1.
Non-metropolitan district
–
Non-metropolitan districts, or colloquially shire districts, are a type of local government district in England. As created, they are sub-divisions of non-metropolitan counties in a two-tier arrangement, in the 1990s, several non-metropolitan counties were created that are unitary authorities and also have non-metropolitan district status. A third category is the districts of Berkshire, which are districts that are unitary authorities. Non-metropolitan districts are subdivisions of English non-metropolitan counties which have a structure of local government. Most non-metropolitan counties have a county council, and also have several districts, many districts have borough status, which means the local council is called a Borough Council instead of District Council and gives them the right to appoint a Mayor. Borough status is granted by charter and, in many cases, continues a style enjoyed by a predecessor authority. Some districts such as Oxford or Exeter have city status, granted by letters patent, by 1899, England had been divided at district level into rural districts, urban districts, municipal boroughs, county boroughs and metropolitan boroughs. This system was abolished by the London Government Act 1963 and the Local Government Act 1972, non-metropolitan districts were created by this act in 1974 when England outside of Greater London was divided into metropolitan counties and non-metropolitan counties. Metropolitan counties were sub-divided into metropolitan districts and the counties were sub-divided into non-metropolitan districts. The metropolitan districts had more powers than their non-metropolitan counterparts, initially, there were 296 non-metropolitan districts in the two-tier structure, but reforms in the 1990s and 2009 reduced their number to 201. A further 55 non-metropolitan districts are now unitary authorities, which combine the functions of county, in Wales, an almost identical two-tier system of local government existed between 1974 and 1996. In 1996, this was abolished and replaced with a unitary system of local government. Since the areas for Wales and England had been enacted separately and there were no Welsh metropolitan areas, a similar system existed in Scotland, which in 1975 was divided into regions and districts, this was also abolished in 1996 and replaced with a fully unitary system. In England 200 out of the 201 non-metropolitan district councils are represented by the District Councils Network, special interest group which sits within the Local Government Association. The network’s purpose is to “act as an informed and representative advocate for districts to government and other bodies, based on their unique position to deliver for ‘local’ people. ”This is a list of non-metropolitan counties. Some non-metropolitan districts are coterminous with non-metropolitan counties, making them unitary authorities and these are excluded from this list as is Berkshire which has no county council. For a full list of districts of all types including unitary authorities, metropolitan districts and London boroughs and this is a list of former two-tier districts in England which have been abolished, by local government reorganizations such as the 2009 structural changes to local government in England. It does not include districts that still exist after becoming an authority or those that transferred from one county to another
2.
United Kingdom
–
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
3.
Countries of the United Kingdom
–
The United Kingdom comprises four countries, England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Within the United Kingdom, a sovereign state, Northern Ireland, Scotland. England, comprising the majority of the population and area of the United Kingdom, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales are not themselves listed in the International Organization for Standardization list of countries. However the ISO list of the subdivisions of the UK, compiled by British Standards, Northern Ireland, in contrast, is described as a province in the same lists. Each has separate governing bodies for sports and compete separately in many international sporting competitions. Northern Ireland also forms joint All-Island sporting bodies with the Republic of Ireland for most sports, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are dependencies of the Crown and are not part of the UK. Similarly, the British overseas territories, remnants of the British Empire, are not part of the UK, southern Ireland left the United Kingdom under the Irish Free State Constitution Act 1922. * Figures for GVA do not include oil and gas revenues generated beyond the UKs territorial waters, various terms have been used to describe England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Wales was described as the country, principality, and dominion of Wales, outside Wales, England was not given a specific name or term. The Laws in Wales Acts have subsequently been repealed, the Acts of Union 1707 refer to both England and Scotland as a part of a united kingdom of Great Britain The Acts of Union 1800 use part in the same way to refer to England and Scotland. The Northern Ireland Act 1998, which repealed the Government of Ireland Act 1920, the Interpretation Act 1978 provides statutory definitions of the terms England, Wales and the United Kingdom, but neither that Act nor any other current statute defines Scotland or Northern Ireland. Use of the first three terms in other legislation is interpreted following the definitions in the 1978 Act and this definition applies from 1 April 1974. United Kingdom means Great Britain and Northern Ireland and this definition applies from 12 April 1927. In 1996 these 8 new counties were redistributed into the current 22 unitary authorities, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are regions in their own right while England has been divided into nine regions. The official term rest of the UK is used in Scotland, for example in export statistics and this term is also used in the context of potential Scottish independence to mean the UK without Scotland. The alternative term Home Nations is sometimes used in sporting contexts, the second, or civic group, contained the items about feeling British, respecting laws and institutions, speaking English, and having British citizenship. Contrariwise, in Scotland and Wales there was a much stronger identification with each country than with Britain, studies and surveys have reported that the majority of the Scots and Welsh see themselves as both Scottish/Welsh and British though with some differences in emphasis. The propensity for nationalistic feeling varies greatly across the UK, and can rise and it reported that 37% of people identified as British, whilst 29% identified as Irish and 24% identified as Northern Irish
4.
England
–
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
5.
Regions of England
–
The regions are the highest tier of sub-national division in England. Between 1994 and 2011, nine regions had officially devolved functions within Government, while they no longer fulfil this role, they continue to be used for statistical and some administrative purposes. They define areas for the purposes of elections to the European Parliament, Eurostat also uses them to demarcate first level Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics regions within the European Union. The regions generally follow the boundaries of the former standard regions, the London region has a directly elected Mayor and Assembly. Six regions have local authority leaders boards to assist with correlating the headline policies of local authorities, the remaining two regions no longer have any administrative functions, having abolished their regional local authority leaders boards. In 1998, regional chambers were established in the eight regions outside of London, the regions also had an associated Government Office with some responsibility for coordinating policy, and, from 2007, a part-time regional minister within the Government. House of Commons regional Select Committees were established in 2009, Regional ministers were not reappointed by the incoming Coalition Government, and the Government Offices were abolished in 2011. Regional development agencies were public bodies established in all nine regions in 1998 to promote economic development and they had certain delegated functions, including administering European Union regional development funds, and received funding the central government as well. After about 500 AD, England comprised seven Anglo-Saxon territories – Northumbria, Mercia, East Anglia, Essex, Kent, the boundaries of some of these, which later unified as the Kingdom of England, roughly coincide with those of modern regions. During Oliver Cromwells Protectorate in the 1650s, the rule of the Major-Generals created 10 regions in England, proposals for administrative regions within England were mooted by the British government prior to the First World War. In 1912 the Third Home Rule Bill was passing through parliament, the Bill was expected to introduce a devolved parliament for Ireland, and as a consequence calls were made for similar structures to be introduced in Great Britain or Home Rule All Round. On 12 September the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, within England, he suggested that London, Lancashire, Yorkshire, and the Midlands would make natural regions. While the creation of regional parliaments never became official policy, it was for a widely anticipated. In 1946 nine standard regions were set up, in central government bodies, statutory undertakings. However, these had declined in importance by the late 1950s, creation of some form of provinces or regions for England was an intermittent theme of post-Second World War British governments. The Redcliffe-Maud Report proposed the creation of eight provinces in England, one-fifth of the advisory councils would be nominees from central government. The boundaries suggested were the eight now existing for economic planning purposes, a minority report by Lord Crowther-Hunt and Alan T. Peacock suggested instead seven regional assemblies and governments within Great Britain, some elements of regional development and economic planning began to be established in England from the mid-1960s onwards
6.
