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::I think any article on the area of "South West England" needs to take into account both official (governement regional offices etc) and common usage - my belief is that whatever the official status "South West England" means something to many people and is likely to be a term they might look for in an encyclopedia (along with [[West Country]]), and is a more likely search term than [[South West Peninsula]]. I feel that in addition to the county pages (without getting into the debate about [[Historic counties of England]] v [[Ceremonial counties of England]] etc) an article on the area/region of the southwest is needed. Having said that it is needed, I would agree that accuracy and clarity are needed, and would support the addition of "statistical purposes" or similar where appropriate. However I would suggest that history and "regional culture" (including accent, products, climate, "identity", media etc) is needed and that something about industry/GDP etc should be included. On the wider national basis I would suggest the creation of a guideline for "regions" be developed in a similar way to those for settlements, counties, districts etc at [[Wikipedia:WikiProject UK geography#Guidelines]] to enable the widest possible consensus and help the reader by having a consistent structure etc.&mdash; [[User:Rodw|Rod]] <sup>[[User talk:Rodw|talk]]</sup> 14:55, 23 July 2021 (UTC)
::I think any article on the area of "South West England" needs to take into account both official (governement regional offices etc) and common usage - my belief is that whatever the official status "South West England" means something to many people and is likely to be a term they might look for in an encyclopedia (along with [[West Country]]), and is a more likely search term than [[South West Peninsula]]. I feel that in addition to the county pages (without getting into the debate about [[Historic counties of England]] v [[Ceremonial counties of England]] etc) an article on the area/region of the southwest is needed. Having said that it is needed, I would agree that accuracy and clarity are needed, and would support the addition of "statistical purposes" or similar where appropriate. However I would suggest that history and "regional culture" (including accent, products, climate, "identity", media etc) is needed and that something about industry/GDP etc should be included. On the wider national basis I would suggest the creation of a guideline for "regions" be developed in a similar way to those for settlements, counties, districts etc at [[Wikipedia:WikiProject UK geography#Guidelines]] to enable the widest possible consensus and help the reader by having a consistent structure etc.&mdash; [[User:Rodw|Rod]] <sup>[[User talk:Rodw|talk]]</sup> 14:55, 23 July 2021 (UTC)
::: Thank you for this, it sounds a sensible way to proceed, and I still think it is worth continuing on this basis. Might you be willing to make some provisional changes and see how this goes down? My last attempt resulted in a reversion without explanation.[[Special:Contributions/213.205.194.146|213.205.194.146]] ([[User talk:213.205.194.146|talk]]) 14:46, 6 August 2021 (UTC)Artowalos
::: Thank you for this, it sounds a sensible way to proceed, and I still think it is worth continuing on this basis. Might you be willing to make some provisional changes and see how this goes down? My last attempt resulted in a reversion without explanation.[[Special:Contributions/213.205.194.146|213.205.194.146]] ([[User talk:213.205.194.146|talk]]) 14:46, 6 August 2021 (UTC)Artowalos
:::Further to my last - since the old regions have now been abolished (that's the government's term, not mine - see Conservative Central for Eric Pickles abolition programme) - and have been replaced by the new LEP regions, we should embed the LEP map somewhere - fyi it may be found at https://www.lepnetwork.net/about-leps/location-map/. There also needs to be a digest of the legislation since 2010 on this, including the published devolution deals for the West of England Region and Cornwall Regions. These are both substantial documents and they reference recent innovations on devolved bus franchising, further education, local enterprise zones, low carbon zones, etc. [[User:Artowalos|Artowalos]] ([[User talk:Artowalos|talk]]) 17:09, 8 August 2021 (UTC) Artowalos

Revision as of 17:09, 8 August 2021

Avon

It was originally divided into just Avon, Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Somerset, and Wiltshire.

