Talk:Administrative counties of England

Each of the entities drawn on the map is an administrative county, and I can provide references to back it up. (Berkshire of course is still one, because Berkshire was never abolished, it just had all its functions transferred downwards). Morwen 12:08, Jan 25, 2004 (UTC)

References? Go on then: Wikipedia:Cite your sources... In fact, the following seems to be good evidence for what you say so I've added it to the article: European Parliamentary Elections Act 1999 - Schedule 2 - Electoral Regions in England Andy G 16:13, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

See User:Morwen/UAs for a list of all the SIs that implemented these changes. You will note that they all exclude/abolish counties, apart from the one dealing with Berkshire one. (And one of the earlier ones, but that was split into two orders, including a Further Provisions one which did the counties stuff). Morwen 22:56, Jan 25, 2004 (UTC)

Was Middlesex ever a county? According to the article it became part of Greater London in 1965, but it is not mentioned before this point. Can someone rectify this please? --HappyDog 16:34, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The article doesn't deal with the pre-1965 counties yet, but yes. Morwen 18:00, Feb 21, 2004 (UTC)

Table on the top map is wrong. E.g. Hertfordshire is 48, not 47.

Is Greater London a county? The previosly-cited reference European Parliamentary Elections Act 1999 - Schedule 2 - Electoral Regions in England implies it (like Scilly) is not. Andy G 22:55, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I think you are probably right. Morwen 22:57, Mar 8, 2004 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but to me as an American this is just bizarre. Of course our states don't change boundaries (except rarely), but except for minor annexations/successions, out county boundaries don't either. Our voting districts do on various schedules, perhaps this is why you must do this so often? As an aid to foreigners like me, could someone put a general explanation of why this is needed at the top of the article, before the wonderfully well researched but rather dry "Under the Baldwin government, boundaries in counties to the north of Newcastle where adjusted three rods to the north and east just to confound visitors from the Continent and provide challenge to the Ordnance Survey" bits? I mean this just seems so much churn. orthogonal 07:30, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It is bizarre. My personal explanation is that the British government has always been deeply unhappy about the 'unfortunate necessity' of delegating power downwards, and thus messes with local governmental boundaries on a regular basis to keep things disorganised. —Morven 07:58, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

And as a further note; this is NOT anything to do with electoral districts for Parliament, Europe or anything else; these are regularly messed with in the UK as in the USA. —Morven 08:00, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I was confused reading the Shire county paragraph. Berkshire is included in the list of Shire counties, but then the use of the term 'Shire counties' is to exclude Berkshire. So, is Berkshire a Shire County or not? Thanks, Ian Cairns 21:15, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It is a Shire county, but with no county council.

Shouln't this really be moved to Counties of England seem as that is what administrative counties are officially called. With perhaps a link to ceremonial counties and traditional counties? G-Man 15:33, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

No, the disambiguation way it is done now is fine. There needs to be a distinction between the different types of county, so moving one type to the main article would cause even more confusion. Owain 09:43, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well as a German I'm very confused about the English administration system with all its counties, caeremonial stuff and god knows what else. I always thought that German administration history is confusing, especially since Germany's Borderlines kept changing through the centuries, (well, especially in the 20th)...but these changements are nothing compared with the British administration changes. Counties appear, vanish again or ar divided up...Foreigners really get the impression that the English/UK governments don't have anything else to do than drawing lines on maps.

Agreed, it is exceptionally confusing and there is so much mis-information around even most British people can't figure it out; so I have little hope that anyone else could. Hopefully Wikipedia will explain all the different types of county in a non-biased way, but this does require authors who favour one system over the other to compromise their positions somewhat :) Owain 09:49, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Just to say reading this 1) British law and history is messy, and cornwall is a case point. 2) people who are not experts on cornish history/ status beware of allowing the modern view of cornwall to confuse you, it was widely considered seperate from england at least until tudor times, even by the english administration. The decline of this as a popular view (i think) came with the decline of the obvious symbol of the language. And yes there has been a continuous (variable size) portion of the population who consider it not part of england.

However... I think its fairly clear it is an administative county at present and we don't want this article becoming a replica of the constitutional status of cornwall one. If possible I think complications should be referred to as briefly as possible and then refered to another article. 131.111.8.104

Is not and never has been a shire county that is why i have removed it from the list of shire counties. If you wish to return it then you will have to provide evidence of it being historically described as a shire or administered as a shire (of Wessex).

Whence county was gradually adopted in English ( scarcely before the 15th century ) as an alternative name for the shire, and in due course applied to similar divisions made in Wales and in Ireland, as well as the shires of Scotland, and also extended to those separate parts of the realm which never were shires, as The Duchy of Cornwall, Orkney and Shetland.

