How The Party Defines Wessex
The party originally used Thomas Hardy's definition of Wessex as consisting of the ancient counties of Berkshire, Devon, Dorset, Hampshire (which includes the Isle of Wight), Somerset and Wiltshire, but recently accepted a proposal to add Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire to this list, bringing their definition into line with that used by the Wessex Constitutional Convention and the Wessex Society. The areas now constituting Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire did not form part of the kingdom of the West Saxons, but were for a time ruled by that entity under its earlier name of the Gewisse. Subsequently, the areas came under Mercian control and today they are claimed by movements for autonomy in both Wessex and Mercia.
The party opposed abandoned plans by the British government to give South West England some form of elected assembly along the lines of the London Assembly and continues to oppose current administrative regional boundaries. These place the heart of Wessex, Hampshire, including its traditional capital, Winchester, in the separate South East region, as well as bisect the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. They also divide two major transport corridors, the M4 corridor and the South Coast Metropole, which the party argues has adverse economic effects that further regionalisation on the basis of current boundaries would increase.
Read more about this topic: Wessex Regionalist Party
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