I have changed this to It was previously divided... Avon was never an historic county, and only came into being in 1974.--MichaelMaggs 08:50, 11 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

All versions are correct. The current region was formed in 1994 so it came after Avon was created and before it was abolished. MRSC 18:34, 7 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Gibraltar

The article on Gibraltar lists that area as part of the EU voting constituency of South West England. Could someone who is more knowledgeable on the subjesct please clear this up for me? - USArsnl 03:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The link was wrong on the Gibraltar article. It should have linked to the constituency and not the region. I've corrected this. MRSC 13:18, 7 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Name

While I think the article name should remain South West England (because that's what most people will think of it as), the emboldened part of the opening paragraph should read ‘South West (or Government Office for the South West) is one of the regions of England . . . ’ since the word England does not form part of its title. The only region of England which includes the word is East of England. If no-one objects, I'd like to change this (and also the other region of England articles). - Heavens To Betsy 13:48, 18 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Traditionally

This section is fatuous and way too early in the article. Some of it belongs in a trivia section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.140.57.113 (talk) 11:09, 21 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree (with me). The southwest surely has deeper and more serious associations with navigation from Bristol, mining in Cornwall, agriculture and tourism. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.189.103.145 (talk) 08:41, 22 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

County sections

The sections on each county seem very brief in some cases: just listing large employers does not really tell you much about the economy.--Felix Folio Secundus (talk) 07:41, 19 June 2009 (UTC)[reply] 

     Erm, can people not follow links to the individual county pages? Govynn (talk) 19:48, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also if, for instance in the Somerset section, we include Yeo Valley Organic (for example), why don't we include every company listed in Category:Companies_based_in_Somerset? CS46 16:01, 20 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. The Early Learning Centre (a business whose name sounds like a school) is hardly a typically southwestern trade. I'm sure they have Tesco's down there too, but saying so isn't encyclopedic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.189.103.145 (talk) 23:30, 22 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am furious with the childish and nasty anti-Cornish edits in this article. Removing Cornwall's status as one of the most deprived sub-regions in the UK and the suppression of the associated primary sources is playing blatant and malicious politics with socio-economic data. You know who you are. Stop it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Artowalos (talk • contribs) 21:29, 3 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Transport

As part of the transport planning system the Regional Assembly is under statutory requirement to produce a Regional Transport Strategy to provide long term planning for transport in the region. This involves region wide transport schemes such as those carried out by the Highways Agency and Network Rail. [12] - now out of date, regional assemblies in England no longer exist (as of now (2011)) Govynn (talk) 19:49, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's true. I've removed it. Ghmyrtle (talk) 20:37, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

History

What evidence is there that Exeter acted as a "regional capital" of a region coextensive with the modern south west region? Govynn (talk) 20:08, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've changed "the" regional capital to "a" regional capital, which was true in Roman times - it doesn't necessarily imply that the region of which it was capital was the same as the modern South West. Ghmyrtle (talk) 20:56, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have edited the Middle Ages section since it was implied by the previous version that there were natives of Devon or beyond who were British Celtic speakers in the Tudor period, the placename and documentary evidence would indicate that Cornish was restricted to west of the Tamar at least several centuries earlier. If anyone is aware of any evidence for a British Celtic speaking tradition persisting east of the Tamar this late you are welcome to add it back in if you can back it up. Govynn (talk) 20:33, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also, does anyone with an interest in the English Civil War want to add some information about places beyond Somerset? Govynn (talk) 20:33, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Map?

The question has come up at Talk:West Country of the need for a better map of the region - showing some administrative boundaries, some towns, etc. As the term "West Country" cannot be satisfactorily defined, it seems to me that a map of the SW region would be preferable. Any views on this? Ghmyrtle (talk) 11:48, 12 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Directory of businesses

WIkipedia is not a directory, yet with this edit that is exactly what this article has become a - a Yellow Pages for South West England. I'll give it a couple of days and if nobody beats me to it then I'll revert and trim a few more out. --Bob Re-born (talk) 18:33, 17 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's probably all true, noteworthy (somewhere), and quite interesting - but almost entirely unsourced. Several possibilities occur to me. If sources are found, there's no reason in my view not to have a new page on Economy of South West England; or, maybe better, to transfer sourced information (or tagged unsourced information) to the individual county pages. Ghmyrtle (talk) 18:39, 17 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
We already have Economy of Somerset, Economy of Devon, Economy of Cornwall etc some of which are better than others - perhaps they could be expanded/sourced etc?— Rod talk 20:02, 17 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Good idea - and someone can start Economy of Wiltshire, Economy of Dorset, Economy of Gloucestershire, etc... We already have Economy of Bristol as well. Ghmyrtle (talk) 16:24, 18 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Zedland

