Glad to hear Wilf is ok. I know it's a horrible thing to have to face with Ruby, but she won't be in pain once it's removed and I'm sure she'll be much happier and better in herself. It's worth talking to your vet about the different options for eye removal, I think you can leave the socket open and insert a false eye if you wanted.
I know how horrible it can be when people pull faces or make comments - we had so many people coming up to us when Boo's eye was bad. Try to ignore them, they're not worth it. And if that doesn't help, just tell them to p**s off!!!!
As for the vet, he sounds great. It may be something to do with eye specialists - the one we saw was lovely and even said how great cocker spaniels were!!