I'm going to keep this as brief as I can as I don't want to bore any of you. We came, we saw we left, we regret!

We left in 2013. Back to the U.K for family. Huh, we hardly see them. Broken promises etc, etc. Lessons learned!

Positives = 16 year old son has had a great education in a local highly regarded Comprehensive school. He is currently doing GCSES when they are done and dusted there's literally nothing to keep us here.

Husband has studied, progressed from Welder to Q.I Welding Inspector and has a wealth of experience under his belt from running his own business for the last 2.5 years.

I AM A Dental Nurse.

The point of my post. Well whilst dodging the egg on my face and the tail between my legs. I think we made a massive mistake coming back to the U.K especially as we are rasing a young man. The young man frequently talks about how he would "go back to Aus tomorrow" if he had his way. I hear him, I understand his plight more than ever. Life here in the U.K is extremely tough for a young man. Drugs and gang violence and knife crime is an absolute epidemic here and rising daily. Worries me to death. I don't ever remember worrying like that ever in the sunny, boil my arse off leafy suburbs of Perth.

Should I feel embarrassed about wanting to go back. The many "could have told you so's I should have listened to". Massive mistake coming back to this heap of shite. But we have made some good moves in that time and not wasted it. However, I feel what we have gained would serve us very well.

Any Welding Inspectors with advice for the hubby?

Pospects for school leavers? What are they like. My son is very into Creative Media/Computing. As a family we have a great work ethic.


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Firstly Perth is full of drugs and social issues around that. Don't be deceived or lulled by false expectations. I don't believe the gang level is on the level of certain inner city UK areas but hardly all UK is impacted by that. Perth has the highest unemployment in Australia post boom so all is far from being probably as easy as when you left in 'boom time' 2013.

I don't think a sixteen year old is in much position to recall just how life is at that age, leaving Perth as a ten year old. He can always come over in a few years on a WHV and stay two years if so desiring. I'd seriously consider the wisdom of a return being in the rather fortunate situation you appear to be in over there. Just what is there to gain? What to lose?
Australia is going through quite difficult times these days. Stagnant wages and high cost living.

Concur with Troubadour - do not look at Perth with rose-tinted glasses, there are plenty of drugs and gangs around. Just today the West Australian's homepage was talking about bikie dramas in Perth.

The WA regions are full of drugs and the meth/ice situation is a crisis.

Are you Australian Citizens? 16 is not a good age for your son to move to Australia - and by no means at age 16 is he a "man" - and to be frank I wouldn't put much stock in what his memories as a 10 year old were. If when he finishes high school he still wants to come back, to do uni here or whatever, sure that is a much better age to serve as a jumping-off point. If you aren't citizens but are eligible for a PR visa again, go on and start that process as it will take time and then you don't have to come back right away.

Can't speak to what prospects for your husband are. Perth circa 2013 is very different from Perth circa 2019.

Hi and welcome to BE.

Put any thoughts of embarrassment about wanting to ping pong where they belong, in the rubbish bin. Circumstances, expectations, experiences, life isn't static, it's evolving and we evolve with it.

In my opinion, the key considerations in such a move are these:
Visas - do you all have PR or citizenship.
Job prospects - easy enough to research what's out there. You both have good qualifications, if you haven't done so already check that they're 'work ready' qualifications for Australia, or if not, what you'd need to do gain employment in your respective fields.
Finances - as you'd be well aware, emigration/immigration is an expensive business. Having sufficient funds to set yourselves up in your preferred area and to allow you to live comfortably until you find work makes the transition so much easier.
Son - timing the move with minimal disruption to his education in mind.
Knowledge of Perth/WA - if your previous time here was years, then you probably have a good understanding of what it's like to live here. If you were only here for months, dig a little deeper. Ask about particular locations you're interested in.

With all that sorted, if you can afford and want to come back, go for it. It doesn't have to be forever, the UK isn't going anywhere (and conversely, nor is Perth).

Best of luck!

Not only are drugs a blight on the suburban landscape they are very prominent in country towns as well. WA has some very serious issues around drugs, best not to beat around the bush about that.
I'm afraid work ethic goes so far. A lot is purely luck and knowing the right people to get a leg in anywhere. Otherwise at best it could well mean an entry level job, often on
not above minimum wages and/or casual employment which means can be 'let go' very readily for any reason.
Loads of workers were put out of work post boom with many leaving the state. There appears to be some slight improvement coming up ahead but I wouldn't bet my last quid on anything remotely approaching 2013 boom period. You would need to check out the need for welders at the moment, but it wasn't very high a year ago.

