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Save Our Earth Mods ([personal profile] ourearth) wrote2017-12-17 05:15 pm
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British stuff

This page is here to give a brief idea of some important points about life in the south of the UK and provide some links to get the interested soul started on more research. We do by no means expect players to get everything right, but we do hope that this page will make it easier for non-British players to get a feeling for the setting.

As a general note: On top of the supernatural ways in which the setting differs from the real world, there are two deviations designed to keep this pretendy funtimes and keep anxiety-inducing part of the real life out of it:
  • The December 2019 general election brought a coalition of Lib-Dems, SNP, Alliance and Greens into power. Lib-Dems got the majority in England and Wales, SNP won Scotland by a landslide, and the Greens captured a couple of seats as well. The new Prime Minister is Nicola Sturgeon. The first thing the new government did was to repeal the invocation of Article 50. Thus, the UK is back in the EU and things will start to heal. The new government has also pledged to strengthen the NHS by restoring funding and staffing.
  • As Season 2 has thrown the world into a time loop of 2019, Corona is not happening.


Adoption, Fostering and Children's Care Homes | Age Restrictions | Climate | Driving
Education and Child Care | Employment | Firearms | Health Care | LGBTQ+
Measurements | Pets | Proving Identity/Age | Shopping | Sports | Religion and Ethnicity


ADOPTION, FOSTERING AND CHILDREN'S CARE HOMES
First, here are a two official government resources: Adoption and Fostering, both of which contain onwards links to related topics. Parents may foster a child that is likely to soon be released for adoption and adopt it later. Same-sex couples have been allowed to adopt in the UK since 2002. Please note that adoptions from other countries are subject to the laws of both countries, the one that receives as well as the one that adopts out, and that international adoptees face special challenges due to cultural and ethnic differences.

The UK practices forced adoptions; note however that typically, unless the parents wish to give up their children or the issues in the birth family seem to be impossible to fix, a child will be fostered instead and child services will attempt to return children to their birth families once the issue that forced a child to be taken away has been fixed (once the mother has given up drugs, for example). One of the issues that child services being constantly short on funding causes is however that supportive intervention measures will run no longer than strictly necessary, and the situation may thus deteriorate again soon after, causing the cycle to start anew.

There is a strong effort to place children with foster families instead of in children's care homes. Today the majority of children's care homes are small, often four- or six-bed residences with a solid number of responsible carers to each unit. According to the Department for Education (DfE), about 15% of children in the care system will have spent some time in a residential setting. The number of children living in homes, hostels or secure accommodation at any one time is about 9% of the total number looked after.

Children's care homes are generally seen as a last resort: Children placed in residential care typically arrive as teenagers after multiple foster care placements. They tend to have complex needs including mental health, emotional and behavioural problems as a result of childhood trauma. About 30% are placed as a result of abuse or neglect, while the same percentage has experienced significant instability with five or more different placements. 62% of children in residential care live with a significant mental health condition and some 38% of children in residential settings have special educational needs. They are also more likely to be in contact with the criminal justice system.

As in most countries, English child services are burdened with too little funding, which aside from the above mentioned issue with the length of intervention measures also means that it has to focus. The focus is on early intervention, thus pouring most money into trying to fix children's situations early and having little ressources left for troubled older teenagers in the system.

Children who are in foster families remain the responsibility of the state, and thus retain its support, until they are 21. For children in residential care, the landmark birthday from which on they have to look after themselves is when they turn 18.


