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I thought this talk page was as good a place as any to propose this, so here goes.
With an election due within the next year or so, I think it's about time that Wikipedia had articles on the UK constituencies showing, past and present, with a list of the past representatives and election results. There's loads of interesting stuff about pocket boroughs, rotten boroughs and disenfranchisement for fraudulant practices etc.. This would be a big project though, so if we start now we might have something approaching completion by the time fo the election. Mintguy (T) 22:53, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
There are now a few articles about the UK constituencies, including Southampton Test. Laurel Bush 10:51, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC). I am working myself on several articles about constituencies, including my own Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross. I have little or no history about any of them but I do intend to insert, when known, results of the now anticipated 2005 general election.Laurel Bush 16:10, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC).
If a language is not de facto official in the state-wide (highest level or whatever you call it), then it doesn't deserve listing on top of the table. At United States, only English is listed, not Spanish or Hawaiian. Listing these other languages will only mislead and cause havoc at India. --Jiang 04:38, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)
There is no official language overall, but there is a de facto official language. That is English, both in the US and the UK. In the state of New Mexico, Spanish is co-official with English. In Hawaii, Hawaiian is co-official with English. In California and a number of other states, English is official. But federally, there is no official language in the US. We're only concerned about what is official on the highest level. In the UK Parliament, only English is spoken. Am I right? We don't want to confuse people and crowd the page by listing languages not official on the country-wide level. --Jiang 03:21, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)
We don't care about ordinary folk and local governments using a certain language. What people (as in ordinary people) use is irrelevant. We're for the real thing (hence the word official). Nigeria only has English listed on top. English there is for the elite, but it is nevertheless official. That's how we've standarized things here on wikipedia. Let's not make people think that theyre debating in the UK parliament in Cornish just as they do it in French in Canada.--Jiang 11:20, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)
French is used on the federal level (printed on currency, govt publications, and spoken in parliament) in Canada. That's our measure of officialness. Widespread use elsewhere is not a criteria. --Jiang 17:29, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Ulster Scots is the variety of the Scots language spoken in Ulster in the same way as Ayrshire Scots is the variety of Scots spoken in Ayrshire. It is not a separate language other than Scots.
See: http://ww2.eblul.org:8080/eblul/Public/member_state_committ/british_committee/uk2/view
The european charter from the Council of Europe(http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/Commun/ListeDeclarations.asp?NT=148&CV=1&NA=&PO=999&CN=999&VL=1&CM=9&CL=ENG) "b) The United Kingdom declares, in accordance with Article 2, paragraph 1 of the Charter that it recognises that Scots and Ulster Scots meet the Charter's definition of a regional or minority language for the purposes of Part II of the Charter." NOTE: _a_ regional or minority _language_ not two separate ones.
Good Friday Agreement (http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/peace/docs/agreement.htm) "3. All participants recognise the importance of respect, understanding and tolerance in relation to linguistic diversity, including in Northern Ireland, the Irish language, Ulster-Scots and the languages of the various ethnic communities, all of which are part of the cultural wealth of the island of Ireland."
Note: Ulster Scots was not referred to as a language.
The North/South Co-operation (Implementation Bodies) Northern Ireland Order 1999 describes Scots in Ulster as: "the variety of the Scots language which has traditionally been used in parts of Northern Ireland and in Donegal in Ireland."
Hope that clears things. — 217.225.26.59, 00:33 22 August 2004
Perhaps the poor soul didn't know the references in the treaties quoted were POV. Good that someone makes it clear that there are two Scots languages not one. — 217.225.18.190 17:13:30, Aug 25, 2004
I agree. English is not the official language by statute because it is the uncontested official language of the UK. Try introducing legislation in Chinese and see what happens. I believe Gaelic is official in Scotland (can be spoken in Scotland) but we're talking about the UK here, not Scotland. Dr Zen 08:45, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
SND [[1]] gives the following pronounciations (X-SAMPA) for "great" [I., m., s.Sc. grIt grEt; mn., sn.Sc. ‡gr@it, Kcd. + grit]. Seeing that "greet" only occurs in Kcd. "great" may be a better pan-dialect spelling. "Greet" may be confused with "greet" (to weep or cry) though admittedly this is highly unlikely in this context.
