You don’t know how lucky you are

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34041, 3 January 1976, Page 11

You don’t know how lucky you are

FELICITY PRICE compares everyday life in Britain and New Zealand.

Not long after 1 arrived home in Christchurch recently, after spending more than a year in England. I wondered why some of my friends were saying to each other, in unusually strong Kiwi accents. “You just don't know how lucky you are.’’ Having missed out on the advent of Fred Dagg, it took me some time to realise what they were on about. Daggisms may not be everyone's cup of tea. but the parochial. insular she'll-be-right-mate attitude. held by so many New Zealanders for so long, does seem to have some justification. 1 have managed to reassume. quite unashamedly, such attitudes, and it is going to take nothing less than a general strike and national unemployment to convince me of anything else. Compare the rate of inflation in both countries, for example. In New' Zealand. it is just over 15 per cent, but in inflation is as high as 25 per cent. The cost of living is much higher over there, particularly for essentials such as food, accommodation, electricity, gas, petrol, and public transport. At the same tune, wages

average about a half to two-thirds of what they are here. And because of the tremendous number of immigrants, mostly West Indians, Indians. Pakistanis, Continentals and Asians, competition for employment is much more intense. Taxes are a much greater dram on the gross income than in New Zealand. In England, they average about a third of one's wages, much higher than the fifth of one’s income deducted here. Secretaries, typists and general office workers, with a fair amount of experience and a reasonable standard of education (at least the English equivalent of School Certificate), could expect to earn_ a gross wage of about $75 a week in London, but after tax and National Insurance has been deducted, only about $5O will remain. Much the same income is received bv a majority of workers, both married and single. Out of this, most people will have to pay rent (at least $l7 per week in a shared flat) and public transport (at least $2.50 a week, but many people pay as much as $l2 a week to

commute into London from the Home Counties? Rents do not usually include gas or electricity, and one generally 7 has to feed a meter, which can cost anything from $3 to $5 per week. The weekly milk bill, for one pint a day, comes to just over 60c a week (12c a bottle). Daily newspapers cost a minimum of 14c each, are as much as 30c ’ per day, bringing the weekly bill as high as $2.10, as the majority are produced seven days a week. But it is the cost of food that is the most crippling. Most vegetables are available nearly all year round, although, of course, when they are off season, they are much more expensive. Potatoes are the only cheap vegetables, unfortunately for the figure. At between 6c and 12c a pound on and off season respectively, they often comprised a whole meal for my flatmates and 1 in the difficult times between Monday and payday (Thursday). Admittedly, there is a much greater variety of vegetables and fruit, all

year round, in England, probably mainly through the Common Market and trade agreements with Canada and New Zealand. But most of it is beyond the purse of the average Londoner. Supermarket shopping is largely geared to precooked, pre-packaged, instantly prepared meals, which only require heating or mixing before eating. Nothing is cheap, and almost everything is at least a third more expensive than it is here. Bread, for example, costs at least 32c for a familysize loaf. In an average week, the food bill could never be under $lO, but this is living pretty frugally. A more realistic figure would be about $l5 a week for a single person. But this is by no means living it up or even eating on a par with the comparative luxuries one gets used to in New Zealand. So there you are, with at least $4O out of your $5O a week net pay spent, and

only on day-to-day necessities. Hardly surprisingly, innumerable people, like myself, took on an extra job to make ends meet. If you should happen to smoke, like myself, a packet of cigarettes will cost you 96c. That is, standard, everyday' brands, like Rothmans or Benson and Hedges. Packets of Dunhill or John Player Special are priced at well over $l. But the English have risen to the occasion and produced both packets of 10 cigarettes. and mini-sized cigarettes, which can be as small as exactly half a standard-sized cigarette. The first time I was offered one of these by someone. I thought they' were having me on. A few months later I was reduced to buying them myself. Liquor is expensive compared with our prices. Although beer is not too bad in price, it is pretty foul tasting to someone brought up on good Kiwi brews. A pint of draught lager will cost about 56c to 60c. Bitter is slightly cheaper, at

about 50c a pint. Special brands of bottled beer cost about 50c also, but for a half-pint size. A nip of spirits Usually' costs about 60c in pubs, and on top of this, one has to buy a bottle of mixer, which is minute and costs at least 24c. How about paying 84c for a gin and tonic in a New Zealand pub. It you manage to stay away' from pubs and clubs at night (they 7 close in the afternoon and are only open for a couple of hours at lunch-time) you may just be able to afford a trip to the pictures or a show, or even take yourself out to dinner. A seat in a West End movie theatre costs about $2.50 minimum, and if you want to get a little flashy, the best seats go as high as $7 for a screening. In the suburbs, where all the good movies go after a short spell in the West End. seats are a little cheaper, at an average of about $2. To compensate for the high price of movie showings, however, they 7 let you smoke if you wish, and in many 7 theatres you are able to sit in them all day until they close and watch the same movies

through four or five times. Theatre seats cost about the same as movies in the West End. But some evening show’s are priced as high as $lO. for some seats, with the cheapest seats at about $4. In some more realistic theatres, if you are really keen, you can stand through the show for as little as $1.60. Dining out is certainly' not as common or as accessible to the average wage-earner as it is in New Zealand, because the average income does not allow for it. But there is certainly much more choice and excitement. Every conceivable nationality and ethnic group is represented in London restaurants. And so is every price range. A really cheap meal, in an unlicensed Wimpy Bar, can cost as little as $l. A more average meal, at a licensed restaurant, whether Italian, French, Lebanese, Iranian, Chinese, Japanese. Greek, German, Indian, Spanish, or Jewish, will usually cost between $5 and $l5 per person, without wine. And at the other end of the scale, there is the Dorchester, Grosvenor House, the Hilton, the Savoy, the Ritz, the Mirabelle, Scotts

and the numerous other places to cater for the excessively wealthy. God knows what the prices are at these places. All I could afford in this category was tea at the Ritz, which was about $4 and worth every bit of it. Lunch-time eating, essential to every inner-city worker who does not have the courage to take a packed lunch, is not usually too costly, especially with the help of luncheon vouchers, which ,are given out by most employers to their staff to subsidise lunches. They vary in value from 20c to 50c' and are usable in most snack bars, pubs (which usually sell the most delectable lunches) and some restaurants. So next time, when you are thinking of complaining about the state of New Zealand’s economy and blaming our high rate of overseas borrowing in the last three years on the Labour Government, just compare your plight to that of the British housewife or single person trying desperately to make ends meet, and count your blessings. You just don’t know how lucky you are.