AGE RESTRICTIONS
  • The minimum age for buying alcohol and consuming it in public is 18; there is no age limit to the consumption of alcohol in private venues. A single glass of beer or wine can be drunk in a public venue if A. it is consumed with a meal and B. was purchased by an adult. As everywhere, law and reality may not necessarily align.
  • The minimum age to buy and consume tobacco products is 18. There are no vending machines for tobacco products, they are not allowed to be advertised in any way, shape or form (thus you will, for example, see no billboards advertising cigarettes), drugstores do not sell them, and if they are sold in a store, they have to be completely covered. Recently, largely as a replacement for smoking tobacco products, vaping has become increasingly popular.
  • The age of consent is 16. It is a criminal offense for a person above the age of 18 to have a sexual relationship with a person below the age of 18 if the older person holds a position of trust or authority over the younger. It is legal for a medical professional to give contraception and sexual advice to a person under the age of 16.
  • Commonly used film ratings are as follows: U (for everyone), PG (parental guidance), 12A (under twelves require an adult), 15 (under fifteens not allowed) and 18 (you must be 18 or over).
  • Watershed regulations govern what content can be shown on TV at what times.
  • There are various minimum (and maximum) ages to be observed when it comes to being allowed to drive in England. Though learners permits can in a few cases be obtained earlier, the minimum ages for driving independently are as follows: 16 (mopeds, quads, and cars for persons with mobility issues) and 17 (cars, motorbikes, ... for everyone). Seniors above the age of 70 require a doctor's note to renew their license, which they have to do every three years. It is important to note that coming by a full driver's license is a process that is long and costly when compared to the USA and short and cheap when compared to Sweden, Japan or Germany - somewhere in the middle, internationally. Older adults may still have paper driver licenses, which don't need to be renewed. Drivers who obtained their driver's license (or had to have it changed/renewed) after 1998 and thus have a plastic card however have to have it renewed every ten years.



CLIMATE
Temperatures in the southern UK rarely go above 30 or below 0 and if they are, it will probably be in the news (in terms of SoE: Assume that if we don't specifically mention it, such extreme temperatures don't happen). However people, transport and housing aren't prepared for temperatures below 5 or above 25 degrees, as they usually last for less than a couple of weeks on each end of the year.

This means that private houses and a good deal of public spaces don't have air conditioning, fans, or basements, and that insulation of houses isn't meant to withstand "extreme" temperatures. The issue is exacerbated by British cold and heat both being very humid, there being very little difference in temperature between night and day, extreme heat often coming with a lack of breeze, and extreme temperatures typically staying around for one or more weeks at a time. Nobody has winter tires for their cars. Trains (aside from the highspeed) run from electricity in the tracks, which makes them vulnerable to frost, extreme heat and autumn leaves and it's usual to have an altered timetable in the autumn to account for the leaffall. People are used to treasuring every ray of sunlight that they can, so extended periods of warm, sunny weather tend to lead to a lot of sunburns and other casualties.

The other side of the coin is that people tend to start running around in a t-shirt and shorts at 20 degrees or less, and you can identify foreigners from warmer countries by them still wearing a jumper when all the men around them have already taken their tops off.

Extremes of weather that you may experience on the coast are storms in the autumn, winter and spring, strong winds and flooding (we will mention flooding if it happens). Despite what the media has told you, it isn't always rainy or foggy, though both are common (due to the coastal location of Mossgate, it will see more fog than most of England). Generally, the climate is temperate and you will probably get caught in the rain about once a week (more often in the autumn, less in the summer).


DRIVING
Foreign driving licenses are permitted to be used in the UK, but must be exchanged for British ones after a year's worth of living in the UK. One drives on the left (watch out for French and other foreign license plates, they may have confused moments there). More information about driving in the UK can be found here. (Dashcam youtube videos are a good way of getting a feeling for what driving in Britain is like.)
Toll roads are extremely uncommon; only very few expensive structures like long bridges and tunnels are tolled. Britain's road classification system includes motorways and A roads, which are long-distance, multi-lane roads with heavy traffic, and lesser (B) routes. Many smaller roads are not classified. Roads in the countryside are usually one-lane roads with passing places; in Kent one-lane roads typically have high hedges on both sides.
Also note that in Britain, as in most of Europe, automatic cars are incredibly unusual.


EDUCATION AND CHILD CARE
A typical English person will do nursery school and/or play school from 3 or 4 years of age (the more their parents work, the earlier the child will start and the more hours they will attend). The school years starts on the 1st of September, and any children who have turned five before that date will begin primary school on this date. The first year of primary school is called Reception ["R" for short] and quite often Reception classes have fewer hours per day and less days per week. After R, primary school continues with the years 1-6. Secondary school begins the year that children turn 11 and begins with year 7. GCSEs are the major externally graded exams which start in year 9 and are completed in year 11. Typically students will take English (literature and/or language), Science (double [two exams cover all sciences] or triple [biology, chemistry and physics separately]), mathematics, a foreign language, history or geography, and an art. Students take more or less exams depending on how academically minded they are. The minimum requirement for most "skilled" jobs is an A to C grade in English, math and science. In previous years students could leave at the age of 16 after completing their GCSEs, but these days you have to stay in education until you are 18. This includes apprenticeships, college courses or 6th form, which end with A-levels. Typically, students take three or four a-levels, chosen with a common theme/university course in mind. The choice is entirely up to the student, but not all 6th forms/colleegs will offer all courses.

