Art galleries
12. Free museums; anything like our Science museum?
13. Free medical treatment
14. Free schools & colleges
15. Social Security for disadvantaged
16. Places of worship for all religions
17. Employment opportunity for all legally in the country
18. Royal family
19. Four seasons in one day
20. Boris Johnson ;-))

[jno]

Lonnie, are you sure it was wicked Labour who took the bobbies off the beat? I thought it started back in the days of Z Cars (because that was about putting bobbies into cars and off the streets) and was well under way in Thatcher's time. But I don't have any figures. If anybody has, please post a link.

Stewey, if you went back anywhere after 20 years you would be shocked by the changes. It's a global thing. But the biggest changes are probably in places like China which were backward and are now heavily industrialised. I had a few days in Shanghai and it was unrecognisable from the city I had visited 25 years earlier.

[stewey]

Yes, teram: some we do and some we don't. We're not really that much different!

[stewey]

jno. You're right, I suspect, about great changes occurring within 20 years anywhere in the world. I left England, as a kid, in 1957. I imagine things have changed to a certain extent!. Do you still have country-lanes in Staffordshire with blackberries peeking through the hedgerows?

[Lonnie]

jno,
To a certain extent your right, but the problems of mainline policing today, I believe, can be put down to closure of police stations, and the intoduction of the Community Bobbies, which together, have drastically reduced real police on the streets, and with that, the visual deterrant that they were.

Thats coupled with the introduction of cctvs, which no doubt help in detection of crime, but thats after the event, and generally, are not a deterrent at all.

[DrFilth]

everton if you drive for stagecoach ask to see the video of the the bus on fire. what can't speak can't lie. cctv showing 2 asian yobs setting fire to a new bus.this has happened on the same route more than once by the same gang of youths.
as for the china programmes on the tv i did watch them.
as for eating chips my friends paid a visit to the local macdonald and they eat chips (fries) with their big macs same as over here but they like to just push their way to the front of the queue.

[123everton]

Oh dear dear dear, Big Macs are American but Macdonalds does trade in China I'm off for an English lunch (shish kebab) tat ta.

[jake-the-peg]

What rot!

Canada has a higher muder rate than the UK

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_perc ap-crime-murders-per-capita

Funny Mr Coren doesn't mention this

[mosesg]

I work beside an American who comes from the Deep South where they can carry guns legally. He said he is more afraid of walking down a street in Britain than walking down a street in one of America's big cities. I asked him why and he said he was more scared of being knifed by a teenager than someone shooting him. makes you think doesn't it !!!!