Ken Mair 26 Nov.
Hi there,
Due to the duplication of countries in both EU and Europe footers, I created a new Template:European_countries_not_in_EU for those European countries not in the EU. This need only be put on pages which have the EU footer - other european countries should probably stick with Europe footer.
Before I change all other EU country pages (I've only changed UK and Ireland), I'm just looking to see if there's any major objections?
Zoney 21:28, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I notice that there are quite a few pages. There is this one United Kingdom and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and there are a few more. There is a lot of confusion out there. If you look at my talk page, you will see long discussion on this topic. It seems that Wikipedia authors/editors and a whole lot of people in the world are either confused, or at best don't care much. I notice that some pages are simply set to redirect, for example Prime Minister of Great Britain redirects to Prime Minister of United Kingdom, similarly with Military of Great Britain. There are others too.
I am engaged in a long debate with Mintguy about whether it is reasonable, for example, to edit references about Churchill and William Pitt from Prime Minister of Great Britain to British Prime Minister and avoiding the redirect that would result from the Prime Minister of Great Britain link. I am sure we will never stop people writing new text that talks about things like the troops of Great Britain serving in Iraq. I have seen debates like this go on in other domains and there is always somebody new cropping up to start it again. In all apart from a few cases, people are referring to the nation, the culture, the people or the nationality and perhaps it hardly matters. I am not sure that I can keep up with some of the weird references like Kingdom of Great Britain.
We rarely worry about the various geopolitical and historical changes to other countries when we describe them. Wouldn't it be far simpler to have it all on one page where it could be all explained, then it wouldn't matter if people got the nuance wrong?
Bobblewik 13:38, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Have a look at the introduction to The Isles A History by Norman Davies. He explains how The British Library Cataloguing system has the same confusion about Great Britain/United Kingdom and England, it doesn't even have a section called 'United Kingdom' (Davies remarking on the peculiarity that the National Library of the United Kingdom does not even have UK as a category) and it also has redirections from Great Britain to England such as <<GREAT BRITAIN HISTORY - SEE ENGLAND HISTORY>> --Cap 20:39, 28 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I notice that the map shows '(UK)' beside the Channel Islands. That gives the false impression that they are part of the UK. Bobblewik (talk) 18:16, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)
I am far from convinced by the logic of the above. The Channel Islands (and the Isle of Mann) may be subject to the same head of state as the UK but they are not therefore under the UK. Please see also my question below regarding Crown dependency and Crown prerogative. Laurel Bush 12:37, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC).
"Also under the sovereignty of the United Kingdom, though not part of the United Kingdom itself, are the Crown dependencies of the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man and a number of overseas territories."
Peter.T 12:47, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Is the UK itself perhaps a Crown dependency? It is subject to Crown prerogative. Laurel Bush 11:42, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC).
I believe that GB was the birth place of postage stamp, mechanically powered railway & electric street lights. There seemed to be no natural place for significant facts like this in the article. David Thrale 21:17, 2 Oct 2004 (UTC)
I thought Little Britain was Ireland, not Brittany? Dunc_Harris|☺ 13:53, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Little Britain, is television programme, surely ;) Grinner 14:38, Oct 4, 2004 (UTC)
I have deleted "the northern regions and" following the referendum in NE England which overwhelmingly rejected regional assemblies 091104
The articles entitled Great Britain and United Kingdom should be combined into one entry, seeing as how they are pretty much the same thing. Besides, United Kingdom is the proper name, and the Great Britain article contains less information. Just a thought. — 68.9.28.244 23:20, Nov 22, 2004 (UTC)
Correct. They are not in any way the same. GB is a landmass. UK is a kingdom incorporating that landmass and a bit of the island next door.FearÉIREANN 19:20, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Shouldn't the British Commonwealth be listed at the bottom. It is a very important organisation even though it does not command as much attention as others. HM the Queen is its head and Britain is linked culturally to its Empire and Commonwealth.
That map should be changed to something more useful. It has a vage place in the orkneys but it dosnt have Leeds, Nottingham and Leicester.
Term needs disambiguation. There have been several united kingdoms, including that of Norway and Sweden.
