I doubt the BBC is talking about developers. You have skills which are in strong demand.
It sounds like you are reasonably experienced and that MAY make up for the lack of a degree. Also, in web dev a degree is really not necessary and there are plenty of people in the industry who are self taught.
If you would like to improve your CV, contribute to some open source projects on github on a few weekends. I guarantee that will put your CV on top of the pile if are a decent coder.
Many places will be able to do a first round interview over the phone, which should cut down on travel hassle. Also, if London is too far away there are plenty of good employers in Bristol which should be a bit easier for you.
Anyway, if you need any more help / advice drop me an email on d.grabov@gmail.com
That doesn't matter. When I hire I don't even look for a degree, I look for code, I look for things you've built, and built well. Then I look for a person who I will like and get along with.
I don't know about the UK, but most software companies (unless they're populated by ex-googlers) in the US simply don't care if you have a degree as long as you can do the work.
I don't know how the programming climate in UK, but here in west coast US, I am almost always the only one who have computer science degree in the team.
But, most of my coworkers (who don't have degree) are fantastic hackers, wielding /usr/bin like magician, appending to fifo as hack-around, compiling xen kernel from source, etc.
So, don't get discouraged. If your situation is agile (being single or without children), move to big city, embrace its big-cityness, and enjoy its salary.
You have something better than a degree, you have work experience. I really wouldn't be worried about the number of unemployed people around - you have specialized skills that are in demand and most of them don't. It may be that they'll all try to apply to any job they see, making the matching of jobs to candidates harder for all concerned but I really wouldn't worry about it too much.
I'd love to work/live in London, but I am a bit nervous about getting down there because I don't have a degree. I'm completely self taught.