Countries of the United Kingdom

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Countries of the United Kingdom is a term used to describe England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales: these four together form the sovereign state of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. While "countries" is the term commonly used to describe them,[1] because of a lack of a formal British constitution, and owing to a convoluted history of the formation of the United Kingdom, a variety of other terms are also used. England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales however are not formal subdivisions of the United Kingdom.[2]

The Parliament of the United Kingdom and Her Majesty's Government deal with all reserved matters for Northern Ireland and Scotland and all non-transferred matters for Wales, but not in general on matters that have been devolved to the Northern Ireland Assembly, Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly. England remains the full responsibility of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which is centralised in London. As the sovereign state, the United Kingdom as a whole is the entity which is used in intergovernmental organisations, and as the representative member state within the European Union and United Nations, as well as under international law; England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales are not themselves listed on the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) list of countries.

The Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are British Islands, but are not under the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom. The republic of Ireland is a separate country and sovereign state, and although part of the geographical British Isles, is not a part of the British Islands or the UK. English, Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh nationals are all British citizens without distinction. (The nationality laws of the Republic of Ireland entitle those born in Northern Ireland also to citizenship of the Republic.)[3]


Name
 Flag Area
(km²)
 Population
(2001 census)
Capital
 Devolved
legislature
 Separate
legal system
England 130,395 49.1 million   London No Combined
with Wales
Northern
Ireland		 None 13,843 1.7 million   Belfast Yes Yes
Scotland 78,772 5.1 million   Edinburgh Yes Yes
Wales 20,779 2.9 million   Cardiff Yes Combined
with England

Many citizens of the United Kingdom cite "Britain" or "United Kingdom" as their country and "British" as their nationality, while others identify primarily with England, Northern Ireland, Scotland or Wales.[4] A large minority in Northern Ireland cite their sole nationality as "Irish" while others identify primarily with Northern Ireland, but hold a sense of 'Britishness' in equal or high esteem. People from a mixed background sometimes ally with more than one of the constituent countries. The propensity for nationalistic feeling varies greatly across the UK, and can rise and fall over time.[5] Generally the UK countries are considered to be a close union, with shared values, language, currency and culture, and with people moving and working freely throughout.[6] Since the significant broadening of autonomous governance throughout the UK in the late 1990s, debate has taken place across the United Kingdom on the relative value of full independence.[7]

Various terms have been used to describe England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. This fact is illustrated by the following two tables.

There is no term in UK law for England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales as a group of individual parts. Terminology has evolved out of usage and preference.[citation needed] The distinct continuance of the former states was not contemplated in these statutes;[citation needed] each one was a complete incorporating union. Nevertheless for various purposes they do refer to the areas of the former states. These are listed below:

[edit] Terminology in the Acts of Union
  • The Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542 annexed the legal system of Wales to England[8] to create the single entity commonly known today as England and Wales. Wales was described as the "Country, Principality and Dominion", "Dominion of Wales"[8] or the "Dominion, Principality and Country" or "Dominion and Principality" of Wales[9]. Outside of Wales, England was not given a specific name or term.
  • The Acts of Union 1707 refer to both England and Scotland as a "Part of the united Kingdom"[10]
  • The Acts of Union 1800 use "Part" in the same way. They also use "Country" to describe Great Britain and Ireland respectively, when describing trade between them[11]
  • The Government of Ireland Act 1920 does not use any term or description to classify Northern Ireland nor indeed Great Britain.

[edit] Current Legal Terminology

The Interpretation Act 1978 provides some definitions for terms relating the countries of the United Kingdom. Use of these terms in other legislation is interpreted following the definitions in the 1978 Act. The definitions are listed below

  • "England" means, subject to any alteration of boundaries under Part IV of the Local Government Act 1972, the area consisting of the counties established by section 1 of that Act, Greater London and the Isles of Scilly." This definition applies from 1 April 1974.
  • "United Kingdom" means "Great Britain and Northern Ireland." This definition applies from 12 April 1927.
  • "Wales" means the combined area of 13 historic counties, including Monmouthshire, re-formulated into 8 new counties under section 20 of the Local Government Act 1972, as originally enacted, but subject to any alteration made under section 73 of that Act (consequential alteration of boundary following alteration of watercourse). In 1996 these 8 new counties were redistributed into the current 22 unitary authorities.