South West England
–
South West England is one of nine official regions of England. It is the largest in area, covering 9,200 square miles, five million people live in South West England. The region includes the West Country and much of the ancient kingdom of Wessex, other major urban centres include Plymouth, Swindon, Gloucester, Cheltenham, Exeter, Bath, Torbay, and the South East Dorset conurbation. There are eight cities, Salisbury, Bath, Wells, Bristol, Gloucester, Exeter, Plymouth and it includes two entire national parks, Dartmoor and Exmoor, and four World Heritage Sites, including Stonehenge and the Jurassic Coast. The northern part of Gloucestershire, near Chipping Campden, is as close to the Scottish border as it is to the tip of Cornwall, the region has by far the longest coastline in England and many seaside fishing towns. The region is at the first-level of NUTS for Eurostat purposes, key data and facts about the region are produced by the South West Observatory. Following the abolition of the South West Regional Assembly and Government Office, the region is known for its rich folklore, including the legend of King Arthur and Glastonbury Tor, as well as its traditions and customs. Cornwall has its own language, Cornish, and some regard it as a Celtic nation, the South West of England is known for Cheddar cheese, which originated in the Somerset village of Cheddar, Devon cream teas, crabs, Cornish pasties, and cider. It is also home to the Eden Project, Aardman Animations, the Glastonbury Festival, most of the region is located on the South West Peninsula, between the English Channel and Bristol Channel. It has the longest coastline of all the English regions, totalling over 700 miles, much of the coast is now protected from further substantial development because of its environmental importance, which contributes to the region’s attractiveness to tourists and residents. Geologically the region is divided into the largely igneous and metamorphic west and sedimentary east, Cornwall and West Devons landscape is of rocky coastline and high moorland, notably at Bodmin Moor and Dartmoor. These are due to the granite and slate that underlie the area, the highest point of the region is High Willhays, at 2,038 feet, on Dartmoor. In North Devon the slates of the west and limestones of the east meet at Exmoor National Park, the variety of rocks of similar ages seen here have led to the countys name being lent to that of the Devonian period. The east of the region is characterised by wide, flat clay vales and chalk, the vales, with good irrigation, are home to the regions dairy agriculture. The Blackmore Vale was Thomas Hardys Vale of the Little Dairies, another and these downs are the principal area of arable agriculture in the region. Limestone is also found in the region, at the Cotswolds, Quantock Hills and Mendip Hills, all of the principal rock types can be seen on the Jurassic Coast of Dorset and East Devon, where they document the entire Mesozoic era from west to east. The climate of South West England is classed as oceanic according to the Köppen climate classification, the oceanic climate typically experiences cool winters with warmer summers and precipitation all year round, with more experienced in winter. Annual rainfall is about 1,000 millimetres and up to 2,000 millimetres on higher ground, summer maxima averages range from 18 °C to 22 °C and winter minimum averages range from 1 °C to 4 °C across the south-west
7.
Non-metropolitan county
–
A non-metropolitan county, or colloquially, shire county, is a county-level entity in England that is not a metropolitan county. The counties typically have populations of 300,000 to 1.4 million, the term shire county is, however, an unofficial usage. Many of the non-metropolitan counties bear historic names and most end in the suffix -shire such as Wiltshire or Staffordshire, of the remainder, some counties had the -shire ending and have lost it over time, such as Devon and Somerset. Shire county is, strictly, a dual-language tautology since the French-derived county means the same as the older Anglo-Saxon word shire, prior to 1974 local government had been divided between single-tier county boroughs and two-tier administrative counties which were subdivided into municipal boroughs and urban and rural districts. The Local Government Act 1972, which came into effect on 1 April 1974, divided England outside Greater London, each county was divided into anywhere between two and fourteen non-metropolitan districts. As originally constituted, the counties were largely based on existing counties. Some counties were based on areas surrounding large county boroughs or were formed by the mergers of smaller counties, examples of the first category are Avon and Cleveland. Examples of the category are Hereford and Worcester and Cumbria. The Royal Mail adopted the counties for purposes in most areas. A Local Government Commission was appointed in 1992 to review the structure of the non-metropolitan counties. It was anticipated that a system of unitary authorities would entirely replace the two-tier system, the Commission faced competing claims from former county boroughs wishing to regain unitary status and advocates for the restoration of such small counties as Herefordshire and Rutland. The review led to the introduction of local government in some areas. In the majority of unitary authorities an existing district council took over powers from the county council, the 1972 Act required that all areas outside Greater London form part of a non-metropolitan county, and that all such counties should contain at least one district. Accordingly, the instruments that effected the reorganisation separated the unitary districts from the county in which they were situated and constituted them as counties. An exception was made in the case of Berkshire, which was retained with its boundaries in spite of the abolition of its county council. This was done in order to preserve its status as a royal county, with the creation of numerous new non-metropolitan counties, the areas used for lieutenancy and shrievalty began to diverge from local government areas. This led to the development of counties for these purposes. A further wave of unitary authorities were created in 2009 under the terms of the Local Government, while a number of new county counties were created, several of the new authorities continued to have the boundaries set in 1974
8.
Dorset
–
Dorset /ˈdɔːrsᵻt/ is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the county, which is governed by Dorset County Council. Covering an area of 2,653 square kilometres, Dorset borders Devon to the west, Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north-east, the county town is Dorchester which is in the south. After the reorganisation of government in 1974 the countys border was extended eastward to incorporate the Hampshire towns of Bournemouth. Around half of the lives in the South East Dorset conurbation. The county has a history of human settlement stretching back to the Neolithic era. The Romans conquered Dorsets indigenous Celtic tribe, and during the early Middle Ages, the first recorded Viking raid on the British Isles occurred in Dorset during the eighth century, and the Black Death entered England at Melcombe Regis in 1348. During the Second World War, Dorset was heavily involved in the preparations for the invasion of Normandy, the former was the sailing venue in the 2012 Summer Olympics, and both have clubs or hire venues for sailing, Cornish pilot gig rowing, sea kayaking and powerboating. Dorset has a varied landscape featuring broad elevated chalk downs, steep limestone ridges, over half the county is designated as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Three-quarters of its coastline is part of the Jurassic Coast Natural World Heritage Site due to its geological and it features notable landforms such as Lulworth Cove, the Isle of Portland, Chesil Beach and Durdle Door. Agriculture was traditionally the major industry of Dorset but is now in decline, there are no motorways in Dorset but a network of A roads cross the county and two railway main lines connect to London. Dorset has ports at Poole, Weymouth and Portland, and an international airport, the county has a variety of museums, theatres and festivals, and is host to one of Europes largest outdoor shows. It is the birthplace of Thomas Hardy, who used the county as the setting of his novels. Dorset derives its name from the county town of Dorchester, the Romans established the settlement in the 1st century and named it Durnovaria which was a Latinised version of a Common Brittonic word possibly meaning place with fist-sized pebbles. It is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in AD845 and in the 10th century the countys archaic name, the first human visitors to Dorset were Mesolithic hunters, from around 8000 BC. The first permanent Neolithic settlers appeared around 3000 BC and were responsible for the creation of the Dorset Cursus, from 2800 BC onwards Bronze Age farmers cleared Dorsets woodlands for agricultural use and Dorsets high chalk hills provided a location for numerous round barrows. During the Iron Age, the British tribe known as the Durotriges established a series of forts across the county—most notably Maiden Castle which is one of the largest in Europe. The Romans arrived in Dorset during their conquest of Britain in AD43, Maiden Castle was captured by a Roman legion under the command of Vespasian, and the Roman settlement of Durnovaria was established nearby
9.
