People say Londoners are cold. We found the truth

It was somewhere along the Sunday junior Parkrun course in our local recreation ground that my husband Jack’s wallet fell from his pocket. Given that we live in a city of more than 9.1 million people, we thought it was unlikely he would ever see it again. But hours later, a text out of the blue. Someone had found it and was trying to give it back.  

That person was Nathan Van Boeventer, 42, a flat-cap-wearing carpenter and prop-maker who works in a studio down our road. He had gone to great lengths to return the property. “It was a bit of digital sleuthing to figure out how to actually get in touch with Jack,” he tells me as we drink kombucha he has (kindly) brought to share with me on a picnic bench by his studio. “It wasn’t obvious to begin with, but I eventually found some blog of his on a bit of old internet with a phone number.”

The funny thing about kindness is that it tends to beget other kindnesses. Shortly afterwards, my husband cycled to Von Boeventer’s house with a bottle of wine to thank him. Von Boeventer, in turn, had helped Jack because of the number of times other Londoners have helped him. “My misplaced wallet twice, my phone, my camera – they all came back to me,” he says, puffing on an e-cig. 

Londoners are reputed for being in too much of a hurry to smile or say hello, for ignoring each other even in crowds, and being as cold and grey-hearted as the rain clouds that famously colour the city’s skies (at least they did before climate change). According to a 2022 YouGov survey, only a third of Londoners would expect people to describe them as having very good manners - the lowest result of all regions nationally. 

But is this stereotype accurate? I wanted to find out, so I spoke to researchers, historians and everyday Londoners who have seen or done acts of kindness.  What I found was that Londoners are actually a much friendlier, kinder and more helpful breed than their reputation suggests – or indeed than they give themselves credit for. I also discovered that there may be psychological explanations for why we London-dwellers act the way we do, and why it’s born out of necessity, not meanness.