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Hi everyone, thank you for all your replies. We are really busy here at the moment so I won't reply individually but yeah thanks everyone for taking the time to respond.

We are all citizens and we were in Aus for nine years, so we are pretty well seasoned on life out out there. Life on the streets here in the Capital of Wales is grim. Boys are getting taunted, beaten up and stabbed just for looking at someone the wrong way. It's pretty dark at the moment. There are gangs developing in schools, doing gang signs, dealing drugs under the teachers noses. Let's not forget we are in one of the better areas here too. Our boy keeps out of it all, doesn't fit in with that scene. He remembers that he could look at someone in Aus and wouldn't be caught up in a fight. Yeah he was only 10 yrs old when we left, but I'm his Mama and I see a massive difference between the two. I fear for him here. It's not a natura,l protective mothers concern for their kid, it goes beyond that. You literally, at his age do not want to go out alone and God forbid you look at the wrong person, the wrong way. Locally, last week three 13 - 14 year olds had their bikes stolen at knife point by a gang od 17 to 18 year olds this was in Llandaff, Cardiff approximately 10mins from where we live, these are daily occurrances. About a month ago a 13 year old 'Carson' passed away in a park in Caerphilly, drugs overdose. I know I am going on about this but people do not know out there what is happening to our youth on the ground in the U.K when I say it's bad it's bad. Yeah, I know Perth has drug problems too, but I still having spent 9 years out there find it difficult to see that it is as bad as things are here, correct if me I'm wrong.

Employment - My Dental Nurse quals were obtained in Australia. My husband's job is off the tools now as he studied and progressed onto Q.I. Welding quality Inspector on Gas pipelines. When we were in Aus he worked away a lot on the rigs as a Welder, what work is like for Inspectors I don't know but the demand here in the U.K is high, he is never out of work. Son wants to go into Creative Imaging, Computing so Web Design etc.

That's a bit more back ground on us. Thank you also for the comment regarding remove any embarrassment. You are so, so right, life is not static its transient and we are entitled to change our minds, I appreciate that.
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Apologies for the spelling errors I typed this very quickly on my tablet.

I read a bunch of Aus, UK and US papers everyday on the web and am shocked with the reported levels of violence in UK and US. We get off lightly here. Hope all goes well the boomerang.

Re GCSEs, they mean nothing here. I would plan to come back asap and start year 11 in 2020. You're citizens so son gets HECS (still called that?) and a cheaper degree than UK, which is just as highly valued. My focus would be on getting son into Aus education system pronto. If he is going to bother with 'A' levels, I would research now which Aus uni and what course and approach them to identify the required 'A' levels and grades. But I wouldn't recommend getting UK school quals at all. FYI, I took my daughter out of school during the first year of her GCSEs. The Aus system doesn't have stressful public exams at 16 like in UK, and given they mean nothing in Aus (unless you chase down some equivalence), there was no reason to finish them.

. . . I don't know about this, though I see what you are trying to say.

Australian kids on a uni pathway have to do ATAR exams in Years 11 and 12, hit certain targets and take enough of these exams to generate an ATAR score. Plenty stressful. This is part of why I thought it was a bad idea for the teenager to come here at age 16, as there might not be convergence between ATAR prep here in lower secondary vs GCSE. As well, joining an ATAR class mid-stream is going to be incredibly difficult.

Whereas there can be certain advantages to applying to uni as an international student and then switching to domestic once enrolled.

If OP is considering moving to Perth, then she needs to be sure it is even possible for her son to graduate - the requirements have changed very recently and may require attendance from the very start of Year 11. Which means it may be too late for OP's son if he is 16 right now.

Some changes are coming again next year.

At age 16, this isn't just as straight-forward as just coming over and enrolling the kid and watching all the problems from the UK vanish into thin air.

Not to mention the social aspects of all of this. 16 is just not a good age to move country because it removes their social system at a delicate age while not leaving a lot of time to fully develop a deep new one before everyone splits up at age 18.

That's good because I'm not at all clear on what you are advising. Is there anything I wasn't clear about?

So you're saying he needs to start year 11 from the start? I think we're in agreement. As OP and family are Aus citizens I didn't see the need to explain ATAR, etc. You're right about comparing the syllabi of Aus and UK subjects. I can only say that my daughter fitted in OK with her British education. Understandable as we're talking about school exams, not degrees? I found a big difference between 'O' level and 'A' level Maths, which was nothing compared to eng maths.


Does this apply as OP and family are citizens?