Just noticed Zedland redirects here, but there's nothing relating to the name on the page. Googling I see a few sites claim Zedland is an old term for the West Counties (Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset) in South West England. It was called this because of the inhabitants pronunciation of S as Z. and another site that claims Zedland was old slang for the West Country (the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Somerset and Dorset). But don't appear themselves to be WP:RS. If this is true, and can be reliably sourced then perhaps it would be a suitable addition to the article, or at least some explanation of the term. Especially given the redirect exists.Number36 (talk) 20:30, 22 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that there seems to be some truth in it, as an antiquated slang term - for example, here and here. A brief mention might be justified. Ghmyrtle (talk) 22:40, 22 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Definition of the 'South West Region'

This Wiki is particularly poor when it comes to defining its terms. If it relates to the Civil Defence Region called the 'South West' then it should say so. I have heard it asserted that there is an 'official' South West region, yet I can find absolutely no evidence for this. There is certainly no constitutional basis for the seven-county region. What there definitely is however is the ex-Civil Defence region, that subsequently became the basis for both the Government Office (GO) area and also for the South West regional development agency (both of which are now defunct). It is also true that national statistics have been complied using the seven-county region.

However, there are also competing terms: West Country (which can mean anything from Cornwall and Devon, Cornwall, Devon, Somerset and Dorset, or even Bristol, Glos, Somerset and Wiltshore depending on who you ask!), 'The West', 'Mid West', Far South-West, Devon-and-Cornwall, Wessex (usually taken to be Devon, Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire but excluding Cornwall and Glos), plenty has also been written about Cornwall being a separate region or quasi-region, and Devon has been taken as big enough to be considered on its own. The issue of Bournemouth and Poole has also been in and out of the press about its potential transfer to the Southeastern GO region in the past.

Then we have the difficulty of government institutions including the previous TECs, LSCs and NEDCs. There are also the EU-based programme areas from Objective 1 downwards, NUTS-regions and so on. Even in the 1960s and afterwards the shadowy 'South' region that included Dorset, Wilts, Oxfordshire and Hants made an occasional showing and Gloucestershire has periodically been included with the Midlands on various bodies. The 1973 local government reorganisation was also important: it created the (disliked) county of Avon which was part of the vogue for building nucleated 'city-states'.

Apologies for being long-winded about this but my point is that an article on 'Southwest England' should at least discuss the usefulness and limitations of the term 'Southwest' and list some of the evidence that both legitimises its usage and otherwise. Taking the 'Southwest' as read without discussing its coherence and cohesiveness as an entity seems very strange and entirely superficial. I welcome discussion on this issue and hope it might significantly improve this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Artowalos (talk • contribs) 21:36, 11 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Infographic?

Hi, I’m Andrew Clark and I work at the Office for National Statistics in the UK.

We publish lots of infographics and I wonder if this one on South West of England (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Regional_profile_of_the_South_West.png) would be of interest for South_West_England

FYI, the full gallery, updated weekly, is here <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Content_created_by_the_Office_for_National_Statistics>

All the best

Andrew Clark (smanders1982) 10 Dec 2013

Smanders1982 (talk) 13:33, 10 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is an interesting graphic - however I do wonder about the selection of comparators ie West Midlands & London for Median Age while North West is used for Life Expectancy & North East for unemployment. I also wonder if it complies with policies (vaguely remembered) about not including logos of the organisations which have produced the graphic - but can't find this at present.— Rod talk 18:51, 10 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

New Forest

Per this edit - later reverted - the region in fact does contain a small part of the New Forest national park, around Hamptworth in Wiltshire. It would probably give it undue weight to mention this in the lead (the region only fully contains two National Parks, Dartmoor and Exmoor), but it should probably be mentioned somewhere in the text. I'm not sure where - does anyone have any thoughts? Ghmyrtle (talk) 07:38, 17 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The West Country Challenge

Would you like to win up to £250 in Amazon vouchers for participating in The West Country Challenge?