Part definition of the term County. Complete Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd Ed 1989 p. 1044. Bretagne 44 26/2/05

I think you misunderstand the meaning of the list. Cornwall is included because of its style of local government (i.e a county council and districts), not because of any historical reasons. G-Man 19:26, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Why use a silly, inaccurate lable like 'shire county', then, particularly as the Oxford English Dictionary, the authority on the correct use of language (the adherence to which goes without saying in an encyclopaedia), disagrees with it? Using the term administrative county to describe two-tier systems and unitary aithority to describe everything else is far more sensible. All the remaining two-tier administrations are basically modified versions of the administrative counties created in 1888, so the term is accurate and has legislative precedents. Furthermore, the legislation also uses the term unitary authority to refer to single-tier administrative entities. The fact that it uses the word "county" to refer to both and more, willy-nilly is neither here nor there, because it's imprecise and ambiguous. "Counties in the context of this bill" has meant all sorts of completely different things in various pieces of legistlation; 'county' is not an 'official' term; just a handy descriptor which, in legislation, has no single meaning. 80.255 23:01, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It is not a term I have invented, it seems to be a common term used for counties with a two-tier system of government, as opposed to single-tier counties like Herefordshire and Rutland, or counties without county councils like Berkshire or the metropolitan counties. Also where exactly does Greater London fit into that definition, the London boroughs are not proper unitary authorities, and the Greater London Authority is not a proper county council. G-Man 20:14, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree with 80.255 and see the use of 'Shire' as inaccurate and unnecessary, it should be changed!

Morwen maybe you could contribute to the Constitutional status of Cornwall article as well.

Also did you add the following to the Cornish nationalism page.

"The Local Government Act 1972 unambiguously declares Cornwall to be part of England" 

If so what was Cornwall before 1972? Was it created a County in 1888, if so what was it before 1888?

Bretagne 44 21/3/05

Are you really trying to contend that there was anybody in 1888 who considered Cornwall not to be an English county? 1911 Britannica calls it "the south-westernmost county of England." It mentions none of these novel constitutional theories respecting the Duchy, either. john k 02:12, 10 May 2005 (UTC)Reply

Yes, most importantly the Duchy of Cornwall as proved in case law in the 19th century.[[1]] see this link for more details, check the date 1855. Not only that but some Cornish people still consider Cornwall not to be a county of England and many more consider there are questions over describing Cornwall as just an English county Bretagne 44 24/5/05

Why has information on the movement for a Cornish Assembly been removed without debate. It is a popular movement which although not successful 'yet' deserves mention under this title. Bretagne 44 21/3/05

Administrative Counties and their divisions were abolished in 1974 and replaced by Metropolitan and Non-Metropolitan Counties. It is incorrect and misleading for this article to have anything other than information for 1889-1974. Post 74 information should be moved to another article. Perhaps Modern (post 1974) counties of England [2] MRSC 22:58, 23 August 2005 (UTC)Reply

The fact that they are called 'Metropolitan and Non-Metropolitan Counties' in the Local Government Act 1972 is neither here nor there with regards the article title. They are administrative counties, as distinct from the other types of county. To call them simply 'post 1974 counties' introduces a whole lot of ambiguity and doesn't take into account the Local Government Act 1992 which allows provision for unitary authorities that wasn't present in the 1972 Act. Owain 08:54, 24 August 2005 (UTC)Reply

The Local Government Act 1992 does not change the status of the modern (post 74) counties. It abolished some and created others but their status remains unchanged in so far as they are all distinct from the administrative counties they replaced. I don't understand why clearly showing this creates ambiguity? MRSC 10:41, 24 August 2005 (UTC)Reply

Calling something like the County of Milton Keynes a post-1974 county is confusing because it couldn't (and didn't) legally exist until 1997. But the main source of ambiguity by dropping the word 'administrative' would be by confusion with other types of county that also existed 'post-1974'. The ceremonial and traditional counties exist 'post-1974', so they are all types of 'post-1974 county'. The phrase is just too ambiguous. Owain 11:37, 24 August 2005 (UTC)Reply

Added the following link

• Celtic Frontier or County Boundary? Competing discourses of a late nineteenth century British border

Bretagne 44 14:44, 24 September 2005 (UTC)Reply

Alistair Dent, the Mapping Services Manager for the Office of National Statistics, has advised the helpdesk that this article has been used as research material in developing maps for a forthcoming publication. Well done to all those involved in preparing the article. Capitalistroadster 23:55, 21 November 2005 (UTC)Reply

The new map in this article is unreadable, at least with the previous one you had a list of the counties and could read the numbers associated with them on the map. Keith D (talk) 23:32, 20 August 2010 (UTC)Reply

Caption needs changing, it shows boundaries from the 1930s as far as I can see (Gloucestershire/Worcestershire/Warwickshire had plenty of enclaves and exclaves until then)Lozleader (talk) 12:28, 21 August 2010 (UTC)Reply