Note that there is no definition of Scotland or Northern Ireland. Even in the Scotland Act 1998 there is no delineation of the country, with the definition in section 126 simply providing that Scotland includes "so much of the internal waters and territorial sea of the United Kingdom as are adjacent to Scotland". See also Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundaries Order 1999 and Anglo-Scottish border.

The following table presents references that use the term "Countries of the United Kingdom". For examples of "country", "consituent country" and other terms in use, please refer to the further tables below.

Term References
Countries of the United Kingdom [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] [43] [44] [45] [46] [47][48]

The following table presents references for the terms most commonly-used to describe the countries of the United Kingdom. The references are listed per country, and in some instances are used more than once, when more than one country is referred to in the source. To avoid duplication, individual examples have been found wherever possible. Some of the table is still under completion.

Term England Northern Ireland Scotland Wales
Constituent country [49][50] [49][50] [49] [50] [51] [52] [53] [54] [55] [56] [57] [58] [59] [49][50]
Constituent part [60] [60] [60] [60]
Country [61] [62] [63] [64] [65] [66] [67] [68] [69] [70] [71] [72] [73] [74] [75] [76] [77] [72] [73] [74] [78] [75] [76] [79] [80] [81] [82] [83] [84] [85] [86] [87] [88] [89] [90] [91] [61] [65] [92] [72] [73] [74] [78] [76] [79] [80] [93] [94] [95] [96] [97] [98] [99] [100] [81] [101] [83] [84] [85] [86] [87] [88] [89] [18] [102] [103] [104] [105] [106] [107] [108] [109] [110] [61] [63] [65] [71] [111] [2] [112] [113] [114] [115] [116] [117] [118] [119] [120] [121] [122] [123] [124] [125] [126] [127] [128] [129] [130] [131] [132] [133] [134] [135] [136] [137] [138] [139] [140] [141] [142] [61] [65] [143] [144] [145] [146] [147] [148] [149] [150] [72] [72] [73] [74] [78] [76] [151] [79] [80] [81] [83] [84] [85] [86] [87] [88] [89] [18] [102] [103] [104] [105] [106] [107] [109] [108]
Countries within a country (UK government term) [61] [61] [61] [61]
Division [152] [152] [152] [152]
Home country [153] [97] - - -
Home nation - - - -
Kingdom - - [154] -
Nation [152] [152] [155] [156] [157] [158] [159] [160] [161] [162][152][163] [152]
Part [117] [117] [2] [117] [117]
Principality - - - [63][164]
Province - [63][165] - -
Region [166] [166] [166] [166]