The The West Country Challenge will take place from 8 to 28 August 2016. The idea is to create and improve articles about Bristol, Somerset, Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, Dorset, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, like this one.

The format will be based on Wales's successful Awaken the Dragon which saw over 1000 article improvements and creations and 65 GAs/FAs. As with the Dragon contest, the focus is more on improving core articles and breathing new life into those older stale articles and stubs which might otherwise not get edited in years. All contributions, including new articles, are welcome though.

Work on any of the items at:

or other articles relating to the area.

There will be sub contests focusing on particular areas:

To sign up or get more information visit the contest pages at Wikipedia:WikiProject England/The West Country Challenge.— Rod talk 15:57, 18 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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Future of the Page?

Hello all. It's been a while since I've looked properly at this page but I'm wondering if it's now needed?

Intro - Is this still correct?

I thought the last government had formally abolished the regions. SWRDA has gone, the Government Office for the SW is now just a ministerial liaison unit and has devolved role. All the Southwest Councils have gone and they are now replaced by LEPS etc. or functions pulled back into government departments at the centre. Any views on this?

Overlapping Geograpical Pages: We also have West Country, Wessex, Wiltshire, Cornwall, Devon, etc. Q: Should/could this page be a stub with links to other pages?

Content: There is a great deal of (fairly broad) content on the page. Perhaps I'm being a little too critical, but the para on cream teas, the Eden Project and Enid Blyton seems a little..... eclectic? If it's needed still, would it be better too pull together all the literary-related material into something tighter? I am prepared to have a go at this if we decide to keep the page and no one objects.

Geography/History: I think I said this before, but I can't help wondering if these would be better kept on the relevant pages on Dartmoor, Exmoor, Blackmore Vale, Somerset Levels etc. and simply linked to. There seems to be quite a bit of duplication here. The same is true of the History section, lots of duplication.

Economics: As I understand it, government policy does not look at regional indicators. Please would someone who knows more on this comment? :-)

I think the options are:

1. Bring up to date, reflect that the relevant institutions have gone and add the LEPs etc. 2. Thin down and remove duplicated material, replace with links. 3. Replace with a stub page. 4. Other?

Best, Artowalos (talk) 13:50, 11 June 2021 (UTC) Artowalos[reply]

Following amendments have been made -
Have attempted to explain about Eric Pickles abolition of the regions
Have replaced 'region' with 'former region' in some places, and 'area' in others
Have removed two (?) paras relating to regional culture as they don't seem appropriate when talking about an administrative structure
Have left most of the rest of it, as I don't think I have strength to do more this evening!
Q1. The Southwest peninsular page does not have much on it, should the geological / geographical parts go there?
Q2. Should the parts relating to industry go under the relevant county, or somewhere else?
Q3. Any thoughts on other parts?
Best, Arto Artowalos (talk) 17:30, 8 July 2021 (UTC)artowalos[reply]
To Chris Takey -> If you are going to undo edits, please signal your reasons BEFORE simply going ahead, and have the courtesy to use the talk page FIRST.
Okay, you have claimed that the region exists for official purposes (I provided direct evidence of the dissolution both SWRDA and the SWRA - did you not read this?) If you have contrary evidence then by all means provide it so we can make a joint decision. Otherwise you risk introducing POV edits. Thank you. Artowalos (talk) 10:50, 23 July 2021 (UTC)Artowalos[reply]
As this page appears to be subject to dispute and changes will simply be reverted, I have added tags to show where the critical problems lie. A solution needs to be found though, and it would seem to me sensible to merge this page with that of the South West Penisula, rather than to continue a sterile argument about whether a South West Region has political legitimacy, which seems to be what is argued by Chris Takey (see above). I would welcome further discussion from anyone that is interested. Artowalos (talk) 10:57, 23 July 2021 (UTC)Artowalos[reply]