School tends to last from 9 o'clock to 3 o'clock, with an hour's break for lunch and more breaks for younger students. School uniforms start from when you start school, but primary school uniforms tend to generic poloshirt and trousers/shorts for boys and for girls the same or a Gingham dress, both with a jumper in school colours. Secondary schools tend to have branded smart looking uniforms with blazers, button up shirts and ties (and skirts for girls). Extracurricular activities (like science club, IT club, athletics, film club...) at lunch or after school are a thing most kids participate in (primary schools often also have a breakfast club for children whose parents need to go to work early). Sports that aren't athletics including team sports are usually not connected to a school and run by the local leisure centre or the local [insert sport here] club instead. Dance and theatre classes are also usually run by the local dance studio or theatre, while musical classes are typically done by individual private tutors or at school.

A child does not get assigned to the next primary or secondary school; parents typically apply to the schools in the area that they like best, and the school then admits some of the children who applied based on factors such as distance, siblings already attending the school, and so forth. Due to the size of Moss Manor and Folkton, children from those villages that apply to their village's primary schools tend to get a spot there. Pupils from Tarwich however might find themselves commuting into Mossgate.

Secondary schools tend to not be very formative institutions in their neighbourhoods, as often pupils don't live particularly close by and the public influence of a school's extracurricular activities tends to be minimal to nonexistent. Primary schools tend to have communities around them as they tend to have more pupils living close by and mothers (and the odd other parent) tend to wait at the gates for their children to come out, gossiping as they do so and thus forming a community.

Generally, school children are walked or driven to primary school and picked up in the same fashion. Secondary school students tend to take the bus and commute alone.

University is applied for in your last year of 6th Form/College. A student can apply for up to six universities and accept offers from two (usually one whose requirements are close to their expected grades and one lower, as a back-up plan). Full-time university courses generally last for three years and as of a few years ago cost up to 9000£ a year. This money is acquired through a governmental loan and paid directly to the university, to be paid back once the student is earning above a certain amount. Loans can also be acquired to cover the cost of living, although those loans rarely cover everything and many students also get themselves a part-time job.

The main form of social engagement during university years are societies: Student-run clubs such as film society, LGBT society, Anime and Manga society, Chinese society, athletic society, archery society, Hungarian society, Islamic society, Christian society, up to and including pirate society. Basically, as long as there are six or more students who want to form a society, that society can be formed. Wether or not it stays active is up to the students involved.

Children below nursery age or whose parents cannot find a nursery/play-school/relative/friend that can cover the hours that they need to have someone else look after their child can find their child a place with a child minder.


EMPLOYMENT
England has a minimum wage which covers all employment. If you work an "unskilled" job, you will work by the hour, if you work a "skilled" job, you will be salaried.

Breaks are protected by law after the first six hours but are not usually paid for. The EU also stipulates a maximum working week, although you can opt out of it. (As with almost all laws that were made to put EU guidelines into national law, the British government will continue to use the maximum work week regulation even after Brexit until at least 2021.)

Unions are common and protected by law, but it is unusual for people working office and retail jobs to be part of one. Occasionally there will be strikes that generally don't last for very long and don't particularly impact day to day life.

Tipping in restaurants is expected but not mandatory, and it is illegal to use it as a part of an employee's pay. It it is typically 10% of the bill. Some restaurants will automatically apply a "table charge" to big tables. Tipping is also common for taxis and cleaners.

There are antidiscriminatory laws to protect people from being fired/not hired based on race, religion, disability, age, sexuality and gender and in practice it generally works.

In the UK, both sick leave and holiday pay are mandatory for full-time workers, although some companies get around the rules by only employing zero hour contract workers. Most companies however are more generous than the law and it is normal to have between two and four weeks of holiday pay. Paid sick leave is granted to those who are off work between 4 days and 28 weeks and requires a doctor's note.