I've corrected some rather dramatic inaccuracies.
Isn't the government answerable to the Lords as well as the Commons? --Pauldanon 18:57, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Discussion moved to /Country, Kingdom or State#Country_vs_Kingdom
Discussion moved to /Country, Kingdom or State#Country_vs_State
Discussion not moved to /Country, Kingdom or State because I don't feel that the credibility of previous contributors has much bearing on the debate at hand (no offense meant to any of the below contributors)
Is it worth noting that there is not one single registered editor with a history backing the "UK is not a country" idea? Aside from User:Considered of course, who registered specifically to comment on this issue.
From this month:
AlistairMcMillan 18:27, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
How dare these anonymous individuals have the absolute audacity to consider themselves as worthy of making informed edits on this website?! Alistair, what do you sound like?!?
And why should the fact that these individuals are not registered users make their contributions any less valid, Alistair? You are right about one thing, though, I did indeed register as a result of your continued disregard of unregistered users' edits. May I remind you that the Wikipedia project is a public forum and not a "private members' club" and our common aim should be unbiased input and fair consideration for all, as opposed to the recent bouts of what can only be described as "playground politics" by individuals like yourself, who really need to reconsider their own aims in this project.
And on the subject of maturity and bullying, I would draw Arwel's (and others') attention to the message AllistairMcMillan left for me on my "User_talk" page. So, what exactly is a "sockpuppet" anyway?
Considered 11:01, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
"Ah, now we see the violence inherent in the system." "Come and see the violence inherent in the system! Help! Help! I'm being repressed!" AlistairMcMillan 14:07, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
AlistairMcMillan, I really have no response to the apparently random and frankly, slightly worrying gibberish that you consistently see fit to write in response. It really isn't normal.
Arwel, I take your point in regard to the questionable validity of some of the more recent UK-specific entries and must confess to being slightly disconcerted at the (I'm sure unintentional) suggestion that I have been running round the country, using a plethora of different PCs as a "sockpuppet", as you term it. If that is the case, then there are two points I feel I must make:
I will waste no further breath on AlistairMcMillan as I do not feel that his conduct merits further engagement, however I would respectfully ask you, Arwel, to brush up on your social skills and avoid making insulting remarks to other users, whom you deem "of questionable validity".
I notice that this little "sub-debate" (for want of a better euphemism), seems to have conveniently side-tracked the whole point of this particular discussion. I apologise if I am being overly-suspicious myself now.
Just out of interest, I'd be most grateful if you could let me know to whom the "local administrators" like yourself are accountable?
Considered, stop taking it all so seriously. In this game you can't get too involved emotionally, especially as a casual editor, as there are loads of people on here whose lives seem to revolve around this site so you must realise that sometimes your edits will tread on the toes of those who seem to have nothing else in life worth doing. But these 'stepping on toes' situations and the ensuing reaction from some of the people who need to get out more, makes it a bit more fun for everyone. Don't take it to heart and don't get sucked into making statements that just brings you down to the level of some others in the forum. Happy editing!
"One of the anonymous editors" aka Mark Gudrunsen (there, I'm no longer anonymous ;o) ) 17:16, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The UK is situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe, surrounded by the North Sea, the English Channel and the Atlantic Ocean? Somebody seems to have lost the UK's only land border. laurelbush1952@hotmail.com 2005 Jan 25
Why is the UK not considered to have land borders with Spain (via Gibraltar) and, more contentiously, (the rest of) Antartica (via British Antarctic Territory)? Bovlb 20:38, 2005 Jan 25 (UTC)
From laurelbush1952@hotmail.com 2005 Jan 26th:
And more to the point, it's (as I understand it) a dependency of the Crown, rather than anything directly to do with the United Kingdom as such at all. --Khendon 14:35, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Just added some information on the movement for home rule in Cornwall, it is worthy of note however it is often overlooked, hushed up or ignored. However the petition of 50000 signatures calling for devolution to Cornwall was probably the biggest political story out of Cornwall in a very long time. Additionally this sites information on the incorporation of the rump sate of Dumnonia, the Earldom of Cornwall and then the Duchy of Cornwall into the UK is non existent, why? Bretagne 44 26/2/05
So i see that my edit was removed and no reason given, can i ask why or is it that someone owns this board and i have trod on their toes. I will keep replacing the edit, it is just the begining of my edits on Cornwall's history in the UK, rest assured! Bretagne 44 27/2/05
Geni wrote "I would suggest that you try and work towards a consensus rather than threatening people with edit wars" Thanks you for your words of wisdom and of course you are correct, however i felt forced to make such statements because my edits where removed and even my discussion on this page was removed by persons unknown who failed to provide a reason or engage in debate. My obnoxious statement was meant to provoke engagement and therefore the beginning of consensus building. Laural Bush, i have provided a separate entry for Berwick on Tweed below.
