I'm posting this because this to me is a big problem.

NO! Not the burglary and crime itself! I mean people's misconception of it.

My wife's cousin is a bit older than us and very anti the UK. He doesn't live there anymore (cos of work) but when he retires he is intending to retire to somewhere like Australia or NZ.

He is full of stories about how bad the UK is. But for pretty much all of his stories I have a story of the same thing (almost exactly in most cases) occurring here in Australia.

He moans about when he lived in London and he had his garage burgled twice. He thinks this is outrageous and it is quite clear that he perceives that this sort of thing does not happen outside London and the UK.

My wife's friend has just built a new house with her husband. They moved the first lot of their stuff in and, that very same night, whilst they were out, they were burgled and LOTS of stuff was taken, including some irreplaceable jewellery.

It just annoys the crap out of me that people keep on discouraging people from moving back to the UK based on gibberish about crime.

What are they saying? There is no crime in Australia?! Well, clearly there is. My wife's friend's house is brand new and in a supposedly good area.

Crime happens everywhere in the world. Why are (some) foolish, naive Brits determined to think it ONLY happens in London and the UK?

I'm tempted to blame the tabloid press for it (Daily Mail etc) but I can't help but feel that some of it is down to the British tendency to think the ''grass is always greener''.

I also think some people want to believe that these problems are just in one country rather than the whole world because, psychologically, that offers them the chance to escape them.

So, if you are thinking of going back to the UK, don't let all the people who tell you that ''the crime is soooo bad in the UK'' put you off. The crime is soooo bad everywhere in the world. It's a fact of life.

I'm not saying crime does'nt happen here in the UK,of course it does,but I havent been affected by any personally.However whilst in Oz,aged 11,we were staying in a caravan park (with parents)had a shower,felt someone was watching me,stood back from the stream of water,and yes there was a guy with his face pressed against the blurred glass window watching me!Nice experience that was!I was later on nearly raped twice.Later whilst taking my baby for a walk in the pram,some guy pulled up next to me,thought he was going to ask directions?Nope he was w****** himself!About a month later,was sat outside in a park with same baby on a blanket,minding my own business,a young guy around 16 rode by on his bike,also w****** himself????(Must be the weather that gets to people,who knows!)a couple of years later,we moved house,went to go shopping one day,went outside,car had been stolen!My nephew's car has also been stolen last year.My Mum's next door neighbour was helf at gunpoint and robbed.Don't know whether this is just luck but nothing (touch wood)has happened in the 10 years I've lived in the UK.

My God. That's pretty bad stuff.

I just find it weird how people chatter on endlessly about the stuff that goes on in the UK. Clearly a huge amount of horrible stuff happens in Australia. Yet people never talk about it. Plenty of people seem basically certain that there is hardly any crime in Australia compared to the UK.

This isn't the case, so why are people so sure of it?

They just dont get it - or want to get it more like.

The lad who is staying in our granny flat for a little while has had his car broken into twice in the last month outside our place - "good" suburb and all that - poor chap couldnt win because just having it been fixed the first time it got broken into at work as well! Just as well we didnt live in one of the "less good" areas in Canberra because apparent they have been on a torching spree down in the Southern suburbs (according to the local rag). Having also had one son mugged when he was a teenager by MOMEA in the food court at Paramatta I have little faith that Australia is the crime free nirvana that people wanting to escape such things in UK actually seem to believe it is. Still, I suppose if you live in Central Liverpool/Manchester/Bradford then the idyllic South Coast/Sunshine Coast/Mornington Peninsula is going to be a whole lot different!

Yeah it bugs me too. Not only is crime not that bad, in the last few years it has been falling. Last time the stats were released the Daily Mail headlined the only one that had increased (by 1%) and buried the rest of the data which showed a decline in most categories.

Personally if I was relocating due to crime I would look up the stats first and compare them but very few people seem to do that. Maybe you are right, that people want to believe they are leaving their problems behind. I like the theory.

From personal experience, it's crimes like vandalism and petty theft that affect people on a day-to-day basis in the UK, rather than violent crime. The latter seems to occur largely as a result of excessive alcohol consumption in city centres, and/or is isolated to certain areas. We did have a firebomb on our street last month, though (I'm not kidding).

re the guys w******themselves?It was obvious I had a baby with me and I found that very appalling and sickening!

Wasn't questionning you! I know it's appalling. I just wonder why the s*** in Australia gets downplayed and the s*** in the UK gets played up.

I don't find the Mornington Peninsula that idyllic.

Because people like to delude themselves!

It amuses me no end that people think Australia is relatively crime free because when you look at the stats, it clearly is the opposite. I do wonder if the density of population in the UK makes it feel as though there is such a lot going on.

It's the media. I think they need to meet in the middle as the media in both countries do a disservice to their people.
It happens everywhere. I was burgled last week.

I have been talking about this lately and I think there are a few reasons crime does seem worse in the U.K. I think the main one is it is not reported in a broader sense in Australia. Often all you here about in WA is what has happened in WA. Also for a lot of people the sun shining tends to make them feel better and they either don't hang on the stories too much or quickly forget about them. The news stories here tend to be in the news and then gone very quickly where as in the U.K I feel the press will often drag a story out for a few day's. Only my take but I do agree it is as bad as the U.K in most aspects of crime.

this is the only site I know of for handy comparisons and the data is a few years old, but still:

Assualts per capita: UK slightly worse than Aus:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...lts-per-capita

Burglaries per capita: Aus much worse than UK:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...ies-per-capita

Murders per capita: Aus fractionally worse than UK:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...ers-per-capita

Rapes per capita: Aus much worse than UK:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...pes-per-capita

Car thefts per capita: Aus slightly worse than UK:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...fts-per-capita

Robberies: UK worse than Aus:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cr...ies-per-capita

Sometimes I think it's cause they are trying to convince themselves they have made/are making the right decision.
We were burgled twice when we were teens in the UK.
Here in a leafy suburb (US) we had things stolen from the garage twice while Dh went for a wee and when he was taking something into the back garden. He couldn't walk in the house for a minute without closing the door. Then we had the back window on the car shot out twice He didn't tell me about the second until we'd moved, I was on holiday in UK, he thought I might not come back
One thing I will look forward to, less gun crime in UK than here. Knives I hear about, but I think thats dependent on where you live. Even my US friend used to carry a knife to school when she was a teen (she's late 40's now) Things like gangs and fights have been going on a long time.

There certainly are blackspots in all countries. I didn't think London was any worse than Montreal in Canada which is where I used to live. However I now live in an area of the UK where I don't bother locking my front door or my car door and people leave their bikes unlocked.

There is only one full time policeman for the whole (small ) town and I suspect they don't have very much to do. Contrary to popular belief these areas do exist in the UK