UK high school education even lower quality than Vietnam. All the blah blah about innovation is only a hoax. The only quality education which the UK still hold the advantage is English and some social sciences (and nich areas in natural sciences as well, which China or Japan still do not care about).
How they can innovate in serious things like science and technology when their students capability in math and other science are so poor (compared to China). They may be "innovative" in things like "inventing" new foods, "inventing" new fashion, innovative decorations etc. but that's it.
When the UK (and the West) still had the advantage about investment and facilities, it was natural that most of innovation science and tech would come from the West. But as soon as Japan (and now China, Korea, Taiwan etc.) catch up with the West in investment and build up the necessary facilities for research, the "not-innovative and only copying" education systems of China, Korea and Japan produced far more real innovations than all the West combined. Japan only is almost equal to all Europe (East and West) combined in numbers of patents. And not to mention about quality of such patents.
