A recent report said that people from Cumbria are at a disadvantage to those in the South. Well I say yes and no. Anything is possible with effort.
Personally I love it here and am not disadvantaged except - to get anywhere else in the country you have a 1 hour drive to the M6 or mainline trains
I was born/brought up in West Riding of Yorkshire, and lived most of my life working in Leeds/Bradford/Halifax/
We moved here about 2 years ago from living on the East Coast of Lincolnshire for 10 years. It is very similar to West Cumbria. The problems there are similar.
We suffered from no big businesses not even something like Sellafield
Nearest A&E was 30miles/45 mins drive away and "big" hospitals 40/50 miles away.
It was over 1 hours’ drive from the nearest Motorway
No trains
Buses stopped running at 6pm and on Sundays at all in the winter.
Broadband was poor.
Electricity was dodgy especially in bad weather.
The doctors could not recruit new doctors/nurses when the staff left and were short. Even the Big hospitals tried recruiting from Spain etc. but they left after a year or two as they felt so "cut off".
There were some good schools - still the Grammar school system flourished but teachers were hard to get.
Young people left for Uni and to get jobs as there were none locally. No one moved in as why would you come to an area with no "night life", no culture, no communications, no population (except old people)?
There were some big nice houses for bargain prices if you were moving from the South but don’t try to go back!
Same here in West Cumberland. It is perceived by outsiders as above. Hence people won't come to work - where is the business, communications, culture etc. Yes beautiful scenery and surroundings much better way of life, (in my opinion) then living in the cities.
If you go down south it definitely changes Manchester southwards. You see that hustle and bustle and things are happening, things are being built, business expanding, recruiting there is nightlife/culture.
Schools here in West Cumberland? - in West Yorkshire you had a choice of several within 10miles. There were "Private schools (very good), there were Private Hospitals. Trains, planes, you can get to London etc. in a couple of hours. I'm sorry but "Professionals” will not move here if they can get these things. The world has changed from 50 years ago and people demand these things for their way of life.
There most definitely is a North South divide and it’s growing.