Wimborne
–
Wimborne Minster is a market town in East Dorset in South West England, and the name of the Church of England church in that town. The town is recognised as part of the South East Dorset conurbation. The town and its area is served by eleven councillors. The electoral ward of Wimborne Minster is slightly bigger than the parish, the population of this ward at the 2011 census is 7,014. Wimborne is twinned with Valognes, France and Ochsenfurt, Germany, Wimborne Minster is part of the Mid Dorset and North Poole parliamentary constituency. The architecture of Wimborne is regarded as one of the foremost collections of 15th-, 16th-, local planning has restricted the construction of new buildings in areas such as the Cornmarket and the High Street, resulting in the preservation of almost all of the original buildings. The town is home to the Tivoli Theatre, a 1930s art deco cinema and this is a Saxon church, with Norman and Gothic architecture. This is made of Dorset Limestone and New Forest Stone to keep it strong, the model town is one of the largest and longest established model towns in England. It depicts Wimborne at the time the model was made, in the 1950s and it is at 1,10 scale, resulting in the model of the Minster being several feet high. The model shop windows accurately show the goods which the shops were selling at the time. The exhibition also includes a railway based on Thomas the Tank Engine, which was opened by Christopher Awdry. Childrens story evenings are held at the model village, at weekends and national holidays, the town crier can be seen in the main square and around the Minster. The legacy and position of the town date back to the Civil War. The town has a civil war reenactment society, which performs every year. The town has a well-established and large market, the market is held on a Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It was previously located in the centre but moved out several years ago to a site on the edge of town to accommodate its size. Every year Wimborne hosts the longest fireworks display in Dorset, as part of its Guy Fawkes celebrations, all proceeds are donated each year to local schools, and since 2004 over £61,000 has been raised for local school projects and equipment. Every summer in June the town holds the Wimborne Minster Folk Festival, founded in 1980, the annual event of traditional folk dance and music has become the focal point for one of the largest gathering of dance teams and musicians in the South of England
10.
Conservative Party (UK)
–
The Conservative Party, officially the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a political party in the United Kingdom. It is currently the party, having won a majority of seats in the House of Commons at the 2015 general election. The partys leader, Theresa May, is serving as Prime Minister. It is the largest party in government with 8,702 councillors. The Conservative Party is one of the two major political parties in the United Kingdom, the other being its modern rival. The Conservative Partys platform involves support for market capitalism, free enterprise, fiscal conservatism, a strong national defence, deregulation. In the 1920s, the Liberal vote greatly diminished and the Labour Party became the Conservatives main rivals, Conservative Prime Ministers led governments for 57 years of the twentieth century, including Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. Thatchers tenure led to wide-ranging economic liberalisation, the Conservative Partys domination of British politics throughout the twentieth century has led to them being referred to as one of the most successful political parties in the Western world. The Conservatives are the joint-second largest British party in the European Parliament, with twenty MEPs, the party is a member of the Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe Europarty and the International Democrat Union. The party is the second-largest in the Scottish Parliament and the second-largest in the Welsh Assembly, the party is also organised in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. The Conservative Party traces its origins to a faction, rooted in the 18th century Whig Party and they were known as Independent Whigs, Friends of Mr Pitt, or Pittites. After Pitts death the term Tory came into use and this was an allusion to the Tories, a political grouping that had existed from 1678, but which had no organisational continuity with the Pittite party. From about 1812 on the name Tory was commonly used for the newer party, the term Conservative was suggested as a title for the party by a magazine article by J. Wilson Croker in the Quarterly Review in 1830. The name immediately caught on and was adopted under the aegis of Sir Robert Peel around 1834. Peel is acknowledged as the founder of the Conservative Party, which he created with the announcement of the Tamworth Manifesto, the term Conservative Party rather than Tory was the dominant usage by 1845. In 1912, the Liberal Unionists merged with the Conservative Party, in Ireland, the Irish Unionist Alliance had been formed in 1891 which merged anti-Home Rule Unionists into one political movement. Its MPs took the Conservative whip at Westminster, and in essence formed the Irish wing of the party until 1922. The Conservatives served with the Liberals in an all-party coalition government during World War I, keohane finds that the Conservatives were bitterly divided before 1914, especially on the issue of Irish Unionism and the experience of three consecutive election losses
11.
Christopher Chope
–
Christopher Robert Chope OBE is a British barrister and Conservative politician. He is the Member of Parliament for Christchurch, Chope was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1972. Chope was elected as a councillor on the Wandsworth London Borough Council in 1974 and became the leader in 1979. He was awarded the OBE for his services to government in 1982. He was one of the pioneers in the selling off of council housing stock and aggressively reducing council spending, after his defeat, Chope took up a consultancy with Ernst & Young in 1992, but was re-elected at the 1997 general election for the Christchurch constituency. He returned to the frontbench after the 2001 election as a spokesman on the Treasury, in 2002, he moved to Transport, then left frontbench politics after the 2005 general election. He currently serves on the Panel of Chairs, Chope was chairman of the Thatcherite Conservative Way Forward group and used to be a barrister in the Chambers of Peter Rawlinson. On 10 February 2009, he called for the wage to be abolished. Later that year, in the scandal, it emerged that Chope claimed £136,992 in parliamentary expenses in 2007/08. This included claiming £881 to repair a sofa, on 12 March 2010, he was responsible for the blocking of a bill to protect poor countries from vulture funds, despite his partys support for the bill. In October 2010, Chope helped host a meeting of climate-science sceptics at Westminster, on 11 October 2011 Chope raised an eleventh hour objection to the Hillsborough debate taking place because he believed a debate about MPs pensions was more important. Cries of shame echoed around the chamber and Labour MP Jamie Reed said that the perpetrator should be named and shamed for raising the objection, Chope helped to lead the backbench support for the motion calling for a European Referendum. He has also heavily involved in the use of Private Members Bills to achieve this aim. Chope came under fire in January 2013 for referring to some staff in the House of Commons as servants, parallels were drawn between this opinion and his views on the minimum wage. Chope voted against the legislation for same-sex marriage in 2013,42 policies were listed including reintroduction of the death penalty and conscription, privatizing the BBC, banning the burka in public places and preparation to leave the European Union. The Daily Telegraph believed the whips sent Edward Leigh to try, in December 2013 Chope objected to the second reading of the Alan Turing Bill in the House of Commons. Because of this, the Government decided to act under the prerogative of mercy. On 24 December 2013 Queen Elizabeth II granted Turing a free pardon, november 28th 2014 Chope, a private landlord, filibustered a Lib Dem bill with cross party support intended to make revenge evictions an offence
12.
