Talk:Monmouthshire

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If Welsh Bicknor is part of the traditional county of Monmouthshire, then does this mean it is part of the traditional country of Wales? (and the administrative country of England)? Morwen 18:39, Apr 13, 2004 (UTC)

That's an interesting question that has occured to me too, before now. I'm really not sure, since I don't know the history of the place. I should think it depends on whether the exclave existed before the two countries became united. On a related issue, this article should also note that prior to 1974 the admnistrative county of Monmouthshire was considered to be part of England for administrative purposes. I'm not sure of the administrative status of the real county prior to 1888, but it might also shed some light on the national status of WB. 80.225.35.154 18:49, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)
A quick look on google suggests that the exclave came into being in 1651, although I'm not entirely sure. 80.225.35.154 18:57, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I was looking for a date for the de-annexing of Wales from England - the best I could come up with was in the 1950s, when Cardiff was proclaimed Wales capital. Remember that the pre-union borders of Wales were not at all well-defined - bits of the marcher lordships ended up annexed to Shropshire and Herefordshire. Morwen 19:12, Apr 13, 2004 (UTC)
There isn't a date because the UK is one country. If the UK was ever to be a federal structure then we could have this argument, but even a federal UK would still be one country so the concept of de-annexing still wouldn't apply. Owain 15:30, Apr 16, 2004
There must have been a date, because in the 16th century 'England' was taken to include Wales, and in 2004 it is not. These things do not happen by accident. Morwen 18:46, Apr 16, 2004 (UTC)
I don't purport to have any knowledge on this issue. However, I would suspect that Wales' (apparent) status as a genuine 'country' has more to do with the appeasement of Welsh nationalists than anything else. Simply proclaiming the Cardiff is the "Welsh capital" dosen't automatically, legally make Wales a seperate country - although it certainly does make a handful of Plaid Cymru activists feel a lot better! 80.255 19:17, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Certainly. However, that was the closest thing i was able to find. If there really was just a gradual slide from England (including Wales) to England and Wales I would be interested to know that too. ~

If the current administrative area called "monmouthshire" cannot corrently be described as a "principal area" then it should not say "Principal Areas of Wales" at the bottom of the page! 80.225.35.154 19:05, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It is a county first, then 'counties and county boroughs' are collectively termed 'principal areas'. So it is a principal area, but it is also a county. This is in addition to its alleged existence as a historic county. So saying "It is a principal area and also a [historic] county" makes a false contrast, because the principal area is a county too. Does this make sense? Morwen 19:12, Apr 13, 2004 (UTC)
The local government area is only a county insofar as the Local Government Act 1972 uses that term. It is not a county in the wider sense, as the LGA 1972 was concerned with amending administrative areas only. Owain 15:30, Apr 16, 2004
Here, have a look at Schedule I. You will note that the 'principal areas' are listed in two sections, the counties, and the county boroughs. In section 1 paragraph 8 it even has a definition that 'principal area' means "in relation to Wales, means a county or county borough." I've no idea why its like that, but its not just principal areas with councils calling themselves 'County Council', they really are legislatively defined as so. Morwen 19:15, Apr 13, 2004 (UTC)
Legislatively defined as so - in the narrow field of local government. Any piece of legislation based on the LGA 1972 only deals with administrative counties, not the counties themselves. Just to prove what a nonsense this is - every unitary authority is defined as an administrative county in terms of local governemnt, but many style themselves as 'district council', 'borough council' or 'city council'. Also because of this reliance on the LGA 1972, various other pieces of legislation have to be tinkered with to stop unwanted consequences of these UAs being administrative counties. *sigh* Owain 15:30, Apr 16, 2004
Indeed- how useful these 'administrative counties' are. Have a look at the Peterborough article: Peterborough is a town in the City of Peterborough in England. Who would have guessed it!? Amazing, too, how it can simultaneously be both a town and a city! The 'policy' on UAAs seems to be utterly inconsistent (nothing new there!) - pick and choose administrative, 'ceremonial' or UA areas, however meaningless - just ensure nobody mentions those nasty traditional counties that have been around for millennia and most people use and understand; that would just be confusing! 80.255 17:22, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Layout

Does anyone know how to move tha darn box? Its blocking half the text!! Pazzer 26 aug 04

Fixed (by removing the line between the two infoboxes -- I don't know why, but it worked!) --RFBailey 13:31, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Gwent 1974-1996

See comment at User_talk:Owain#Monmouthshire.2FGwent_issue. --RFBailey 13:31, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] County Town?