  1. ^ Scottish Parliament. "Your Scotland questions; Is Scotland a country?". scottish.parliament.uk. Retrieved on 2008-08-01. "As the UK has no written constitution in the usual sense, constitutional terminology is fraught with difficulties of interpretation and it is common usage nowadays to describe the four constituent parts of the UK (Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland) as “countries”."
  2. ^ a b c United Nations Economic and Social Council (August 2007). "Ninth United Nations Conference on the standardization of Geographical Names" (PDF). unstats.un.org. Retrieved on 2008-10-21. "There is [...] no common stratum of administrative unit encompassing the United Kingdom at this very high level, and England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland should not be considered first-order administrative divisions in the conventional sense."
  3. ^ "Agreement between the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the Government Of Ireland". British-Irish Council.
  4. ^ "Why is England or the UK sometimes called Britain?". British Life and Culture. Woodlands Junior School.
  5. ^ "Devolution, Public Attitudes and National Identity". www.devolution.ac.uk. "The rise of the Little Englanders". The Guardian, John Carvel, social affairs editor.
  6. ^ "The English question". by Michael Kenny and Richard Hayton, The Institute for Public Policy Research.
  7. ^ "Devolution and Britishness". Devolution and Constitutional Change. UK's Economic and Social Research Council.
  8. ^ a b Laws in Wales Act 1535, Clause I
  9. ^ Laws in Wales Act 1542
  10. ^ e.g. "... to be raised in that Part of the united Kingdom now called England", "...that Part of the united Kingdom now called Scotland, shall be charged by the same Act..." Article IX
  11. ^ e.g. "That, from the first Day of January one thousand eight hundred and one, all Prohibitions and Bounties on the Export of Articles, the Growth, Produce, or Manufacture of either Country, to the other, shall cease and determine; and that the said Articles shall thenceforth be exported from one Country to the other, without Duty or Bounty on such Export"; Union with Ireland Act 1800, Article Sixth.
  12. ^ Moores, B (July 1987). The changing composition of the British hospital nursing workforce 1962-1984.. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3655137. 
  13. ^ Economic and Social Data Service (ESDS). "2001 Vital Statistics available from ONS".
  14. ^ Nuffield Trust (27/11/2006). "NHS Values in Wales (summary)".
  15. ^ Northern Ireland Statistics and Research agency (NISRA) (2006). "Vital Statistics".
  16. ^ ESRC Public Services Programme. "Policies for Improving Public Service Performance".
  17. ^ British Medical Journal (BMJ), Arthur Morris (1 May 1999). "BMJ should stop confusing its readers over national differences".
  18. ^ a b c British Geriatrics Society (May 2006). "THE DISCHARGE OR TRANSFER OF CARE OF FRAIL OLDER PEOPLE FOR COMMUNITY HEALTH AND SOCIAL SUPPORT". “Methods of joint working between health and social care agencies vary across the 4 countries of the United Kingdom.”
  19. ^ British army. "Welsh Guards".
  20. ^ Working Rights. "Solicitors and Legal Aid".
  21. ^ Channel 4 News (28 Jun 2006). "Do the Scots subsidise the English?". 
  22. ^ Scottish Government Publications. "INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE ON QUALIFICATIONS FRAMEWORKS".
  23. ^ Land Rover. "Takeback and recycle".
  24. ^ They Work for You (25 June 2008). "House of Lords debate".
  25. ^ Royal College of Nursing. "Evidence to the National Health Service Pay Review Body".
  26. ^ Office for National Statistics. "Life expectancy by health and local authorities in the United Kingdom".
  27. ^ "Report assesses impact of demographic changes for universities" (10 July 2008).
  28. ^ SARS (academic census) (2001). "The Samples of Anonymised Records".
  29. ^ Times Higher Education (20 March 2008). "The age of uncertainty".
  30. ^ UNESCO. "Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland".
  31. ^ Bat Conservation Trust (01/03/06). "Bats and the Law".
  32. ^ BBC News, Caroline Briggs. "Eurovision's frights and delights". 
  33. ^ Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Lavinia Mitton (16 July 2008). "Financial inclusion in the UK: Review of policy and practice". 
  34. ^ Guardian online, Alice Wignall (May 13 2008). "Paying for your course".
  35. ^ The University of York, Social Policy Research Unit. "The well-being of children in the UK".
