Silvermist

Hello again

For all of you that moved to Canada and lived there for many years, why did you move back to the UK?

How different is Canada from the UK in general?

Schooling?
Country benefits as perm resident vs UK citizenship benefits?
Quality of Living?
Job scope and availability?
Housing?
Anything else?

Thanks
SM

BristolUK

In Canada over 10 years so far

The answers are Snow, snow, snow, snow, snow and more snow.

Isismom

Yup, gets old after a while, 8 months of winter takes its toll

Im still undecided but the fact Im on here says something prob!

Depending where you move to in Canada you can get a lot of house and land for your money, the food selection here is different but good, seafood quality even in landlocked alberta amazes me, lots of british foods available locally or on the internet delivered to your door.

Education, I dont have kids but I find the ones I know to be a bit behind UK standards and IMO Grade 12 qualification is a joke, its all graded weird, no one fails kind of thing, hopefuly someone else can enlighten you more!

Job scope again depends on where and what you do, when you first arrive your lack of canadian experience can be a problem whatever that menas lol! plus you may have to take a few exams if you are into engineering or medical, again you need to be more specific with location and job you are after.

Healthcares alright, much the same as I remember it being in the UK although I havent needed much done, its hard to find a decent english speaking doctor sometimes though.

Houses and cars are the big bonus, if you want a fancy pants house with land and nice cars and dont mind snow then what are you waiting for?!

philwood

I've spent a considerable amount of time in Toronto, and one of the things which I really liked was the public transport. I found it to be more efficient and accessible than transport in the UK.

The cost of living was generally much cheaper, although groceries tended to be more expensive than the UK. Clothing and shoes were much cheaper, as was eating out.

The tipping culture is quite different, I would say. We tip in Canada, but rarely in the UK. It's not expected so much in the UK either.

I found in quite easy to find jobs in Canada compared to the UK; however, this could be just my personal experience, as I have friends who find it very difficult to find work.

Many things were very similar. Christmas definitely wasn't a big thing in Toronto (contrary to what many people think), and all in all, I would choose the UK over Canada.

Wombat7

I think it depends on where in Canada and where in Uk. For example, Ottawa weather completely different from Vancouver. Can't really compare the public transportation system of a metropolis like Toronto to, for example, the countryside in England.

colchar

That would depend on location within the UK. The Tube, for example, is far better than Toronto's subway system.




My experience has been the opposite.

Wombat7

My experience as well. With respect to groceries, milk, eggs and some cheese are cheaper in the UK - everything else more expensive. For example, before leaving Toronto, I used to be able to buy 10-12 limes for $1.

Oh wine is cheaper in UK as is car insurance.

Also in Toronto, I could find things very cheaply on Craigslist, on the UK equivalent, Gumtree, people are asking much higher prices.

MY advice would be, assume your cost of living will be higher in the UK than in Canada (again I am thinking about Toronto) - compare AMAZON.ca and AMAZON.co.uk to double check

AB4NOW

Family
Friends
Culture
Travel - did so much more in the UK

daisymoll

Ultimately for us we are moving back after ten years, it comes down to really not enjoying the LONG LONG LONG and COLD COLD COLD winter, it really is an event and not being part of an extended family.

Love the provincial parks here but other than that I don't really think I will miss much at all.

Can't wait to embrace the heritage and culture the UK has, Europe on its doorstep, and be within driving distance of family.

Have made many friends here, but find friendships ever changing and evolving depending on kids activities etc, hence I long for the constant that is family

HTH

Canuck74

The UK is the centre of the universe.

Wombat7

Nope that is Toronto, os so I have been told by countless people from out west and out east.

MikeUK

Why did we move
My main reason ;
The type of ‘Head Office’ R&D work I do was tending to move either south to the US or East to Europe as big companies headed out of Canada
So to keep my career options open I needed to follow the jobs out of Canada

Second driving force was the winters, I knew I wasn’t going to retire in Canada and each year the commute got more and more depressing, the day I got my citizenship and I didn’t have to stay for a minimum number of day a year made me realize I didn’t want to do another winter commute and that February I started to look for jobs in Europe, by November I was on a plane

For my wife an ex-Canadian (Ontario) teacher, she was so frustrated with the Canadian schooling system, with one boy not wanting to go to school and the other put in a class for disruptive children but anti the US option, in her opinion the sooner we got our boys into the English education system the better, it was hard work getting them up to speed for the 1st 6 months, but she was right, we now have two very happy boys who now enjoy school, and with a lot of help from my wife have now more than caught up and are trending to the top half of the class..

IMHO I think some part of the boys problems were the long days shut in, some due to cold weather limiting the time spent outside playing, some on those hot days where they could only run around for a short while before the heat shut thing down or the mosquitoes and DEET made going outside unpleasant
Now we can throw them out almost every day, we have wood they love to play in out back and out biggest issue is brambles and stinging nettles, and they’ll even play out in the rain, although there Canadian mindset struggled with that to start with… especially the idea of doing ‘Gym’ outside if it was raining

In an ironic point of view its the outdoorsy life style available in the UK that helped our boys vent their frustrations, and the UK economic climate that provided a place for Job opportunities for me

15 years ago those were my thoughts/reasons for moving to Canada

Rosie Lee

We moved because of the "What if" scenario.
We are going back back because of the schooling, cost of living (BC), lack of culture, oh, and cheap getaways to Europe!

CalgaryPete

After 14 years in Calgary I gave up skiing and then felt stuck in the city for half the year. I thought the British countryside suited me better than the dense forests. I also felt too isolated from family and friends back in the UK.

Now I am back in Britain I am not so convinced by those arguments.

curleytops

you beat me to that one!