I got to school in (and live very close to) Monmouthshire and still am at a loss to name its county town. Is it Monmouth? Is it Newport (Traditional only)? Is it Abergavenny? Does it have one? Anyone know the official stance? Dan 21:39, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Here's the official word from the Laws in Wales Act 1535, Section 3:
Paragraph 5: "and the said Town of Monmouth shall be named, accepted, reputed, used, had and taken, Head and Shire-town of the said County or Shire of Monmouth;"
Bur paragraph 6 states: 'and that the Sheriffs County or Shire-court of and for the said Shire and County of Monmouth shall be holden and kept one Time at the the said Town of Monmouth, and the next Time at the Town of Newport, in the same County or Shire, and so to be kept in the same two Towns alternis vicibus, and according to the Laws of this Realm of England for ever, and in none other Places;'
So it could be argued that the traditional county town is both Monmouth and Newport. It certainly isn't Abergavenny!! Owain 09:29, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Was there really a 1968 Order in Council?

For some time this page has stated that -

The question was clarified in law by an Order in Council of 1968

but I cannot find any reference to this supposed Order in Council anywhere, except on Wikipedia (this article and the Laws in Wales Acts 1535-1542 article). In addition -

  • John Davies' History of Wales doesn't mention an Order in Council - indeed he states that Monmouthshire's ambiguous status was only resolved when the Local Government Act 1972 came into force on 1 April 1974.
  • Halsbury's Laws of England states that Monmouthshire was an English county until LGA 1972 came into force.
  • The Interpretation Act 1978 states explicitly, in clause 5(a) of schedule 2, that, "in any Act passed before 1st April 1974, a reference to England includes Berwick upon Tweed and Monmouthshire and, in the case of an Act passed before the Welsh Language Act 1967, Wales."

I've scanned through the list of statutory instruments passed in 1968 and can't find anything specifically related to Wales except two Orders concerning ballots on allowing Sunday drinking.

On this subject, the statement on this page that -

in the rare event that an Act of Parliament was restricted to Wales, Monmouthshire was always included

is not quite true. The Sunday Closing (Wales) Act 1881 did not apply to Monmouthshire; Monmouthshire was not paired with Wales in respect of Sunday drinking legislation until the passing of the Licensing Act 1921. I'm not aware of any Act passed since the First World War that didn't pair Wales with Monmouthshire, however.

Unless anyone knows of, or can find, a reference for this supposed Order in Council, I suggest that reference to it be deleted.

As someone who was born in Monmouthshire in 1973 I'd love to be told that I was "officially" born in Wales and not England! James Groves 19:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree, I haven't been able to find a reference to it either. As for Acts passed since the First World War that didn't pair Wales with Monmouthshire, how about the Local Government Act 1933? That explicitly listed the administrative county of Monmouth and county borough of Newport in the England section. As someone born in Monmouthshire subsequent to April 1974, I like our ambiguous status. Long live idiosyncrasies! Owain (talk) 09:14, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Not all orders in council are published as S.I.s are they? Having said that, I would have thought that one this important would. I'm plodding through the London Gazette archives at the moment... What I have discovered is that the Council for Wales and Monmouthshire became the Welsh Council in 1968, (presumably with the same area).Lozleader 12:34, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
The fact that the Welsh Council covered Wales and Monmouthshire isn't significant, though, since for at least a century, (almost?) all public bodies concerned with Wales also covered Monmouthshire. The Welsh Office and Secretary of State for Wales are obvious examples; also for census and registration purposes, the Welsh Registration Division had covered Monmouthshire, North Wales and South Wales since its inception (presumably in the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1836). Since the Victorian era the state has been content to treat Monmouthshire as Welsh for administrative purposes; it's just that no-one seemed willing to amend the 1543 definition of "Wales" to include it until 1972. James Groves 18:48, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I've searched the Gazzette archives for 1968 and can't find any sign of such an Order in Council. The only reason I mentioned the Welsh Council thing is the name change was in 1968, and is the only (very slight) evidence of an official change in the county's status. In the meantime the reference in the article has gone, anyway.Lozleader 20:33, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Incidentally, according to the page history, the Order in Council info was added on September 29, 2004 by an anonymous IP (194.81.116.246). And we all took their word for it for two years. Lozleader 10:23, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Interestingly, 194.81.116.0 - 194.81.116.255 is the Welsh Office! Curiouser and curiouser... Owain (talk) 10:55, 7 September 2006 (UTC)


Is this any use?

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199900/cmhansrd/vo000621/debtext/00621-29.htm

Namely, to quote: "To take a lesson from Wales, after the Act of Union a part of Wales called Monmouth was unfortunately included in the Oxford judicial circuit. For four centuries, there was a wrestling match as to whether Monmouth was part of Wales or not, and it was not settled until the 1960s, with the establishment of the Welsh Office."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/southeast/sites/history/pages/counties_monmouth.shtml mentions that 1900 seems to be a cutoff point, but it does seem to be an issue of confusion. I consider myself Gwenhwyseg anyway ;-)

http://www.earlymodernweb.org.uk/waleslaw/gfintro.htm also adds about the Assizes court. As someone born pre-1974 in Monmouthshire I have a Welsh birth certificate, for example. I find it strange that Chester doesn't suffer from much the same confusion, considering it is included in a Welsh grouping.