Maternity leave lasts up to 52 weeks and can start from 11 weeks before the expected date of delivery, any pregnancy-related leave before that has to be sick leave. Paternity leave is 1 to 2 weeks. Shared parental leave and pay is also an option.


FIREARMS
Everything in this section is specifically about England and Wales, as Northern Ireland and Scotland are different.

Britain has one of the most restrictive firearm regulations in the world, and firearms are generally regarded as something that makes people and society unsafe. Members of the public may own sporting rifles and shotguns, subject to licensing, but handguns were effectively banned after the Dunblane school massacre in 1996. Air weapons are not subject to licensing, but can cause legal issues if they are used as pretend-firearms. Firearms may not be carried in public, open or concealed, and ammunition must be transported separately from the firearm it can be used with. Being found to own/carry/store an unlicensed/illegal firearm will result in a prison sentence, even if the firearm is never used. Due to this, even criminals tend to favour other weapons - often knives or blunt weapons, but recently acid has also been on the rise.

Most police officers in Britain do not carry firearms. That duty is instead carried out by specially-trained authorised firearms officers (AFOs), and they may only carry firearms when authorised by an "appropriate authorising officer", ranked Inspector or higher. Someone getting killed because of police using firearms is very rare (about three persons a decade) and tends to cause a nationwide outcry of distress.

Getting a license for a firearm requires the possession of two safes that comply with certain standards (one for the weapon and one for the ammunition), an in-depth background check, and an in-depth interview with a Firearms Enquiries Officer. It can take a while. Each firearm needs to be licensed individually, with the exception of shotguns that can be added to a license as long as there is space in the safe for them. For a more detailed description of the process, please go here. It is of course also possible to acquire firearms illegally.

Two additional useful links:


HEALTH CARE
The National Health Service, short NHS, provides a comprehensive range of health services which are free for all people ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom, thus including both British nationals and those legally residing in the UK. All that is required is a National Insurance Number, which immigrants can apply for at the Job Centre Plus.
Exceptions to the free-of-charge nature of this tax-based system that provides the vast majority of health care services in the UK are as follows: The NHS does only provide optical care for under sixteens, those on jobseekers and of low income, full-time students, pensioners on state pension, pregnant or recently pregnant persons. Everyone except for those people also has to pay a charge for dental care that depending on the service provided clocks in between about 20£ and about 240£. The aforementioned groups also don't have to pay prescription charges, which most other patients have to pay under the English section of the NHS (further exemptions to prescription charges include birth control, epilepsy treatment, medicine administered directly by the GP and similar medicine that exemption certificates are provided for). The current pescription charge is a bit over 8£ per item.
Services that the NHS does not cover can be paid for out of pocket or through private insurances. The NHS provides good and extensive medical care, but for anything that is not urgent, waiting lists can be long.


LGBTQ+
  • Laws, Society and the NHS

    • Same-sex marriage has been legal in Great Britain since 2014. It is considered a Hate Crime to attack someone based on their sexuality or gender, and discrimination on grounds of sexuality or gender is forbidden by law.
    • Most treatments for gender reassignment are covered by the NHS (see above). Anyone can change their name by deed poll, and it's relatively easy to get your sex marker changed on your passport. Legally changing your gender is a lot more complicated and involves a lot of paperwork and cost. It's not possible to have an X in your passport, but it has been discussed.
    • Fifty years ago, being gay was illegal but times have moved on since then, and generally homosexuality isn't seen as shameful anymore. As in most Western countries, society as a whole is tolerant towards LGBTQ+ individuals, their communities and families, but there are individuals and pockets of society that will give you abuse for it. Some holdovers have not been removed, like the ban on homosexual men giving blood if they're sexually active. In other spots, the past is being dealt with: Everyone still alive who was convicted under indecency laws for homosexuality was pardoned recently. Minorities within the LGBTQ+ community (like transgender persons)/LGBTQ+ individuals that also belong to other minorities are usually worse off.


  • Drag
    Drag is not necessarily attached to LGBTQ+ culture in the UK. There is a strong history of performance drag that was born from pantomimes and music halls in the Victorean area where men used drag to create a comedic character. In modern day, this non-LGBTQ+ drag culture extends across pantomimes and musicals and into TV and film, like Dame Edna Everage. There is also a history of women dressing as men in a similar fashion, although it is considerably less prominent and usually used to portray young men or boys rather than comedic roles.
    Drag queens (and drag kings) as part of the LGBTQ+ culture have come up more recently and are almost completely separate from their popular culture counterparts. Compare, if you will, the difference between Ru Paul's Dragrace and Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire.