  36. ^ Telegraph, Auslan Cramb (09 Jul 2008). "[Barnett formula could undermine the Union, says think tank Barnett formula could undermine the Union, says think tank]".
  37. ^ British Council/BBC (6 July, 2006). "Living in the UK".
  38. ^ Professor David Blanchflower, Bank of England (26 Feb 2007). "Recent developments in the UK labour market".
  39. ^ The Scotsman, Lindsay Moss (17 July 2008). "UK 'trailing other countries on cancer survival rates'". 
  40. ^ The University of Manchester. "How To Reference".
  41. ^ AEA Energy and Environment. "UK Smoke control areas".
  42. ^ International Glaucoma Association (April 20, 2008). "UK Vision Strategy - Vision 2020".
  43. ^ Department of Health (October 2004). "The NHS Knowledge and Skills Framework".
  44. ^ University of Arizona, James E Rogers College of Law. "Guide to Finding English and UK Law in the Law Library".
  45. ^ "Life. Live it. The case for first aid education in UK schools. author=Red Cross".
  46. ^ British Embassy. "Tackling the Challenge of Climate Change Together".
  47. ^ The Independent, Maxine Frith (25 August 2006). "Britain's population tops 60 million for first time". 
  48. ^ College of Arms (December 2008). "The College of Arms Newsletter: December 2008" (PDF). college-of-arms.gov.uk. Retrieved on 2009-01-01. "The design, which was produced in Scotland, makes floral reference to the countries of the United Kingdom covered by the Supreme Court: a leek for Wales, flax for Northern Ireland, a thistle for Scotland, and a Tudor rose for England."
  49. ^ a b c d Office for National Statistics (2004-09-17). "Beginners' Guide to UK Geography: Administrative Geography". statistics.gov.uk. Retrieved on 2008-04-16.
  50. ^ a b c d "DCA". Retrieved on 2008-06-30. "nationally in this context will be taken to mean within the United Kingdom as a whole or within the constituent country (England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland), or both", at www.dca.gov.uk
  51. ^ Vickers, Dan; Rees, Phil. "Creating the UK National Statistics 2001 output area classification.". Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series A (Statistics in Society) 170 (2): 379(25). 
  52. ^ Bramley, Glen. "The Sudden Rediscovery of Housing Supply as a Key Policy Challenge.". Housing Studies 22 (2): 221(21). 
  53. ^ Haubrich, Dirk; McLean, Iain. "EVALUATING THE PERFORMANCE OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT.". Policy Studies 27 (4): 271(23). 
  54. ^ Dixon, Tim. "Integrating Sustainability into Brownfield Regeneration: Rhetoric or Reality? – An Analysis of the UK Development Industry.". Journal of Property Research 23 (3): 237(31). 
  55. ^ Turner, Karen. "Additional precision provided by region-specific data: The identification of fuel-use and pollution-generation coefficients in the Jersey economy.". Regional Studies 40 (4): 347(18). 
  56. ^ Cole, Stuart. "Devolved Government and Transport—Relationships, Process and Policy.". Public Money & Management 25 (3): 179(7). 
  57. ^ Wells, Alan. "United Kingdom.". European Environmental Law Review 14 (6): 150(7). 
  58. ^ Hartley, Jean. "Innovation in Governance and Public Services: Past and Present.". Public Money & Management 25 (1): 27(8). 
  59. ^ Hodges, Ron; Macniven, Louise; Mellett, Howard. "Annual General Meetings of NHS Trusts: Devolving Power or Ritualising Accountability?". Financial Accountability & Management 20 (4): 377(23). 
  60. ^ a b c d about.com, Matt Rosenberg. "Country, State, and Nation".
  61. ^ a b c d e f g h "Countries within a country". 10 Downing Street. Retrieved on 2009-01-04.
  62. ^ "England". Britannica Student Encyclopedia. Retrieved on 2008-04-27.
  63. ^ a b c d "ISO 3166-2". ISO. Retrieved on 2008-06-30. BS ISO 3166-2:2007 (second edition released 2007-12-13) consolidates changes detailed in ISO 3166-2 Newsletter I-9 (pg 11) which uses the terms "country" to describe England and Scotland, "principality" to describe Wales, and "province" to describe Northern Ireland, at www.iso.org
  64. ^ British Embassy. "England". britishembassy.gov.uk. Retrieved on 2008-05-11.
  65. ^ a b c d the Office for National Statistics states in its glossary that "In the context of the UK, each of the four main subdivisions (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) is referred to as a country". see statistics.gov.uk
  66. ^ England Rural Development Programme 2000 - 2006: 5.1 Description of the Current Situation - "5.1.2 England is a country of some 50,351 square miles". Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs at www.defra.gov.uk