Greenwich Mean Time
–
Greenwich Mean Time is the mean solar time at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, London. GMT was formerly used as the civil time standard, now superseded in that function by Coordinated Universal Time. Today GMT is considered equivalent to UTC for UK civil purposes and for navigation is considered equivalent to UT1, consequently, the term GMT should not be used for precise purposes. Due to Earths uneven speed in its orbit and its axial tilt, noon GMT is rarely the exact moment the sun crosses the Greenwich meridian. This event may occur up to 16 minutes before or after noon GMT, noon GMT is the annual average moment of this event, which accounts for the word mean in Greenwich Mean Time. Originally, astronomers considered a GMT day to start at noon while for almost everyone else it started at midnight, to avoid confusion, the name Universal Time was introduced to denote GMT as counted from midnight. Astronomers preferred the old convention to simplify their observational data, so each night was logged under a single calendar date. Today Universal Time usually refers to UTC or UT1, in some countries Greenwich Mean Time is the legal time in the winter and the population uses the term. For an explanation of why this is, see GMT in legislation below, synchronisation of the chronometer on GMT did not affect shipboard time, which was still solar time. Most time zones were based upon GMT, as an offset of a number of hours ahead of GMT or behind GMT and it was gradually adopted for other purposes, but a legal case in 1858 held local mean time to be the official time. On 14 May 1880, a signed by Clerk to Justices appeared in The Times, stating that Greenwich time is now kept almost throughout England. For example, our polling booths were opened, say, at 813 and closed at 413 PM. This was changed later in 1880, GMT was adopted on the Isle of Man in 1883, Jersey in 1898 and Guernsey in 1913. Ireland adopted GMT in 1916, supplanting Dublin Mean Time, hourly time signals from Greenwich Observatory were first broadcast on 5 February 1924, rendering the time ball at the observatory redundant in the process. The daily rotation of the Earth is irregular and constantly slows, on 1 January 1972, GMT was superseded as the international civil time standard by Coordinated Universal Time, maintained by an ensemble of atomic clocks around the world. Indeed, even the Greenwich meridian itself is not quite what it used to be—defined by the centre of the instrument at the Observatory at Greenwich. Nevertheless, the line in the old observatorys courtyard today differs no more than a few metres from that line which is now the prime meridian of the world. Historically GMT has been used two different conventions for numbering hours. The long-standing astronomical convention dating from the work of Ptolemy, was to refer to noon as zero hours and this contrasted with the civil convention of referring to midnight as zero hours dating from the Romans
13.
UTC0
–
UTC±00,00 is the following time, Coordinated Universal Time, the basis for the worlds civil time. Time used there is 2 hours and 12 minutes ahead of time in the summer. The easternmost settlement where UTC with DST is applied is Lowestoft in Suffolk, East Anglia, note that Ireland uses the term standard time in reference to the summer months and winter time during what the rest of the time zone calls standard time. This is the reverse of the practice of most countries in the EU, see also Time in Antarctica The westernmost point where UTC with no DST is applied is Bjargtangar, at the northwest peninsula of Iceland. Time used there is 1 hour and 38 minutes ahead of physical time and this is the greatest deviation from physical time for UTC with no DST. The easternmost locale where UTC with no DST is applied is Bouvet Island, of Norwegian jurisdiction, at the South Atlantic Ocean
14.
Daylight saving time
–
Daylight saving time is the practice of advancing clocks during summer months by one hour so that evening daylight lasts an hour longer, while sacrificing normal sunrise times. Typically, regions that use Daylight Savings Time adjust clocks forward one hour close to the start of spring, American inventor and politician Benjamin Franklin proposed a form of daylight time in 1784. New Zealander George Hudson proposed the idea of saving in 1895. The German Empire and Austria-Hungary organized the first nationwide implementation, starting on April 30,1916, many countries have used it at various times since then, particularly since the energy crisis of the 1970s. The practice has both advocates and critics, DST clock shifts sometimes complicate timekeeping and can disrupt travel, billing, record keeping, medical devices, heavy equipment, and sleep patterns. Computer software often adjusts clocks automatically, but policy changes by various jurisdictions of DST dates, industrialized societies generally follow a clock-based schedule for daily activities that do not change throughout the course of the year. The time of day that individuals begin and end work or school, North and south of the tropics daylight lasts longer in summer and shorter in winter, with the effect becoming greater as one moves away from the tropics. However, they will have one hour of daylight at the start of each day. Supporters have also argued that DST decreases energy consumption by reducing the need for lighting and heating, DST is also of little use for locations near the equator, because these regions see only a small variation in daylight in the course of the year. After ancient times, equal-length civil hours eventually supplanted unequal, so civil time no longer varies by season, unequal hours are still used in a few traditional settings, such as some monasteries of Mount Athos and all Jewish ceremonies. This 1784 satire proposed taxing window shutters, rationing candles, and waking the public by ringing church bells, despite common misconception, Franklin did not actually propose DST, 18th-century Europe did not even keep precise schedules. However, this changed as rail transport and communication networks came to require a standardization of time unknown in Franklins day. Modern DST was first proposed by the New Zealand entomologist George Hudson, whose shift work job gave him time to collect insects. An avid golfer, he also disliked cutting short his round at dusk and his solution was to advance the clock during the summer months, a proposal he published two years later. The proposal was taken up by the Liberal Member of Parliament Robert Pearce, a select committee was set up to examine the issue, but Pearces bill did not become law, and several other bills failed in the following years. Willett lobbied for the proposal in the UK until his death in 1915, william Sword Frost, mayor of Orillia, Ontario, introduced daylight saving time in the municipality during his tenure from 1911 to 1912. Starting on April 30,1916, the German Empire and its World War I ally Austria-Hungary were the first to use DST as a way to conserve coal during wartime, Britain, most of its allies, and many European neutrals soon followed suit. Russia and a few other countries waited until the year
15.
Ordnance Survey National Grid
–
The Ordnance Survey National Grid reference system is a system of geographic grid references used in Great Britain, different from using Latitude and Longitude. It is often called British National Grid, the Ordnance Survey devised the national grid reference system, and it is heavily used in their survey data, and in maps based on those surveys. Grid references are commonly quoted in other publications and data sources. The Universal Transverse Mercator coordinate system is used to provide references for worldwide locations. European-wide agencies also use UTM when mapping locations, or may use the Military Grid Reference System system, the grid is based on the OSGB36 datum, and was introduced after the retriangulation of 1936–1962. It replaced the previously used Cassini Grid which, up to the end of World War Two, had issued only to the military. The Airy ellipsoid is a regional best fit for Britain, more modern mapping tends to use the GRS80 ellipsoid used by the GPS, the British maps adopt a Transverse Mercator projection with an origin at 49° N, 2° W. Over the Airy ellipsoid a straight grid, the National Grid, is placed with a new false origin. This false origin is located south-west of the Isles of Scilly, the distortion created between the OS grid and the projection is countered by a scale factor in the longitude to create two lines of longitude with zero distortion rather than one. Grid north and true north are aligned on the 400 km easting of the grid which is 2° W. 2° 0′ 5″ W. OSGB36 was also used by Admiralty nautical charts until 2000 after which WGS84 has been used, a geodetic transformation between OSGB36 and other terrestrial reference systems can become quite tedious if attempted manually. The most common transformation is called the Helmert datum transformation, which results in a typical 7 m error from true, the definitive transformation from ETRS89 that is published by the OSGB is called the National Grid Transformation OSTN02. This models the detailed distortions in the 1936–1962 retriangulation, and achieves backwards compatibility in grid coordinates to sub-metre accuracy, the difference between the coordinates on different datums varies from place to place. The longitude and latitude positions on OSGB36 are the same as for WGS84 at a point in the Atlantic Ocean well to the west of Great Britain. In Cornwall, the WGS84 longitude lines are about 70 metres east of their OSGB36 equivalents, the smallest datum shift is on the west coast of Scotland and the greatest in Kent. But Great Britain has not shrunk by 100+ metres, a point near Lands End now computes to be 27.6 metres closer to a point near Duncansby Head than it did under OSGB36. For the first letter, the grid is divided into squares of size 500 km by 500 km, there are four of these which contain significant land area within Great Britain, S, T, N and H. The O square contains an area of North Yorkshire, almost all of which lies below mean high tide
16.
