How would you divide up England by region?

[GrimsbyPacer]

Whatever problems Brexit may arguably bring, I think breaking up a centuries old unitary state would bring those problems multiplied and then some.

But yes, English separatism is a strange thing. It's so uncommon, it's a novelty when you come across it. It's as eccentric as Castillian or Prussian separatism.

It's not really a unitary state, the UK is a complete mess, every part is treated so totally differently with differing laws, parliaments, and national institutions that it will always be deeply unfair and adversarial, in fact for all practical reasons the "UK" is only applicable to England except in foreign affairs and defense. In regards to Brexit, if we stayed, politicians would of sold us out, if we left, politicians would of sold us out. Politicians can never be trusted to sort anything out. But how can it be democratic (or even civilised) for Welsh MPs to vote on lockdown measures that only effected England, while English MPs had no say the other way last year? They all get their own voice, England has no voice, and that isn't fair.

As uncommon as English separatism supposedly is, it is equally as valid a point as Scottish separatism. We just have no one to vote for to express that opinion politically unlike the other areas as the English Democrats are the only ones on that side and they are only concerned about muslims. Scotland and Northern Ireland keeps voting in anti-UK parties, Wales is heading that way too, the more devolution they get, the further apart they drift.

---

But anyway, back on dividing England up into rough regions, we all have ideas of where North and South boundary lines can be drawn...
Where could an East / West line be best drawn if England was split into two that way?

 

[317 forever]

It might have been better if England had declared independence from the rest of the UK. You could have had your Brexit and not buggered it up for everyone else.

We potentially will have Scotland and a United Ireland in the EU within a couple of decades or so, with a shrunken "United Kingdom" comprising just England & Wales.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Oct 2021 ==

It's not really a unitary state, the UK is a complete mess, every part is treated so totally differently with differing laws, parliaments, and national institutions that it will always be deeply unfair and adversarial, in fact for all practical reasons the "UK" is only applicable to England except in foreign affairs and defense. In regards to Brexit, if we stayed, politicians would of sold us out, if we left, politicians would of sold us out. Politicians can never be trusted to sort anything out. But how can it be democratic (or even civilised) for Welsh MPs to vote on lockdown measures that only effected England, while English MPs had no say the other way last year? They all get their own voice, England has no voice, and that isn't fair.

As uncommon as English separatism supposedly is, it is equally as valid a point as Scottish separatism. We just have no one to vote for to express that opinion politically unlike the other areas as the English Democrats are the only ones on that side and they are only concerned about muslims. Scotland and Northern Ireland keeps voting in anti-UK parties, Wales is heading that way too, the more devolution they get, the further apart they drift.

---

But anyway, back on dividing England up into rough regions, we all have ideas of where North and South boundary lines can be drawn...
Where could an East / West line be best drawn if England was split into two that way?

An effective east/west split could be areas with Rotala bus operations, south or west of them, could be England West and everywhere else England East.

A disclaimer is that Diamond South East buses that reach Heathrow or Kingston would be "cross-boundary" journeys from West to East.

 

[Meerkat]

Firstly - anything that puts Surrey in the same devolved unit as those scruffs in Essex can go on the bonfire straight away!
Every time I ponder this I end up realising it’s too complicated and give up! It’s near impossible to be consistent across the varied circumstances and geography of England and I always end up with awkward areas that don’t really fit anywhere and get a raw deal.
I have decided I am totally against devolved regional administrations - it’s just a bonus time for highly paid administrators and power point parasites, and ‘ooh we must devolve power’ always seems to end up with most of the power actually being undevolved up to them from the lowest levels.
I do think Counties have had their time as administrative units - changing geography/demography/economics has made them obsolete - and basing anything on them makes a mess of things. City Regions make much more sense (and are the new shires effectively) - ie bits of Derbyshire really being part of Manchester and Sheffield city regions now.
But I would like the power/elections devolved to Borough level and then them being allowed to delegate that to whatever grouping they choose bit like City regions. In Surrey the county has little relevance - the West of Surrey has has very little to do with the East of Surrey, it’s just a collection of similar big towns and their economic areas. Get those boroughs to co-operate in the groupings they choose (as they do with bin collection etc), but any attempt to put a level above them would degenerate into rivalries like the Southport v Bootle one occurring above.

