There's a few open source (free) .Net IDE's out there..

http://www.icsharpcode.net/OpenSource/SD/

Definately sure that there are UK events.. there's a UK section of the MSDN page...

As for online events there are a ton:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/showsandwebcasts/

granted you best have broadband -- but these are updated very often with new content.