Wimborne Minster
–
Wimborne Minster is a market town in East Dorset in South West England, and the name of the Church of England church in that town. The town is recognised as part of the South East Dorset conurbation. The town and its area is served by eleven councillors. The electoral ward of Wimborne Minster is slightly bigger than the parish, the population of this ward at the 2011 census is 7,014. Wimborne is twinned with Valognes, France and Ochsenfurt, Germany, Wimborne Minster is part of the Mid Dorset and North Poole parliamentary constituency. The architecture of Wimborne is regarded as one of the foremost collections of 15th-, 16th-, local planning has restricted the construction of new buildings in areas such as the Cornmarket and the High Street, resulting in the preservation of almost all of the original buildings. The town is home to the Tivoli Theatre, a 1930s art deco cinema and this is a Saxon church, with Norman and Gothic architecture. This is made of Dorset Limestone and New Forest Stone to keep it strong, the model town is one of the largest and longest established model towns in England. It depicts Wimborne at the time the model was made, in the 1950s and it is at 1,10 scale, resulting in the model of the Minster being several feet high. The model shop windows accurately show the goods which the shops were selling at the time. The exhibition also includes a railway based on Thomas the Tank Engine, which was opened by Christopher Awdry. Childrens story evenings are held at the model village, at weekends and national holidays, the town crier can be seen in the main square and around the Minster. The legacy and position of the town date back to the Civil War. The town has a civil war reenactment society, which performs every year. The town has a well-established and large market, the market is held on a Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It was previously located in the centre but moved out several years ago to a site on the edge of town to accommodate its size. Every year Wimborne hosts the longest fireworks display in Dorset, as part of its Guy Fawkes celebrations, all proceeds are donated each year to local schools, and since 2004 over £61,000 has been raised for local school projects and equipment. Every summer in June the town holds the Wimborne Minster Folk Festival, founded in 1980, the annual event of traditional folk dance and music has become the focal point for one of the largest gathering of dance teams and musicians in the South of England
17.
Verwood
–
Verwood is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. The town lies 15 miles north of Bournemouth and 19 miles north of Poole, the civil parish comprises the town of Verwood together with the extended village of Three Legged Cross, and has a population of 15,170 according to latest figures from Dorset County Council. Verwood is the largest town in Dorset without an upper school, Verwood was originally recorded as Beau Bois in 1288, and it was not until 1329 that it got the name Verwood, which developed from Fairwood or The Fayrewood. Verwood is recorded as Fairwod and as Fayrwod, this name has the meaning fair wood, the East Dorset pottery industry, known collectively as Verwood Pottery, thrived from early times on the clay soils of the neighbourhood which had ample firing material close at hand. The major production was of domestic earthenware although finer and more pieces have been found from earlier times. In the latter days ornamental and novelty items were produced, until the end of their useful life, the methods of production had not varied from Roman times, all the processes being carried out with no mechanisation or electrification. For example, the clay was always trodden by foot and not mixed in a pug mill, the wheel was turned by an assistant with a pole or handle, and the kilns were wood fired. For these reasons the Crossroads Pottery, then the last remaining in the area, the industry was not confined to a local sales base. Hawkers, or higglers, took the wares for sale over an area of southern England. They were also exported abroad, especially to Newfoundland which had a trade with the nearby port of Poole. Examples of Verwood pots can be seen at the Verwood Heathland Heritage Centre, verwoods first supermarket opened in the 1980s. In 1985 the town was twinned with the French town Champtoceaux, in 1987 the population of Verwood reached 9,856. The Parish Council passed the resolution to become a Town Council under provisions made in the 1972 Local Government Act. In 1992, the new Verwood Town Council offices were opened, later that year, the town twinned with the German town Liederbach am Taunus. In 2001, the reached a population of 12,069. Verwood Heritage Centre was opened by Rt, the centre is used as a museum of local history and a coffee shop. In 2007 the Verwood Hub, a cinema and theatre. A country market which is open from 10,00 to 11,30 is held each Friday in the Memorial Hall, the market sells locally produced seasonal vegetables and fruit, plants and cut flowers, homemade cakes and jams and craft items
18.
Ferndown
–
Ferndown is a town and civil parish in the East Dorset district of Dorset in southern England, situated immediately to the north of unitary authorities of Poole and Bournemouth. The parish, which until 1972 was called Hampreston, includes the communities of Hampreston, Longham, Stapehill, the latest population figure for the parish is 26,559. Ferndown is the 2nd largest inland town in Dorset in terms of population The district has a large elderly population. Ferndown is also the town of Sean Camp, and who was previously the drummer for Pirates of Panama Ferndown lies adjacent to the A31 trunk road between Wimborne and Ringwood. To the east, the A31 connects to the M27 and M3 via the outskirts of Southampton to Winchester, to the west, the A31 links to the A35 to East Dorset and Devon. The nearest railway station is Branksome,6.8 miles away, the nearby port of Poole provides year-round services to Cherbourg in France and Santander in Spain. Condor Ferries catamarans run seasonal services to Guernsey, Jersey and St. Malo, Ferndown is also only 4 miles from Bournemouth International Airport at Hurn. Ryanair, EasyJet, Thomsonfly, Bmibaby and Palmair operate from the airport and provide scheduled services to destinations in the UK and Europe. On the outskirts of the town lie the Ferndown and Uddens Industrial Estates, Ferndown Industrial Estate, Uddens Trading Estate and East Dorset Trade Park cover an area of approximately 61. h hectares. Many household names ad major employers are present there, such as Farrow & Ball, a diverse range of industries are also represented covering business services, manufacturing, retail and many more. Businesses on the Ferndown and Uddens Industrial Estates endorsed the Business Improvement District in July 2014, to be approved the majority of business voters must have support the BID. The outcome was that 60. 5% voted in favour which increased to 68. 8% by rateable value, the turnout was 42. 5%, which is considerably higher than the average for first term BID ballots. No matter how businesses vote or if they chose to abstain, the first chairman of the BID is Russell Bowyer who is quoted as saying “A BID can only be established if it does useful things for local businesses. It is a fair and equitable means of working together to address matters of common interest. It also means that 100 per cent of the money raised stays in the area to be spent on priorities determined by the local business community. The Ferndown Leisure Centre, situated next to Ferndown Upper School, has two heated pools, a hall, a fully equipped Gymnasium, Squash Courts and a rifle range as well as a power house suite. Also there are areas of woodland and heathlands around Ferndown including Holt Heath. This heathland originally covered the area and up until the early 1900s covered many areas that are now residential
19.
West Moors
–
West Moors is a village in East Dorset, England, on the northern fringe of the Poole-Bournemouth conurbation, just outside the larger settlements of Ferndown and Verwood. The parish of West Moors had an population of 7,400 in 2004. This however, was resurfaced and the central reservation was removed. The village expanded with the development of the fuel depot located outside the village. The depot is home to elements of the Defence Fuels Group, including the Defence School of Petroleum, in the past many military families were housed in their own housing estates, however most jobs are now undertaken by civilian personnel and the military housing sold off. More recent population increases have been due to the influx of commuters, West Moors has a mixed population, with a relatively high proportion of elderly people, and significant number of young families. There are two first schools, one school, two youth clubs, including the west moors scout group, and a skatepark. There are various shops including two butchers, one baker and two Public Houses, there is also the West Moors Social Club which has entertainment nights. Moors Valley Country Park is just outside the boundary, and is easily accessible from the Castleman Trailway. The villages sports facilities include two football pitches, the tennis courts have recently been refurbished into an artificial floodlit grass football facility and a multi-use area that can be used as two tennis courts or other sports. Media related to West Moors at Wikimedia Commons West Moors Parish Council
20.
