The Leaving of London: Peak Guardian

And so the end of days feel we have laboured with these two years becomes all too real as we face the terrible fact that the population of London is decreasing.

And there are many reasons why. London is hideously expensive. You have to sell a limb to buy a decent gin and tonic. The property bubble is leaving acres of empty prime apartments. To live in Central London you have to be either a multi millionaire or seriously poor. There is a tendency for companies to move out.  And Brexit will lose us City jobs and EU agencies.

But the Guardian has identified a lack of culture. Because if you have a choice between spending 2 million for a house in Highgate, or an eighth that in Leicestershire, the thing that makes the difference is whether the Corbynist Mime Collective is still going in Camden.

Near Regents Park, an outside pulpit costs £1,000 per week to rent

Apparently 400 venues have closed in London. Well nightclubs and their attenders are plummeting rapidly.  I mean, obviously the sorts of people that attend nightclubs tend to plummet - mostly around 3am when they lose control of their heels. But they're not even going to the trouble of all that pre-drinking, queueing up, fighting off harrassment and dancing round handbags. In Taunton for instance, both nightclubs have had to abandon their strict "no agricultural smocks" rules in the face of declining attendance.

The conclusion of the article, of course, is not that if only we had more independent breakfast shops and Taiwanese dance collectives, London would not be draining population. No, turns out the real solution is to get more livable property prices. Funny that. Turns out it's not culture at all.