  • The church of England
    Though England is a multicultural country that is home to individuals of many religions and Christian denominations, the Church of England dominates the "Christian faith market" and is thus the loudest religious voice in the country. It is the state church of England and the mother church of the Anglican Communion. The Anglican Communion has opinions on homosexuality that among other things caused it to impose sanctions against the Episcopal church over this very matter. The Church of England, like all Communion members, has its own stances, but has a public reputation for homophobia. It does not allow same-gender marriages or blessing rites and indeed forced an exclusion in law to prevent itself from performing homosexual marriages. It permits special prayer services for same-sex couples following a civil marriage or partnership and clergy can enter into same-sex civil marriages (though only if they promise to remain chaste). Individual congregations or vicars may be more or less tolerant.

  • Mossgate, Brighton & London
    London and Brighton are the biggest LGBTQ+ hubs in the greater area around Mossgate. Both of them are easily accessible by train, London on Highspeed in a bit over an hour, Brighton on the coastal route in under an hour. The third hub, Manchester, is too far away to affect Mossgate directly.
    Mossgate itself has a lively LGBTQ+ community. There is a yearly Pride parade and a selection of LGBTQ+ clubs and bars. The community is spread out across all ages, though an unusually large amount of older LGBTQ+ folks, especially retirees, are active and visible in it, due to Mossgate having become a bit of a retirement village for those who tire of the high pace of life in Brighton and London.



MEASUREMENTS
Britain uses imperial and metric measurements, with no apparent system to what gets used when. There is a lot of history that would have gone down in older characters' lifetimes. Note that imperial measurements have no international standard. The UK imperial system thus has different unit sizes from the imperial systems of other countries that use such measurements, like the US.

Below you'll find the typically employed systems for a few commonly encountered things in need of measurement:

  • Body weight is measured in stone. Kitchen scales (which are found in every kitchen) and cook books are evenly divided between grams and ounces, while store packaging uses grams. Market stalls and independent grocers tend to have both marked.
  • Height and length is measured in metres, but geographical distances are measured in miles. Speed on the road is described in miles per hour.
  • Beer, milk and cider are measured in pints, all other liquids (including petrol) are measured in litres.
  • Areas of land are done by acre, but all other areas (like houses) are done in square metres.
  • Precious metals are measured by troy ounce (this is not common, but the only other imperial measurement allowed by law to be used in trade).



PETS
Cats are usually kept as part-time outdoor pets unless you live in a very built-up area (which Mossgate Council is not). Certain dog types fall under dangerous dog laws which among other things requires them to be microchipped and insured.

Medical pet insurance is exceedingly common for cats and dogs.

Declawing cats, docking dogs's ears or tails, and other unnecessary surgical procedures are generally strongly frowned upon and considered animal abuse, and also illegal under British law. Pet hoarding can also be prosecuted under the law as animal cruelty if neglect can be proven. Neutering and spaying of cats and dogs is extremely common and most rescue centres neuter/spay all animals that come into their care. Kill shelters do not exist in the UK. Stray cats and dogs are very uncommon and generally treated with concern.

There are also laws as to what types of animals you can keep. Certain animals require a wild animal license.

Pet shops sell small pets up to the size of a parrot or bunny, but cats and dogs must be bought or adopted from different sources. Exotic pet shops, which are rare, specialize in lizards, snakes, amphibians and spiders. Most "pet" stores actually don't sell any pets, but only pet equipment, medicine and food.

Livestock and pets are regulated by different rules and guidelines and social attitudes towards their treatment often differs.


PROVING IDENTITY/AGE
The UK does not have national identity cards. Driving licenses and passports are universally accepted to prove identity/age, though some select places also accept other officially issued proofs of identity such as student IDs.
Speaking about student IDs, quite a lot of student discounts are only given to students who are studying at a recognized facility in England or Wales (or, often, Scotland).