Corfe Mullen
–
Corfe Mullen /ˌkɔərf ˈmʌlən/ is a village in Dorset, England, on the north-western urban fringe of the South East Dorset conurbation and is part of the rural district of East Dorset. There are three electoral wards within the village, the name Corfe Mullen is derived from the Old English for a cutting or pass, corf and the Old French for a Mill, molin. The mill referred to is the old mill on the River Stour, mentioned in the Domesday Book. Despite the proximity of the area, Corfe Mullen is surrounded by Green Belt. It lies within the Dorset Heaths, around 3000 BC, the first real settlers came, cleared the forests and began to farm, although even they were largely nomadic. Later settlers, during the Bronze Age, built burial mounds or barrows, examples of which may be found to the east of the village at Barrow Hill and at Naked Cross at the southern end of the village. These forms of occupation continued into the Iron Age, evidence of pottery manufactured around the 1st century BC may be found at East End, just prior to the coming of the Romans, in around 50 BC, the area was inhabited by the Belgae. The Roman Second Legion under Vespasian arrived in the Corfe Mullen area during the decade of the 1st century AD. The location of this fortress was important, the River Stour provided a barrier to the north. Lake cut this important tribal centre off from the settlements at Dudsbury and Hengistbury Head, to subjugate the local tribes and keep themselves supplied and in communication with other Roman centres, the Legion built several roads that run through or close to the area. Probably the most important of these, and the one visible today, is the road that connected the deep water anchorage at Morionio and Lake. This road forms the boundary of the village. Although the Roman occupation of Britain lasted nearly 400 years, the presence at Corfe Mullen was very short lived. However the Roman influence continued in agriculture and industry even after they had left, the Saxons probably settled in the area around the 7th century. Christianity arrived before 700 AD and open-air services are believed to have held on the same site as the present-day old village church. During the centuries leading up to the millennium, division of land into Hundreds and tithe took place and Manorial courts dealt with disputes. The name of Corf came into usage during this period and was located in the hundred of Cogdean, with the court being held at Cogdean Elms in the north of the present village. A number of land holdings dating from this period have been found around the village, the most notable being at Mountain Clump and the Knoll
21.
Heath (habitat)
–
A heath is a shrubland habitat found mainly on free-draining infertile, acidic soils and is characterised by open, low-growing woody vegetation. Moorland is generally related to high-ground heaths with—especially in Great Britain—a cooler, heaths are widespread worldwide, but are fast disappearing and considered a rare habitat in Europe. They form extensive and highly diverse communities across Australia in humid and sub-humid areas where fire regimes with recurring burning are required for the maintenance of the heathlands, even more diverse though less widespread heath communities occur in Southern Africa. Extensive heath communities can also be found in the California chaparral, New Caledonia, central Chile, in addition to these extensive heath areas, the vegetation type is also found in scattered locations across all continents, except Antarctica. Heaths are dominated by low shrubs,20 centimetres to 2 metres tall, heath vegetation can be extremely plant-species rich, and heathlands of Australia are home to some 3,700 endemic or typical species in addition to numerous less restricted species. The fynbos heathlands of South Africa are second only to tropical rainforests in plant biodiversity with over 7,000 species, in marked contrast, the tiny pockets of heathland in Europe are extremely depauperate with a flora consisting primarily of heather, heath and gorse. The bird fauna of heathlands are usually species of the region. In the depauperate heathlands of Europe bird species tend to be characteristic of the community and include Montagus harrier. Australian heathlands are also home to the worlds only nectar-feeding terrestrial mammal, the bird fauna of the South African fynbos includes sunbirds, warblers and siskins. Heathlands are also an excellent habitat for insects including ants, moths, butterflies and these heaths were originally created or expanded by centuries of human clearance of the natural forest and woodland vegetation, by grazing and burning. Referring to heathland in England, Rackham says, “Heaths are clearly the product of human activities and need to be managed as heathland, in recent years the conservation value of even these man-made heaths has become much more appreciated, and consequently most heathlands are protected. However they are threatened by tree incursion because of the discontinuation of traditional management techniques such as grazing and burning that mediated the landscapes. Some are also threatened by urban sprawl, anthropogenic heathlands are maintained artificially by a combination of grazing and periodic burning, or mowing, if not so maintained, they are rapidly re-colonised by forest or woodland. The re-colonising tree species will depend on what is available as the seed source. Bolster heath Chalk heath Garrigue Maquis shrubland Matorral Scrubland The Countryside Agency information on types of open land Origin of the word heath
22.
Forestry Commission
–
The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for forestry in England and Scotland. It was set up in 1919 to expand Britains forests and woodland after depletion during the First World War, to do this, the commission bought large amounts of former agricultural land, eventually becoming the largest land owner in Britain. The Commission is divided into three divisions, Forestry Commission England, Forestry Commission Scotland, and Forest Research, Forestry Commission Scotland reports to the Scottish Government. Over time the purpose of the Commission broadened to include other activities beyond timber production. One major activity is scientific research, some of which is carried out in research forests across Britain, recreation is also important, with several outdoor activities being actively promoted. Protecting and improving biodiversity across Britains forests are part of the Forestry Commissions remit. The Commission received criticism for its reliance on conifers, particularly the appearance of conifer forests. Protests from the public and conservation groups accompanied attempts to privatise the organisation in 1993 and 2010. The Forestry Commission manages almost 700,000 hectares of land in England and Scotland, the majority of the land is in Scotland, 30% of the landholding is in England. Afforestation was the reason for the creation of the commission in 1919. Britain had only 5% of its original forest cover left and the government at that time wanted to create a resource of timber. Since then forest coverage has doubled and the commissions remit expanded to include greater focus on sustainable forest management, the Forestry Commission is also the government body responsible for the regulation of private forestry, felling is generally illegal without first obtaining a licence from the Commission. The Commission is also responsible for encouraging new private forest growth, part of this role is carried out by providing grants in support of private forests and woodlands. The Forestry Commission was established as part of the Forestry Act 1919, the board was initially made up of eight forestry commissioners and was chaired by Simon Fraser, 14th Lord Lovat from 1919 to 1927. The commission was set up to increase the amount of woodland in Britain by buying land for afforestation and reforestation, the commission was also tasked with promoting forestry and the production of timber for trade. During the 1920s the Commission focused on acquiring land to begin planting out new forests, during the Great Depression the Forestry Commissions estate continued to grow so that it was just over 360,000 hectares of land by 1934. The low cost of land, and the need to increase timber production meant that by 1939 the Forestry Commission was the largest landowner in Britain and this division lasted until 1941, when the Timber Supply Department was absorbed by the Ministry of Supply. Much of the timber supplied for the war came from the New Forest, the war also saw the Commission introduce the licensing system for tree felling
23.