Personally I support the changes that were made and think that they shouldn't have been reverted. However, I think we should be looking to get consensus on how all the English region pages should be modified to ensure consistency. Pick a wikiproject, e.g. UK politics, or England, from the list above. My suggestion is the England one. --10mmsocket (talk) 11:10, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for this, I couldn't agree more. Would you be up for raising this on the England project? I have tagged the page for the following, in the vain hope we can at least move forward in the meantime:
Missing Information - This article omits important information about the abolition of the SW Region for administrative purposes (the SWRA and SWRDA), and in doing so introduces a POV issue relating to the use of the term 'region' for political purposes. This may be avoided by adding an appropriate para.
Weasel words - The use of the word 'official' is problematic and will vary depend on who you talk to. If referring to the Office of National Statistics, then this should be made explicit and a citation provided. I'd be okay with saying 'for official statistical purposes by the ONS' and then citing.
Circular argument - Going on to talk about the 'region' in terms beyond the statistical is disingenuous and uses a circular argument to justify its further use in other circumstances. Personally, I'd remove non-statistical elements from this page and signpost to the page on the South West Peninsula to avoid this. Note also the comment by 10mmsocket above on a consistent approach across the ex-regions.Artowalos (talk) 11:41, 23 July 2021 (UTC)Artowalos[reply]
The article does need to be updated, but not deleted. It's good to see that Artowalos, who has not edited on this site for eight years, shows no signs of repeating the WP:POV behaviour that they showed until then in relation to fringe views on the status of Cornwall. Ghmyrtle (talk) 13:55, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This is not the place to make personal comments (again). I do not agree with your politics, which I find inappropriate, but I choose not discuss them on the talk pages of a topic, since they are not relevant to that page. I don't know whether you are deliberately trying to be provocative, or intend to resume name calling, but my views on Cornwall are mainstream here in Cornwall, whatever you may think or assert. I'm truly sorry you don'tlike the terms Duchy or nation, or that Cornwall had kings, or that the flag is a national, not county, flag used on the field of battle in Tudor times, and that Cornwall has its own system of Arms, or that the Cornish are a recognised national minority, or that the language is protected under treaty, or any of the other things that upset you about Cornwall. May I respectfully suggest that deleting them from Wikipedia and reverting text simply because you personally don't like them, is not the way forward. I have offered talk page dialogue on contentious issues with you before, but so far you have not taken me up on it - I would be delighted if you did. 213.205.194.146 (talk) 14:46, 6 August 2021 (UTC)Artowalos[reply]
I think any article on the area of "South West England" needs to take into account both official (governement regional offices etc) and common usage - my belief is that whatever the official status "South West England" means something to many people and is likely to be a term they might look for in an encyclopedia (along with West Country), and is a more likely search term than South West Peninsula. I feel that in addition to the county pages (without getting into the debate about Historic counties of England v Ceremonial counties of England etc) an article on the area/region of the southwest is needed. Having said that it is needed, I would agree that accuracy and clarity are needed, and would support the addition of "statistical purposes" or similar where appropriate. However I would suggest that history and "regional culture" (including accent, products, climate, "identity", media etc) is needed and that something about industry/GDP etc should be included. On the wider national basis I would suggest the creation of a guideline for "regions" be developed in a similar way to those for settlements, counties, districts etc at Wikipedia:WikiProject UK geography#Guidelines to enable the widest possible consensus and help the reader by having a consistent structure etc.— Rod talk 14:55, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for this, it sounds a sensible way to proceed, and I still think it is worth continuing on this basis. Might you be willing to make some provisional changes and see how this goes down? My last attempt resulted in a reversion without explanation.213.205.194.146 (talk) 14:46, 6 August 2021 (UTC)Artowalos[reply]
Further to my last - since the old regions have now been abolished (that's the government's term, not mine - see Conservative Central for Eric Pickles abolition programme) - and have been replaced by the new LEP regions, we should embed the LEP map somewhere - fyi it may be found at https://www.lepnetwork.net/about-leps/location-map/. There also needs to be a digest of the legislation since 2010 on this, including the published devolution deals for the West of England Region and Cornwall Regions. These are both substantial documents and they reference recent innovations on devolved bus franchising, further education, local enterprise zones, low carbon zones, etc. Artowalos (talk) 17:09, 8 August 2021 (UTC) Artowalos[reply]
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