For what it's worth - 99.9% of people would get sacked if they brought drugs into the workplace in England. I would get struck off a register I have taken years to get on and not be allowed to ever practise again. Again you have been unlucky but what you cite is not that typical of the UK. There are bad boses everywhere... There are also some amazing ones... Like mine...

Yes, I realise it was an isolated incident, I was just making the point that no matter where you go, it's not acceptable. Someone had previously posted that taking drugs in canada was like second nature, and it's def not just as one would assume that it isn't in the uk either.
I do absolutely agree with you that it was misfortune, and I have had serious problems getting work since. I have had some good bosses before, and am looking forward to being employed again as I've graduated from college and spent money on school, and I want to put it into good practise.

LOL @ Multiple Reply Fail

I suppose it depends what you count as drugs. I've often worked with people who would smoke a joint at lunchtime or while waiting for the bus home. At one place there was a daycare downstairs and the staff would take sanity breaks in the street during the day, blending into the crowd from the hospital across the way. Such people must carry their weed into the workplace, I think it goes unnoticed because there are so many other people smoking.

wow, like i said in 25 years of living in canada, i've not once come across that situation. I knew people who openly smoked pot at home, but i don't know anyone who actually does drugs whilst on duty.
A person who takes drugs openly whilst working should not be working. That's how I feel about it.

Depends on the work, surely, I think I'd prefer my plasterers to be relaxed.

This is where I think you are at the moment. You have made your mind up to be unhappy, not like anything at all about England, although reading your posts you have seen very, very little of it and sounds like what you did see you had already made your mind up not to like. I am not going to go on about the good parts of England other have done that.

I live in Burlington, been here for nearly 3 years I can honestly say I have never seen such an ugly place as the GTA. Every where you go dowdy strip malls with food outlets, nail salon's and dont forget the Tims drive through. Look around when you are driving in your free and open space, what do you see, ugly building, electric pylons, and nutters dodging from one lane to the other just to be a car ahead.

Come back to Canada and I hope you will be happy, but spare a thought for your OH when he starts to get home sick, cant get a job and starts to dislike Canada as much as you dislike the UK. Lets hope he for your sake give's Canada and better chance than you gave England.

People in the UK dont want people like you there, constantly berating their country.

People in England berate their own country!!!! Do you not read the Gaurdian??? If you did, you would see, that there are MANY people who are dissatisfied with living here. The financial system is in the **** because of corrupted bankers who took peoples money and just ****** it away. They are talking about pension reforms that are absolutely outragous to those that work in the public sector like my husband. About 2 million people decided to strike from the public sector last month including me and my husband as a show of just how unhappy people are. Don't even get me started on britians educational system and just how screwed up that is. Unemployment is at the highest level it's been at since 1994. AWESOME.

Um, have you EVER been to London? it's a complete ****hole. God, just go into Tottenham, or Hackney or Walthamstow and they would make burlington look like fantasy island. I've come home to my flat with notices on the door saying to be careful when going out as some bloke had been stabbed in the neck the night before. Actually come to think about it, in my area alone, there have been at least 5 or 6 murders since I've been here and countless assults. It's not even safe to walk outside at night time.

You're right, I have't been EVERYWHERE in England, but I've been to enough places to know that it's not for me. I've been to all the surrounding towns in Oxfordshire. Such as Buckingham, Whitney, Faringdon etc....I've been over to Hereford, Brighton, Newbury, Bishops Cleeve, Bath, Windsor, Birmingham, Bristol, Maidenhead, and all the parts of London. So, although I've not see EVERYWHERE, I've driven to a fair amount of places, and the british countryside is obviously MUCH nicer than London, but still, my desire is to be with my family and friends, in the best country in the world, save maybe norway.

Honestly, If the UK was so fantastic, why did you move to Canada? Wait until you move back and see all the reforms and bullshit they have implemented through the Conservatives over the year and a half. David Cameron has made sure that the divide between the rich and the poor will continue, your kids will not get their free college/uni like they had before, you'll have to work until your 68 in order to retire and by then, there probably won't be such a thing as a pension to collect when you're finished.
Public transportation is out of this world expensive. England has the most expensive public transportation in all the world. You would think charging people an arm and a leg, you would make sure the bloody trains are actually air conditioned/comfortable/less cramped, but no, all they care about is stealing your money, **** customer service, that doesnt even exist here.

I'm pretty sure in the last 3 years you've been missing in action over in Canada, you've clearly missed one hell of a lot of **** that has been flying over in this country. So, before you get all high and mighty about me berating England, you better have a read of what's really going on here and inform yourself.

I live in England, and don't recognise the country you describe - unless I'm reading about it in the Daily Mail of course. However, I could swap several things you said about England for Canada, which just goes to show that it's all down to individual experiences.

My personal '****hole' was Toronto, which I thought was the ugliest place I've ever seen and where I experienced crime just like you have in London. A lot of the things you mention are happening in Canada too - unemployment, paying for university, etc so I'm unsure why you seem to think they're unique to England.

My rural idyll in the UK doesn't have any of the things you've mentioned, I can't fault my children's education, I feel incredibly safe and rarely lock my front door or car, etc. So again, please don't generalise about all of England being like that, because it really isn't.

Oh dear! what an angry bunny you are.

Calm down, calm down. Move back to Canada, enjoy your family and friends and put it down to experience. That's what we're doing (well the other way round) but trying not to berate Canada too much in the process. It's not for us,end of story.

Well I don't like to be told that I am not wanted in England just because I have complained about political and social aspects of it.
I'm just so tired of people saying how great the UK is. It's just not true. It's a false statement. There are so many things going wrong over here, socially, economically, and politically it's unbelievable.

And its not that way in Canada? Perhaps the UK wears its problems on its sleeve for the world to see whereas Canada tends to keep quiet, but scratch the surface........

exactly, to each their own. Home is where the heart is!

And you'll find just as many people on this forum complaining of the same things in Canada - funnily enough, they're not specific to England and you might just find that the economic problems could even be worldwide (sure somebody mentioned something about a global recession at some point).

Have a read of the Moving Back to the UK forum and you'll see why members are leaving Canada, many for the same reasons you've cited as why you want to leave the UK. Although that may just may you even shoutier.

Different strokes for different folks and all that.