SHOPPING
Where to buy (not only, but primarily) food

  • Supermarkets in the UK are very indicative of the social class a person comes from. If you shop at Waitrose, you are upper class (and also have money). If you shop at Sainsbury's, your are on the upper end of middle class, if you shop at Tesco, you are at the lower end of Middle class, and if you shop at ASDA or Morrisson's, you're lower class. There are of course also other stores, but those are the most prevalent ones.
    In addition there are stores that are considered "supplementary", that is, people go there only every once in a while for stock: Iceland is mainly frequented by lower class shoppers, while Aldi and Lidl are targeted at lower class shoppers but recently middle class shoppers have started to discover them as well (in a "oh look how cheap this is" way).
    There is, of course, some flexibility depending on what is closest to a person's house. But the social standing aside, the shopping preferences are also based in financial reasons (ASDA is cheaper than Sainsbury's which is cheaper than Waitrose), so flexibility doesn't go too far.
  • In addition, corner shops exist. Since trading laws don't apply to stores under a certain square footage, they can be open whenever. Down south where the game takes place, they are either independent, Sainsbury's Local, or Tesco Metro.
  • There are, of course, also small stores that have an ethnic, ideological, or other specific slant to their wares.
  • And last but not least, there are farmer's markets.


Pharmacies and Drugstores
Pharmacies are often independent and stay relatively close to their core trade of medicine (including filling prescriptions), though they do also sell cosmetics and the like. There are two big chains, Superdrug and Boots The Chemist, that are pharmacy-based but have vastly expanded from there, selling anything a drugstore would have: Cosmetics, toiletries, small electronics, baby stuff, health food, prescription-free medical things, and so on. Boots also has a photo lab. Some special types of medicine, you'll have to go to the hospital for, though.
Most things a drugstore sells can also be bought at homeware stores like The Range or Wilko's.

Other

  • Trading laws in the UK dictate that stores above a certain size are not allowed to be open for longer than six hours on Sundays, so department stores, supermarkets, and other big stores close early and open late on Sundays. Bank holidays are subject to the same trading laws as Sundays. On Christmas Day and Easter Sunday, all stores remain closed the whole day.
  • Little village shops are typically open 9-5, while in central Mossgate things should close between 6pm and 8pm. Independent stores close earlier than chains, and out-of-town stores like IKEA can be expected to be open until 8pm or even longer.
  • There is an abundance of charity shops in most towns, and people shop there mostly independent of class or money considerations.
  • "Malls" tend to be located downtown, or right next to the center of town, in the UK. In Mossgate, there is a shopping centre called "Riverside Centre" north of the historic centre of the town.



SPORTS
The most popular team sports in England are football, rugby and cricket, in that order; clubs typically consist of junior and adult teams, sometimes helmed by a professional or semi-professional team. Rugby in England is (due to history - mainly class issues and the north-south divide) split into union (professional and recreational, 15 players) and league (amateur and recreational, 13 players).

Those sports, with the addition of darts and pool, are typically shown in pubs. What is shown usually is decided by the popularity of the sport and the importance of the match. Unless a local team plays, in which case that will be shown no matter what else is on. Athletics are also popular, and during the Olympics they become the main TV event.

An overview of sports in England can be found here.

Mossgate has a professional football team, Mossgate United, who play in League Two and have a stadium much like this one. Back in the 1950ies, they made it into the then-highest league of English football (the Championship) and people are still talking about that. It also has Rugby club, Mossgate RFC, that plays in the London & South East Premier, a recreational Cricket team, Tarwich Cricket Club, that plays in the Kent Cricket League and a golf course. Other sports are of course available in Mossgate as well.


RELIGION AND ETHNICITY
Britain is a multicultural country that is (permanent or temporary) home to people with a large variety of religious and various ethnic backgrounds. As in most western countries, non-white minorities grow rapidly less prevalent (or at least less visible) once one leaves the bigger cities. Mossgate, due to its international ties, has more than most towns its size, but there are still significantly less than in, say, London. Most major religions have at the very least a small gathering space in Mossgate. If ethnic lines demand it, there are several.

Generally, both in theory and in practice, an individual's freedom from religion is considered more important than an individual's freedom to religion, so if the two clash, freedom from religion usually wins. This does of course not apply when the individual faces the state, as both freedoms protect the individual, not the state.



FURTHER RESOURCES

If you know any other resources, please tell us about them! Just message a mod with a link and give us a quick explanation of what the resource is good for.