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>You need to move to NZ. Our Professional development allowance is currently $8000 (so about 3500 pounds) and likely to go up with our current contract negoiations + 6 weeks Annual leave and 2 weeks study leave. --> NZ$8000 is around 2670 Sterling... You are using a conversion rate which is somewhat out of date. The NZ currency has done badly against the Sterling recently and, the higher UK interest rates go, the worse it will do... Could you give us an estimate of the big picture? i.e. for a consultant with, say, 10 years experience, what is the gross annual remuneration package? If the corresponding pay in the UK was not 2670 Sterling above that or more, THEN it will be financially better in NZ... I am also thinking about how much time and money it would take to make it over to any major conference (mostly Europe and North America) all the way from NZ... You will be needing a decent budget for travel... Some time back I had a discussion about this with a friend who works in the financial world. He took into account what he thought the main financila advantage in NZ was (lower living costs and housing costs) and many other numbers; he factored in new & old UK contract pay, pension, travel, salaries, awards, etc, etc. (his wife is a doc and they were thinking about the move). He worked out that, as things stand, the NZ salary would buy a better standard of living in NZ than the UK one would buy in his part of England. However, the longer he stayed down under, the further behind he'd be should he ever decide to return... They are still in the UK... Hopefully when the negotiations are over, you can fill us in on the new details and we'll recalculate. It may eventually become tempting...