Can you be helpful and explain? If a kid goes through years 11 and 12 do they get an ATAR?

Let me understand. OP's son should stay in UK until 18 and get 'A' levels because it will be socially upsetting for kid to move at 16? But it's OK to move at 18 as the group breaks up because they go to uni, which usually means moving away in the UK? Yet, in Melbourne the kids tend to go to a local state uni and maintain their friendships from school. BTW, did you read what mum wrote about her son?

Our eldest had just turned 16 when we came over and had done his first year of GCSE study. Of course, we moved initially to Queensland where everything was a year earlier, but he did year 11 and 12 there, his biggest complaint was that as he had to redo a year it put him and his brother in the same year. They both managed to overcome the horrendousness of mummy and stepdaddy moving them from their schoolfriends, and just made more at High School. It was more of a issue moving to NSW after the youngest completed Year 10, as the elder two found it more difficult to make "proper" friends at the local uni, where there wasn't the same social situations as there would have been if they'd gone away to uni, either here or in the UK.

My daughter was coming to the end of her first year when we arrived. She was offered the chance to jump a year but didn't. I wish I had made her as she decided to enjoy herself and took her foot off the pedal when it came to studying. On the plus side she made a great bunch of friends. In hindsight it was probably the best decision to give her time to chill and socialise as it didn't affect her education. Lives in NY now and was watching Celine in Vegas yesterday while I watched Tranmere win the play-off on tele. I know my place in the world.

No, if a kid goes through years 11 and 12 they do not automatically get an ATAR. They need to be taking four ATAR-pathway subjects. This gets complicated real fast if they don't start from the beginning of Year 11. Similarly, the changes recently made to the course structure mean that it is extraordinarily difficult to change out of an ATAR pathway and into the VET pathway and still graduate. So, yes, big stakes, though things will change next year with the introduction of an additional General pathway,

If an Australian Citizen does the whole of their secondary study elsewhere, they can be advantaged (or disadvantaged). For instance if a student studied overseas and got a score of "4" on 4 or more Advanced Placement exams, they are given an equivalency ATAR of 99 (or at least this was true two years ago). However if they do that but then come to Australia and finish up the end of Year 12 here, that gets completely thrown out, even if they whizzed 20 AP exams with a score of 5, and only the domestic things get factored in.

So, yes there is a significant complicating factor as if the 16 year old comes now, midway through Year 11, and then crashes and burns in ATAR because of different curriculums etc, it could be extremely problematic for university entrance.

OP should call a high school program coordinator of their intending neighbourhood senior high school in Perth to discuss options, in depth, before making any decisions (and also probably call admissions at UWA or ECU or wherever and see what they say).

I just think, this late in their schooling, it's a bad idea to move and what is another 18 month wait or so.

Get your asses back here, it's great - especially now that we've just reelected a decent government that is trying to encourage people to get ahead via real tax cuts. The economy in Perth is on the up and people with hard engineering skills are getting back in demand. I'm expecting the next few years to be pretty good

Drugs are definitely a problem here, there's no escaping that fact, but youth gangs and knife crime is not a massive problem in most normal, middle-class suburbs

Do it

Well I wasn't going to bother as think OP as mind made up, just wanting some confirmation to support decision to return. Fair enough. But hardly fair not to correct mistakes above. The economy is far from great. The re election of government will do nothing to alleviate the problems ahead, apart from causing greater division. The Aussie dollar is being down graded for a reason. That reason being the economy is doing poorly, with odds in favour of a recession next year. There are so many factors at play both internal and external few would care to predict any improvement and will be fortunate to tread water.
In my view the economics alone would make it concerning to ditch good jobs to come out in times of such uncertainty.

Yes drugs are a massive industry in WA. Suburbs don't play to much a part unless looking at the bottom of the market. The dealers/distributers live in middle class suburbs, drive very expensive cars, I've noticed Hillux being fairly common, but sporing type cars , new model BMW's even work vans with logo on sides, all may go towards disguising intent. Hours of operation starts usually around midnight and picks up in the wee hours. Now there is certainly a growth activity in high demand with potential ,, if don't end up in prison.

Gangs don't exist the same way as UK. Fact being few disgruntled youth hanging about the streets here. Nobody in the streets here for that matter. Doesn't mean not considerable violence though. WE don't have a tabloid press that exploits every incident and gets off on pushing stories of negativity. But some may recall the gang of girls going on a rampage a few days ago in the southern suburbs, bashing people and entering a medical centre creating further violence, or the gang fight that got members of the public involved as well or the nurse that was stabbed at RPH .....certainly violence happening out there.