 

[adrock1976]

Firstly - anything that puts Surrey in the same devolved unit as those scruffs in Essex can go on the bonfire straight away!
Every time I ponder this I end up realising it’s too complicated and give up! It’s near impossible to be consistent across the varied circumstances and geography of England and I always end up with awkward areas that don’t really fit anywhere and get a raw deal.
I have decided I am totally against devolved regional administrations - it’s just a bonus time for highly paid administrators and power point parasites, and ‘ooh we must devolve power’ always seems to end up with most of the power actually being undevolved up to them from the lowest levels.
I do think Counties have had their time as administrative units - changing geography/demography/economics has made them obsolete - and basing anything on them makes a mess of things. City Regions make much more sense (and are the new shires effectively) - ie bits of Derbyshire really being part of Manchester and Sheffield city regions now.
But I would like the power/elections devolved to Borough level and then them being allowed to delegate that to whatever grouping they choose bit like City regions. In Surrey the county has little relevance - the West of Surrey has has very little to do with the East of Surrey, it’s just a collection of similar big towns and their economic areas. Get those boroughs to co-operate in the groupings they choose (as they do with bin collection etc), but any attempt to put a level above them would degenerate into rivalries like the Southport v Bootle one occurring above.

An alternative idea I have thought about is creating City Regions with surrounding postcode areas allocated to them. For example, Carlisle CR would have the whole of the CA and DG postcode areas (DG= Dumfries & Galloway - with Carlisle being the closest city to the rural towns).

Then I realised that it may be too complex especially in Yorkshire. For example, a Bradford CR could cover the whole of the BD postcode area, Leeds CR could cover the whole of the LS postcode area, York CR the whole of YO postcode, Hull CR the whole of HU postcode area, Wakefield CR the whole of WF postcode area, and Sheffield CR the whole of the S postcode area. The problems would be what to do with HG (Harrogate postcode area), HX (Halifax postcode area), HD Huddersfield postcode area), and DN (Doncaster postcode area, which the high DN sectors run into the northern part of Lincolnshire along the south bank of the Humber).

Back to the drawing board, or stick with my own idea of progressive federalism for the whole of Great Britain.

 

[GrimsbyPacer]

An alternative idea I have thought about is creating City Regions with surrounding postcode areas allocated to them. For example, Carlisle CR would have the whole of the CA and DG postcode areas (DG= Dumfries & Galloway - with Carlisle being the closest city to the rural towns).

The term city region is one I don't understand, any area that covers a city and a wide area of countryside is a region, politicians seem to have invented it in the last few years.

Dumfries and Galloway being merged with Cumberland sounds like a logistical nightmare, the transport from Stranraer to Carlisle is terrible by road or train, the area is extremely widespread and crosses the border, can't see how such a set up could work.
For example with transport devolved in Scotland but not in England, and with tax allocations, it will be unworkable.

The postcode system is very smart at delivering post in the fastest time, but it's not good for defining geographical areas, that's why Royal Mail used to have Postal Counties in addition, although they have been scrapped due to confusion they caused.

 

[Meerkat]

The basis of political administration should really be around travel to work areas (or travel to work/shop/hospital/leisure). Of course then they change if infrastructure changes, but it’s a decent basic case. Any suburbs that don’t want to be part of a town/city should be charged more if they then expect to to use that city’s facilities. Some boundaries are ludicrous - Nottingham and Reading are one’s that spring to mind.

 

[Purple Orange]

The term city region is one I don't understand, any area that covers a city and a wide area of countryside is a region, politicians seem to have invented it in the last few years.

Dumfries and Galloway being merged with Cumberland sounds like a logistical nightmare, the transport from Stranraer to Carlisle is terrible by road or train, the area is extremely widespread and crosses the border, can't see how such a set up could work.
For example with transport devolved in Scotland but not in England, and with tax allocations, it will be unworkable.

The postcode system is very smart at delivering post in the fastest time, but it's not good for defining geographical areas, that's why Royal Mail used to have Postal Counties in addition, although they have been scrapped due to confusion they caused.

City Region, as a term, is actually rather common around the world. It is essentially there to define the metropolitan area. Conurbation means the same thing. For example, Greater Manchester and Liverpool are two City Regions that exist within the North West region. You could replace ‘City Region’ with ‘Conurbation’ or ‘Metropolis’ and it means the same thing.

 

[XAM2175]

The postcode system is very smart at delivering post in the fastest time, but it's not good for defining geographical areas, that's why Royal Mail used to have Postal Counties in addition, although they have been scrapped due to confusion they caused.

The system of postal counties was in use long before postcodes, but postcodes deliver far greater precision and thus once postcodes were fully introduced and people had become accustomed to using them postal counties became increasingly irrelevant.

It's worth remembering, of course, that the postcode system is designed and maintained entirely according to Royal Mail's whims and needs in aid of delivering mail, not defining local government areas.