Tina talks to... Today's Britons

In this conversation with German hairdresser Fabian Raad-McAndrew (who came to London in 2008 when he was 21 and settled here after marrying a British guy), we get to learn that technical training in Germany is as much about gaining the right attitude as it is about learning and developing the best skills to be good at your job and achieve your goals. Fabian tells us about his experiences working alongside British-trained stylists in the West End and his success in setting up his own small salon in South London at the age of 25 – where the high-standards he’d learned in Germany drove him forward and were always on display. We learn too how ‘officialdom’ can be blind to the contribution small businesses with high standards make to a local area and, when councils focus on all the wrong things, discourage people who we can’t afford to lose. Fabian’s is in many ways an uplifting and positive story and he is a fantastic example of someone technically trained, but it also shows why we as Brits still have a lot to learn about how to value people with a trade and who work with their hands.