  67. ^ British Embassy - What are Britain's national costumes? England: "Although England is a country rich in folklore and traditions, it has no definitive 'national' costume". British Embassy, Vilnius - Special features at www.britishembassy.gov.uk
  68. ^ The Official Yearbook of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 2003 - "England is a country of mostly low hills and plains. ". 2003 Yearbook at www.statistics.gov.uk
  69. ^ Civil Service Policy Hub - Performance pay for teachers (Last Updated: 12/2/2008) - "Many more schemes have appeared in recent years in other countries such as England, Sweden and Singapore". News item at www.nationalschool.gov.uk
  70. ^ Results for England from the UK 2007 Survey of Public Opinion of Forestry, carried out on behalf of the Forestry Commission, November 2007 - "The same principle is of course also valid for individual countries such as England, where an impractical level of afforestation would be required" PUBLIC OPINION OF FORESTRY 2007 - ENGLAND at www.forestry.gov.uk
  71. ^ a b The Oxford English Dictionary, in its 1893 edition, includes under "country" the meaning "3. The territory or land of a nation ; usually an independent state, or a region once independent and still distinct in race, language, institutions, or historical memories, as England, Scotland, and Ireland, in the United Kingdom, etc."
  72. ^ a b c d e "Foreign and International Law". Library of Congress. "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the collective name of four countries, England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland."
  73. ^ a b c d Europa, the European Untion Portal. "The education system in the United Kingdom". "It must be remembered that the UK is actually four countries and that there are some differences in the education system across these four countries.
  74. ^ a b c d British Medical Journal (BMJ). "Is the English NHS underfunded?". "The NHS is broadly similar in each of the four countries, but it is funded at different levels."
  75. ^ a b D. EVANS, E. KULA, H. SEZER (7 OCT 2005). "Regional welfare weights for the UK". "Estimates of these weights are then provided for the four countries comprising the UK."
  76. ^ a b c d London School of Economics. "Government failing to learn valuable lessons from UK health care experiment". "the health service across all four countries."
  77. ^ Ordnance Survey (28 October 2000). "Mapping mission offers close-up on England".
  78. ^ a b c The Grocer (23-JUN-07). "Why school policies don't make the grade". "Why school food policies don't make the grade: four countries, four sets of policies."
  79. ^ a b c Edinburgh Evening News (07 July 2008). "Our health service is the envy of the world, so let's cherish it". 
  80. ^ a b c Channel 4 News (28 Jun 2006). "Do the Scots subsidise the English". 
  81. ^ a b c Commonwealth Secretariat. "United Kingdom - Geography".
  82. ^ Research in Comparative & International Education, THERESA THONHAUSER, DAVID L. PASSMORE (2006). "ISO 9000 in Education: a comparison between the United States and England". A study on “two different countries, the United States and England.”
  83. ^ a b c Birrell, Derek, Public Money & Management, Volume 27, Number 5 (November 2007). Divergence in Policy Between Great Britain and Northern Ireland: The Case of Local Taxation. http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/bpl/pmam/2007/00000027/00000005/art00006. 
  84. ^ a b c NHS National Library for Health (April 2008). "NHS Structure: the impact of devolution". “Up until this time the NHS policy differences between the four countries had been marginal,”
  85. ^ a b c Sarah Carter, LLRX (2001). "The UK Legal System". “The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland consists of four countries forming three distinct jurisdictions each having its own court system and legal profession: England & Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.”
  86. ^ a b c Nuffield Trust (29/11/2006). "Values and health policy in the European Union (summary)".
  87. ^ a b c TOEFL. "Four nations in one". “The UK may be relatively small, but it is extremely diverse. It is home to 60 million people and comprises four countries – England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales – each with a distinct history and culture. “
  88. ^ a b c New Policy Institute. "Education-related websites".
  89. ^ a b <