Office for National Statistics
–
The Office for National Statistics is the executive office of the UK Statistics Authority, a non-ministerial department which reports directly to the UK Parliament. Its main office is in Newport near the United Kingdom Intellectual Property Office and Tredegar House, but another significant office is in Titchfield in Hampshire, ONS co-ordinates data collection with the respective bodies in Northern Ireland and Scotland, namely NISRA and NRS. The ONS was formed on 1 April 1996 by the merger of the Central Statistical Office, following the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007, the United Kingdom Statistics Authority became a non-ministerial department on 1 April 2008. This is often produced in ways that make comparison with other societies and economies possible. Its publications, and analyses by other users based on its data, are reported and discussed daily in the media as the basis for the public understanding of the country in which they live. The complexity and degree and speed of change in the society, combined with the challenge of measuring some of these rise to periodic debates about some of its indicators. Consequently, unexpected or incomplete data or occasional errors or disputes about its analysis can also attract considerable attention, ONS data can also be used in epidemiologic studies such as survival analysis. This was originally a 1997 Labour manifesto commitment and was also the policy of the Liberal Democrat, such independence was also sought by the Royal Statistical Society and the Statistics Commission. The National Statistician would be accountable to Parliament through a more widely constituted independent governing Statistics Board. The ONS would be a government department so that the staff, including the Director, would remain as civil servants. The details of the plans for independence were considered in Parliament during the 2006/2007 session and resulted in the Statistics, on 7 February 2008, following the first meeting of the shadow board, it was announced that it would be known as the UK Statistics Authority. In 2012, Andrew Dilnot replaced Michael Scholar as chairman of the Authority, since its establishment, ONS has had five Directors, Professor Tim Holt, Len Cook, Karen Dunnell, Jil Matheson, and, from October 2012, Glen Watson. Len Cook was the first Director to hold the newly created role of National Statistician, the roles of Director of ONS and National Statistician were combined until 2012 when Jil Matheson continued as National Statistician while Glen Watson became Director of the ONS. John Pullinger replaced Jil Matheson as National Statistician in July 2014, the work of the ONS covers the collection of data and the analysis and publication of statistics covering the economy, population, and society of the UK. Where data is broken down by geographical area, this is usually done by the areas defined in the ONS geographical coding system and they are members of the Government Statistical Service and are the professional responsibility of the head of the service, who is also the National Statistician. Each department has a statistical service Head of Profession, for example, data on Agriculture, Fishing and Forestry comes primarily from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. ONS is also responsible for the maintenance of the Inter-Departmental Business Register and this ceased to operate from 1 April 2008. The General Register Office and the post of Registrar-General for England & Wales ceased to be part of ONS from that date, the annual United Kingdom National Accounts are published in an online publication by the Office for National Statistics
24.
Life expectancy
–
Life expectancy is a statistical measure of the average time an organism is expected to live, based on the year of their birth, their current age and other demographic factors including sex. National LEB figures reported by national agencies and international organizations are indeed estimates of period LEB. In the Bronze Age and the Iron Age, LEB was 26 years, for recent years, in Swaziland LEB is about 49, and in Japan, it is about 83. But for those who survive early hazards, a life expectancy of 60 or 70 would not be uncommon, for example, a society with a LEB of 40 may have few people dying at precisely 40, most will die before 30 or after 55. In populations with high infant mortality rates, LEB is highly sensitive to the rate of death in the first few years of life. Mathematically, life expectancy is the number of years of life remaining at a given age. It is denoted by e x, which means the number of subsequent years of life for someone now aged x. Longevity, maximum lifespan, and life expectancy are not synonyms, Life expectancy is defined statistically as the mean number of years remaining for an individual or a group of people at a given age. Longevity refers to the characteristics of the long life span of some members of a population. Maximum lifespan is the age at death for the individual of a species. Moreover, because life expectancy is an average, a person may die many years before or many years after the expected survival. The term maximum life span has a different meaning and is more related to longevity. Life expectancy is also used in plant or animal ecology, life tables, an analysis published in 2011 in The Lancet attributes Japanese life expectancy to equal opportunities and public health as well as diet. The oldest confirmed recorded age for any human is 122 years and this is referred to as the maximum life span, which is the upper boundary of life, the maximum number of years any human is known to have lived. Theoretical study shows that the life expectancy at birth is limited by the human life characteristic value δ. The following information is derived from the 1961 Encyclopædia Britannica and other sources, unless otherwise stated, it represents estimates of the life expectancies of the world population as a whole. In many instances, life expectancy varied considerably according to class, Life expectancy at birth takes account of infant mortality but not prenatal mortality. Life expectancy increases with age as the individual survives the higher mortality rates associated with childhood, for instance, the table above listed the life expectancy at birth among 13th-century English nobles at 30
25.
East Dorset District Council elections
–
East Dorset District Council in Dorset, England is elected every four years. Since the last boundary changes in 2015,29 councillors have been elected from 16 wards, boundary changes took place for the 2003 and 2015 elections. Below is a summary of recent by-elections, full results can be found by clicking on the by-election name
26.
Liberal Democrats (UK)
–
The Liberal Democrats are a liberal political party in the United Kingdom. The party was formed in 1988 as a merger of the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party, at the 2015 general election, the party was reduced to eight MPs. Nick Clegg resigned as leader and Tim Farron won the subsequent leadership election, the party currently has nine MPs, following the Richmond Park by-election. The Alliance was led by David Steel and Roy Jenkins, Jenkins was replaced by David Owen, the two parties had their own policies and emphases, but produced a joint manifesto for the 1983 and 1987 general elections. Following disappointing results in the 1987 election, Steel proposed to merge the two parties, although opposed by Owen, it was supported by a majority of members of both parties, and they formally merged in March 1988, with Steel and Robert Maclennan as joint interim leaders. The new party was initially named Social and Liberal Democrats with the short form The Democrats being used from September 1988. The name was changed to Liberal Democrats in October 1989. The new party logo, the Bird of Liberty, was adopted in 1989, the party is a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party and Liberal International. The then-serving Liberal MP Paddy Ashdown was elected leader in July 1988, at the 1989 European Elections, the party received only 6% of the vote, putting them in fourth place after the Green Party. They failed to gain a single Member of the European Parliament at this election, over the next three years, the party recovered under Ashdowns leadership. They performed better at the 1990 local elections and in by-elections—including at Eastbourne in 1990, Ribble Valley in 1991, the Lib Dems did not reach the share of national votes in the 1990s that the Alliance had achieved in the 1980s. At their first election in 1992, they won 17. 8% of the vote, in the 1994 European Elections, the party gained its first two Members of European Parliament. The election was, however, something of a point for the Liberal Democrats. Ashdown retired as leader in 1999 and the party elected Charles Kennedy as his replacement, the party improved on their 1997 results at the 2001 general election, increasing their number of seats to 52 and their share of the vote to 18. 3%. The party won seats from Labour in by-elections in Brent East in 2003 and Leicester South in 2004, under Kennedys leadership the majority of Pro-Euro Conservatives, a group of former members of the Conservatives, joined the Liberal Democrats on 10 December 2001. At the 2005 general election, the Lib Dems gained their highest share of the vote since the SDP–Liberal Alliance and won 62 seats. Many had anticipated that this election would be the Lib Dems breakthrough at Westminster, party activists hoped to better the 25% support of the 1983 election, or to reach 100 MPs. Much of the apparent lack of success resulted from the first-past-the-post electoral system, controversy became associated with the campaign when it became known that Michael Brown had donated £2.4 million to the Liberal Democrats
27.
East Dorset District Council election, 2015
–
The 2015 East Dorset District Council election took place on 7 May 2015 to elect members of East Dorset District Council in Dorset, England. The whole council was up for election after boundary changes reduced the number of seats by seven, the Conservative party stayed in overall control of the council. Before the election the Conservatives controlled the council with 30 councillors, as they were the only candidates in Verwood West ward they were elected without opposition. In three other wards, Crane, Handley Vale and Verwood East, the Conservative candidates were also unopposed and this meant 12 wards had elections in 2015 with a total of 66 candidates contesting them. Boundary changes since the last election in 2011 reduced the number of councillors from 36 to 29 and these changes also reduced the number of wards to 16, with four wards electing three councillors, five electing two and seven electing one. The Conservatives remained in control of the council with 24 of the 29 seats, the only three contested seats that were not won by the Conservatives, were taken by the Liberal Democrats, who won both seats in Wimborne Minster, as well as one seat in Colehill East
28.
