It's not different in the UK. It is correct, in a list context, to use the comma. The comma dileneates list items. The "and", distinct from commas, might be used to join multiple objects within a single list item, and the comma is necessary to distinguish between that "and" behavior and the use of "and" to indicate the nature of the list (as opposed to an "or").
In both the US of A and the UK, there is a definite trend in informal English instruction to omit technically correct, but largely inaudible (in verbalization), punctuation. Informal English style is creeping into formal communication, because many people are never exposed to instruction in properly rendered formal English. This trend is only accelerated by such phenomena as the default setting of the MS Word grammar check, which omits the last comma and actually (incorrectly) indicates only one space after a sentence-ending punctuation rather than the two that would be correct.
The fact that nobody pays any attention to "two spaces after a period" any longer really kind of annoys me. I've learned to overlook it online, since without use of HTML character entities to render nonbreaking spaces (or going to other such lengths) all whitespace is minimized to a single space by the HTML standard. Though there's only one space after each period as you read this, I automatically insert the correct two spaces after a period when typing because I originally learned the correct standard for punctuation. The same applies to my use of that last comma in a list context within a sentence: I use it, regardless of whether anyone else notices it's correct. As a drill sergeant once told me, "Discipline is doing the right thing even when no one is looking."
Technically, house was incorrect, in that those are parentheses, not brackets. He was correct to say they were not necessary. You (neil@home_in_UK) are correct in your suggestion that they are not incorrectly used, however. The presence or absence of parentheses there would change the meaning of the sentence, but neither is necessarily incorrect.
