❓WHAT HAPPENED: A global Ipsos poll revealed that Britons are among the most dissatisfied with the progress of the past 50 years, with many believing life was happier and safer decades ago.
👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: Ipsos pollsters and respondents from the United Kingdom and other nations worldwide.
📍WHEN & WHERE: The poll was conducted recently and included participants from various countries, with a focus on the United Kingdom.
💬KEY QUOTE: “These results reflect a widespread dissatisfaction with the current direction of our country … when we ask people to compare present times with the past, they perceive a nation that was happier and more secure.” – Ipsos UK Managing Director Trinh Tu.
🎯IMPACT: The findings highlight a growing sense of unease and dissatisfaction among Britons, with implications for societal cohesion.
A new international survey by Ipsos indicates that Britons are among the most dissatisfied populations when comparing life today with life 50 years ago. The research asked adults in 30 countries whether their nation was happier and safer in 1975 or in 2025.
In the United Kingdom, 63 percent of respondents said the country was happier in 1975, while only 12 percent believe life is better in 2025. The figure places Britain well above the global average for dissatisfaction, as 55 percent of respondents overall said their nations were happier half a century ago. France recorded the highest level of unhappiness, with about 70 percent of respondents saying life was better in the 1970s.
Feelings about safety followed a similar pattern. Sixty percent of Britons said the country was safer in 1975, compared with 17 percent who said it is safer today. On the question of global conflict, 44 percent of British respondents said the world was less at risk of war in 1975, while only 16 percent said the world is safer now.
Notably, Ipsos reported that most British respondents expressing these views were not alive in 1975, suggesting the sentiment reflects broad public unease rather than direct personal memory. Commenting on the findings, Ipsos UK Managing Director Trinh Tu said: “These results reflect a widespread dissatisfaction with the current direction of our country … when we ask people to compare present times with the past, they perceive a nation that was happier and more secure.”
Reform Party leader Nigel Farage reacted by saying: “The centre is moving very rapidly … all of this indicates the public have just had enough.”
The poll comes at a time when wider public anxieties about crime, migration, and social change continue to dominate national debate. Several recent reports have raised concerns about migrant-related crime. Certain migrant nationalities show much higher incarceration rates than average. A recent whistleblower even warned that some migrants with serious criminal histories, like sex offenses, have been granted asylum by the British government despite their dangerous past.
Hundreds of migrants living in taxpayer-funded hotels have been charged with serious offences, and migrants are as much as 70 percent more likely to be arrested for sex crimes compared to native Britons.
Notably, these findings follow a viral moment ahead of Remembrance Sunday, when 100-year-old Second World War veteran Alec Penstone lamented on national television that his slain comrades’ sacrifice was not worth it for “the country of today.”
The Greatest Generation no longer believe their sacrifice was worth it. That’s on you and your equally feckless predecessors. pic.twitter.com/ifWEp6ecnh
— Jack Montgomery (@JackBMontgomery) November 9, 2025
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