--Desdinova 20:24, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] English Democrats Party

I wonder if they have any plans to stand in Blaenau Gwent :p I suspect not. Morwen - Talk 11:29, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

May be worth asking them! Owain (talk) 15:14, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Too late, isn't it? —Nightstallion (?) 13:14, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Murky transfer revisited

Turns out that stuff an anonymous IP added the article appeared the next day on the English Democrats blog with the byline Elwin Jones [1] Lozleader 15:06, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

And not just their text, but some of my prose did, without any attribution (as well as other people's prose, I assume). I'm even more annoyed than when it turned out the Reading Festival had printed the history and list of bands to have headlined from Wikipedia in their programme. Morwen - Talk 15:27, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unsplit

I've just noticed that this edit, after we'd given the Monmouthshire (historic) its own article, had effectively nullified the split, by reintroducing text at the top talking about the old Monmouthshire in the present tense, before any mention of the fact that the current Monmouothshire differs, also failing to mention Gwent or the fact that the old Monmouthshire is no longer shown on maps, etc etc, which in culmation was rather deceptive. I still find my version superior, but I have made a few edits to the existing version instead to try to bring it vaguely in line with mainstream usage. I would point editors at WP:SOAP. It seems a large part of our articles on Welsh geography have been written or edited solely with the aim of promoting historic counties, which is something that needs addressing. The Radnorshire article for example was rather impressively failing to mention Powys or the Radnor district entirely - same with the Montgomeryshire article [2] ([3]) - really, what good reason is there for that? Morwen - Talk 15:58, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

This doesn't nullify the split, it provides pieces of context on the disambiguation page for Monmouthshire (historic) and Monmouthshire Council. There used to be further context (i.e. a map) to show that the areas differ but this was split off. It may be worth splitting the principal area map off onto the Monmouthshire Council page if this is causing confusion. Let's not get too hung up about what does and doesn't appear on Ordnance Survey maps on every single article - perhaps that is something suitable to the main articles Subdivisions of Wales, Preserved counties of Wales, &c. Owain (talk) 14:07, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Sorry: it does. Let's actually look at the article text, shall we? The Monmouthshire article as it stands has an introductory statement, which says Monmouthshire is a historic county and a principal area. It does not make the point these have different areas. The second paragraph talks about the historic county in the present tense. The fact that the current principal area does not cover the entire historic Monmouthshire is not noted until much later down in the article, in the 'Principal area' section.
My version of the intro clearly made the point that the historic Monmouthshire was larger than the principal area in the introduction: your change obscured that fact by lowering it in the page, below the historic borders : in effect we now have two pages about the historic county of Monmouthshire. Is Monmouthshire (historic) a sub-page of this one, or a disambiguated page? This alteration forms part of a disturbing pattern of removing or moving information you want to downplay.
Merging to Monmouthshire Council would be inappropriate: we need an article about the territory - as well as one of corporate body. Morwen - Talk 14:35, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Hurrah! Morwen - Talk 15:14, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A place for this?

I took this out as it's tone seems uncyclopedic, and it probably belongs in Monmouthshire_(historic)#Ambiguity_over_Welsh_status, when duly rewritten. It would be helpful to have some of the "detail".

Anyone in doubt should read Howell, Ray, A History of Gwent, (Llandysul 1988), pp.106-111 and pp.183-187. Dr Ray Howell is the foremost authority on the history of Monmouthshire and he explains in detail why it has been continuously Welsh since the end of Roman rule.

Lozleader 18:58, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] English Democrats Party and reopening the Wales v. England debate

There seems to be a slow revert war over the inclusion of this paragraph:

A number of organisations, including the English Democrats, a minor political party, dispute this. <ref>[http://www.Lettingmonmouthshiredecide.com English Democrats Party Monmouthshire Referundum Campaign Site]</ref>.

Where "this" is the transfer of Monmouthshire to Wales. I see some problems with this paragraph (not just that 'referendum' is spelt wrong). It seems to break WP:NPOV's dictates on "undue weight", because the English Democrats have negligible support in Monmouthshire. The other organisations are not identified. The link to the party website looks like an attempt to boost its prominence. Sam Blacketer 23:07, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I've added what I believe is a more neutral edit, tell me what you think. Marky-Son 23:16, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
I must admit I'm guilty of mispelling "referendum", when I made this edit [4]. I was trying to show that the apparently neutral extlink added by an anonymous IP here [5] was in fact a party political one. I figured that if the extlink was removed it would just be put back again, and at least its context was made clearer by my edit. Doznt excusss my speling tho.
Is there any value in creating a separate article on the "ambiguity over Welsh status" issue, as it's inclusion here has led to insertion of POV text by advocates of the "it was always Welsh and never in England" and "it is really in England but got moved on the sly" factions. It also occupies rather a lot of the Monmouthshire (historic) article. Lozleader 13:03, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
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