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This is the best place to live in the UK if you're a woman

Woman’s Hour has revealed the best and worst places to live in the UK if you’re a woman [Photo:<a href="https://www.pexels.com/u/tobi-dami-153731/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank" data-ylk="slk:Tobi Dami;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas" class="link ">Tobi Dami</a> via Pexels]
Woman’s Hour has revealed the best and worst places to live in the UK if you’re a woman [Photo:Tobi Dami via Pexels]

Good schools, closeness to friends and family and cosy pubs? There’s a lot to factor in when choosing a new place to live, but to give us a helping hand, a new study has revealed the best places in the UK for a woman to live.

And you might be surprised about where comes out on top.

Forget trendy East London, East Dunbartonshire is the best place to live in the UK if you are a woman, according to research for BBC Radio 4′sWoman’s Hour‘.

Female residents in the Scottish local authority, which borders Glasgow, reportedly have some of the best educational facilities, highest air quality levels and access to green space.

The area also scored well on overall personal wellbeing and income with the median hourly wage among women equalling £15.07 per hour (ranking 41st).

Using data from a number of sources, including the Office for National Statistics’ 2016 Annual Population Survey and the 2011 Census, researchers aimed to give a “holistic analysis of women’s quality of life.”

All 380 local authorities in the UK were measured across eight categories – income, housing, wellbeing, safety, education, life expectancy, environment and culture. They also factored in issues such as the gender pay gap.

Two of the best areas in the country for women to reside were in Scotland – while London hosts four of the worst.

Islington, in north London, was rated the worst place for women to live, ranking low for environmental quality, housing affordability and safety.

It also came in at second to last on the environmental quality domain, with particularly high pollution levels and limited access to green space.

And it won’t come as a surprise to learn that housing in Islington was among the least affordable in the UK, with the median house priced at over 16 times the local median income. The borough also ranked highly for crime, with 122 reported offences per 1,000 people.

Woman’s Hour has revealed the best and worst places to live in the UK if you’re a woman [Photo: Chevanon Photography via Pexels]
Woman’s Hour has revealed the best and worst places to live in the UK if you’re a woman [Photo: Chevanon Photography via Pexels]

Scotland, south-east England and the West Midlands dominate the top 10 list for the best overall places for women to live.

But four London boroughs feature in the 10 worst places for women to live, with Camden, Westminster, and the City of London featuring alongside Islington.

However, the results were different when the research was broken down into different age groups. Young women (under 30) rated Kingston upon Hull the worst local authority, with high rates of unemployment, as well as poor environmental quality, life expectancy and safety.

On the flipside, they ranked West Oxfordshire as the best place to live, with low unemployment rates and high rates of safety, culture, personal wellbeing and education.

Nottingham ranked lowest for middle aged women (30-65) and Islington ranked lowest for women over 65, while South Oxfordshire was ranked the best place to live for the older generation.

Responding to the findings, Karen Dalziel, Woman’s Hour editor, said: “The Best Place to be a Woman analysis has given us a powerful tool to understand the factors affecting the quality of a woman’s life in Great Britain, and a fascinating insight into the way a woman’s needs, experiences and expectations change during her life.”

Best 10 areas for women to live in the UK

  1. East Dunbartonshire, Scotland

  2. East Renfrewshire, Scotland

  3. West Oxfordshire, South East

  4. West Berkshire, South East

  5. South Oxfordshire, South East

  6. Winchester, South East

  7. Mid Sussex, South East

  8. Wycombe, South East

  9. Stafford, West Midlands

  10. Shropshire, West Midlands

Worst 10 areas for women to live in the UK

  1. Islington, London

  2. Blackpool, North West

  3. Corby, East Midlands

  4. Boston, East Midlands

  5. Kingston upon Hull, Yorkshire and The Humber

  6. Burnley, North West

  7. City of London, London

  8. Westminster, London

  9. Wolverhampton, West Midlands

  10. Camden, London

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