Melbourne voted most liveable city in the world

Photo credit: Kev Whelan

The EIU report has always favoured Australia and Canada, as the two country's safety, environment and culture offer an unbeatable package for expats looking to relocate. This year, Melbourne ranked top out of 140 cities around the world, achieving perfect scores in healthcare, education and infrastraucture.

Indeed, there ae three other Australian cities in the EIU top 10, with Adelaide, Sydney and Perth all included. The top 10 is made up by Toronto, Calgary, Helsinki, Finland and Auckland, with Vienna and Vancouver in second and third place.

Safety remains a decisive factor in sorting the league table this year, as unrest spreads across the globe. Indeed, the cities with lowest scores from the EIU are those in areas of conflict, such as Damascus in Syria, which had the worst rating. This instability then impacts other factors, with the best cities found to be mid-size locations in richer countries. It is no surprise, then, that over half of the changes noted this year have been driven by instability-linked declines.

"Since 2009, average liveability across the world has fallen by 0.7 per cent," notes the EIU, "led by a 1.3 per cent fall in the score for stability and safety. While this may seem marginal it highlights that over 50 of the cities surveyed have seen declines in liveability over the last five years. Recent conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have underlined continuing fallout from a decade of destabilising events ranging from the war in Iraq to the Palestinian Intifada and the Arab Spring."