On Dec 3, 2007 12:19 PM, Robert (Jamie) Munro <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Is there really a difference between an "Administrative County" and a > > mere "County" (as Berkshire is listed) and the three "Metropolitan > > Counties" in the list, or is this some kind of data processing > > artifact? > > Berkshire shouldn't be on the list. It's a historical county that > doesn't exist any more, like Middlesex. > I think there is a difference between "Administrative County" and > "Metropolitan County", but it doesn't matter. > Ok, the real situation is *the United Kingdom is divided into four parts, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland **Scotland is divided up into a number of subdivisions with no formal name. they are known as 'council areas' or 'unitary authorities' ***Three of these subdivisions (the Western Isles, Shetland and Orkney) are known as 'island councils' because they pre-date the present structure ***each council area is divided up into a number of 'communities', which have very little to no functions and most people would not even be aware of their existence ***some of the unitary authorities correspond to cities: that is 'City of Glasgow', 'City of Edinburgh', 'City of Dundee', 'City of Aberdeen'. These have no particular special status other than having different names for things. **Wales is divided up into a number of 'unitary authorities' again ***In Wales, these can be called either Counties, County Boroughs, or Cities ***as in Scotland, these names make no difference ***Wales is also divided into communities, the councils of which have a much firmer existence than in Scotland **in Northern Ireland, there are unitary authorities again, locally known as 'districts', 'boroughs' or 'cities'. ***there is no difference between these ***there is no equivilant to community councils **England is divided into 9 Government Office Regions ***one of these is called 'London', and consists solely of the administrative area of 'Greater London', and has a regional authority ***Greater London contains 32 London boroughs, (one of which, the Westminster has the style of a city, which again is just a title) ***Greater London also contains the small City of London, which is a unique entity [an unreformed prescreptive borough] **Elsewhere in England, the Government Office Regions contain a variety of Metropolitan Counties and Non-Metropolitan Counties. **Metropolitan Counties (Greater Manchester, Tyne and Wear, Merseyside, West Midlands, West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire) still exist, but no longer have directly elected councils. ***each Metropolitan County is divided into a number of Metropolitan Districts/Boroughs. **Non-metropolitan counties may have multiple districts, or may not. If they do not, the non-metropolitan county is a unitary authority (e.g. Rutland, Leicester, East Riding of Yorkshire, Herefordshire) **If they do have districts, then it might have no county council anyway, and districts might all be unitary authorities (here, the districts of Berkshire) **or, it might be a 'shire county', with a county council, and district councils (e.g. Bedfordshire) **districts (metropolitan and non-metropolitan) can have the title 'borough' or 'city' Within metropolitan and non-metropolitan districts there may be parishes, with a parish council. Parishes may sometimes be called 'towns' or 'cities'. Not all of England is parished. None of Greater London is. Some (mainly rural) districts are entirely parished, some are not parished at all. Others have a few at the edges, etc. This is odd. I haven't checked your list for missing entries etc. It would be > sensible to compare it to the CIA list above. > I would avoid the CIA list, as it is just bizarre and conflates things that have the same style rather than the same underlying properties. -- Abi
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