I agree and think Cornwall and the Cornish merit being viewed as a constituent people and nation of the UK for the following reasons.
Bretagne 44 28/2/05
I believe both Berwick-upon-Tweed and Cornwall have some claim to be counted as constituent parts and this should be stated (so creating perhaps the start of a longer 'wish list') somewhere near the top of the article page. Laurel Bush 11:06, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC). The burgh of Berwick on Tweed is the only remaining Englander gain from the Wars of Scotland, which occurred when Englanders had ambition (contrary to the 1237 Treaty of York) to annex or absorb territory north of the River Tweed and south of the River Forth and River Clyde estuaries. Within a continuing Scotlander perspective the burgh is either occupied or neutral territory. If neutral and UK then it is one of the UK’s constituent parts. Laurel Bush 12:32, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC).
I believe Berwick on Tweed has actually been listed, historically, as if a constituent part of the UK in a declaration of war. Also the relevant article paragraph is about the politics of territorial boundaries and I cant see references to 'peoples' and 'Cornish' as very appropriate in this context.
Nation refers to a people ie Jewish nation (spread over many states). The Cornish are one of the constituent peoples of the UK, with a distinct identity and therefore arguably a nation. Or if you prefer a National Minority as the Council of Europe has urged the UK gov to recognise the Cornish. Additionally there is a dispute over the constitutional nature of Cornwall see my posting above. Bretagne 44 2/3/05
I do not appreciate User:Heimdal calling me a "vandal" for my edits. I have reasons for editing the article. Images should not be 350px (or anything wider than 300px) because it takes up over half the article width in 800x600 browsers. I believe the addition by Heimdal to the politics section was in good faith, but that section is already of sufficient length. Naming the other commonwealth realms is not necessary. Three sentence sections, such as "Head of Government" should not exist. all other subsections under the politics section only had one paragraph at most, again not long enough to make a section. According to wikipedia:summary style and Wikipedia:WikiProject Countries, details should be kept in politics of the United Kingdom, not here. Heimdal should also note that in mass reverting my "vandalism", he removed the bn: interwiki link. --Jiang 21:08, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)
On second thought, I've restored a good portion of Heimdal's edits, excluding those mentioned above. Please note that House of Commons is a general page and the page we're interested in is British House of Commons. There's no reason to revert me on that. --Jiang 21:21, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Heimdal, please do not just revert me without explanation. I would like my objections addressed. I am very interested in knowing why you would want to keep images at 350px and leave out the bn: interwiki link. --Jiang 10:47, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Furthermore, I see no reason for reverting these series of edits. the lead section is too long and discussion of part not in the UK can go elsewhere. images that are too small for thumbing should not be thumbed - the coin image was actually expanded in size and looked hideous. the miscellenous topics section is designed for links not found elsewhere, why list links more than once? Please answer, Heimdal. dont just revert everything i change in this article. --Jiang 12:49, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I had several similar experiences with user Heimdal, when I tried to improve the Germany page. I am sure there are more victims of his behavior about. Such Wikipedia inappropriate behavior can not remain unnoticed forever. Jiang, go ahead and make all necessary improvements to this page. gidonb 19:17, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Page protected after request on Wikipedia:Requests for page protection due to an edit war. Please discuss the matter on the talk page. -- Chris 73 Talk 02:53, Mar 3, 2005 (UTC)
I've updated the article with the estimated population 2004. source: CIA World Factbook
--Benbread 17:50, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Discussion continued in Archive 3.