Alderholt
–
Alderholt /ˈɔːldərhoʊlt/ is a large village and civil parish in the East Dorset district of Dorset, England, situated 3 miles west of Fordingbridge. The parish includes the hamlets of Crendell and Cripplestyle, the local travel links are located 11 miles from the village to Salisbury railway station and 9 miles to Bournemouth International Airport. The main road running through the village is the B3078 connecting Alderholt to Fordingbridge, the village has a population of 3,113 according to the 2001 Census, increasing along with the electoral ward of the same name to 3,171 at the 2011 Census. The village is served by a small Co-operative store, Veterinary clinic, the village pub is the Churchill Arms. There are three churches in the village, Alderholt Chapel, St James Church of England, and the Tabernacle Gospel Church, until mid-2014, Alderholt also had its own independent pet store. The village also has a recreation ground with a sports and social club. The civil parish was created in 1894, a Parish Book was published in 1994 by the Alderholt Parish Council, recording Parish details and interest over the 100 years. Alderholt is home to the ReCreate Arts Festival each April and has hosted such acts as Dodgy, Andy Kind, media related to Alderholt at Wikimedia Commons Alderholt Parish Council website Census data St James First School The Parish Church of St James Alderholt Chapel
29.
Chalbury
–
Chalbury is a village in the English county of Dorset. It lies within the East Dorset administrative district of the county, four north of Wimborne Minster. The village is sited on Chalbury Hill, the view from which has described as one of the most fascinating in the county. This feeling of space seen from relatively small hills is a blessed peculiarity of Dorset. The village has a population of 140, journalist Mary Frances Billington was born at Chalbury in 1862, while her father was the rector at All Saints Church. In a 2004 adaptation of Shakespeares The Taming of the Shrew, media related to Chalbury at Wikimedia Commons Census data Photographs and Information on Chalbury Church from Strolling Guides
30.
Colehill
–
Colehill is a parish, neighbouring Wimborne Minster, in Dorset, England, with a population of 7,000, reducing slightly to 6,927 at the 2011 census. The name Colehill originated in 1431 as Colhulle, becoming Colhill in 1518 and Collehill in 1547, six round barrows, which can still be seen, show that people lived here as early as 2000 BC. Fortifications at Hengistbury Head and more forts inland were established then, part of the tracks survive, running parallel to the river from the coastal fort through modern locations such as Parley and Stapehill to Badbury Rings. It is very likely that the line of Middlehill Road derives from one of very early tracks. Later in Roman times Wimborne developed as an important trading centre on the River Stour, another track radiating eastward possibly set the line for what was to become in modern times the A31. Bridges replaced the fords in about 100 AD, There then followed the Saxon invasion and the formation of the Kingdom of Wessex. Agriculture became established and with it clearance of some small plots on the sunny heathland slopes around Colehill. Over the centuries farms grew until, with the impetus of the Inclosure Acts, they were consolidated into the estates that we know of today - Kingston Lacy, Hanham, in Colehill there are three first schools, Colehill First School, Hayeswood First School and St Catherines. The middle school is St Michaels, There is also a memorial hall, and a community library was opened in February 2013, it is run by volunteers with some support from Dorset County Council. Colehill also has one post office, a pharmacy and a hairdressers, the latest parish plan for Colehill was published in 2008. Many of the actions have been implemented. A website was published in November 2008, it is updated regularly, a half-yearly newsletter, the Colehill Clarion, carries the news from the Parish Council. Colehill appears on Twitter and Facebook, traffic calming in Middlehill Road has been introduced and the major roundabout on the A31 at Canford Bottom has been re-engineered. The latest parish initiative is a project to rebuild the Reef as a community centre for the people of Colehill. Funds of over £500K have been raised and building is proceeding, There are a few houses in Colehill dating from the 1860s and rapid expansion took place in the last century. The population rose from 1786 in 1951 to 5370 in 1971, several large estates of modern family homes were built and there is quite a lot of infill building. The Parish Church, Church of England, is St Michaels and it was designed by Caröe in 1893 and is a half brick and half timber construction in the Arts and Crafts style. Nearby and close to the war memorial at the centre of the village are the Triangle Woods which have village green status, There are areas of common land, a recreation ground at Olivers Park, and a Local Nature Reserve at Leigh Common
31.
Cranborne
–
Cranborne is a village in East Dorset, England. In 2001 the village had a population of 779 people, unaltered at the 2011 Census, the appropriate electoral ward is called Crane. This ward includes Wimborne St. Giles in the west and south to Woodlands, the total population of this ward at the 2011 census was 2,189. The town is situated on chalk downland called Cranborne Chase, part of a large expanse of chalk in southern England which includes the nearby Salisbury Plain, the village dates from Saxon times and was recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Creneburne, meaning stream of cranes. In the 10th century the Benedictine abbey known as Cranborne Abbey was founded by a knight by the name of Haylward Snew who made it the parent house of the foundation at Tewkesbury. The priory was fully subject to Tewkesbury until the dissolution of the abbey in 1540, the priory buildings were demolished in 1703, but the Norman priory church of St Mary and St Bartholomew survives as the parish church. In the 13th century King John visited the downs for the hunt, since 1605, Viscount Cranborne has been the courtesy title of the heir of the Earl of Salisbury. The village was a town in times when it was frequented by royalty. The towns population was at one time large, but its importance. Cranborne was for centuries the centre of the hundred of the same name. In the 1980s there was a reproduction Iron-Age Round House built at the back of Cranborne Middle School and it is now the Cranborne Ancient Technology Centre. The church of St Mary and St Bartholomew is of 12th-century origin, there is a massive 15th-century tower and the chancel was rebuilt in the 19th century. There are 14th-century wall paintings and a 15th-century pulpit
32.
Edmondsham
–
Edmondsham is a village in the county of Dorset in southern England. It is situated two miles north west of Verwood and ten miles north of Bournemouth and it is sited near the source of a small stream which flows into the River Allen. In the 2001 Census it had a population of 200, Edmonsham House was built in 1589, and in 1905 was described by Sir Frederick Treves as grey with age and hence like a mist in the wood. Edmonsham House Gardens are open to the public, media related to Edmondsham at Wikimedia Commons Census data Edmonsham House and Gardens
33.
Hinton Martell
–
Hinton Martell is a village in the county of Dorset in southern England. It lies within the East Dorset administrative district of the county, in the 2001 Census the village had a population of 368. Hinton Martell was once known as Hinetone, the village of the monks and it was owned at this time by Eudo Martel, a Frenchman whose surname meant hammer. The village has a church and thatched cottages, and also a rather unusual fountain, the current fountain is a replacement for an original which was built low for sheep to drink from. In 1905 in his Highways and Byways in Dorset, Sir Frederick Treves called the original a fountain as may be found in a tea garden or in front of a gaudy Italian villa. He continues, The fountain, of painted metal, tawdry and flimsy, no unhappy detail is spared, the ambitious pedestal, the three impossible dolphins, the paltry squirt of water, are all here. How this cafe chantant ornament has found its way into a modest, the fountain was irreparably damaged in the severe winter of 1963. It was replaced, and was revealed in 1965 by Miss Anne Sidney of Poole, media related to Hinton Martell at Wikimedia Commons Census data Our Benefice, Hinton Martel
