“Long live Region of Cornwall”

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Local Lib Dem MPs have welcomed the news that future official Government statistics will relate to Cornwall instead of the south west “region”.

Andrew George MP

The Department for Communities and Local Government have announced that from October statistics will no longer be published for the ‘south west’ but will instead reflect Cornwall as a region in its own right.

North Cornwall MP, Dan Rogerson, said: “I am pleased to see that Cornwall will now be treated as Cornwall, rather than the western most component of a made up south west “region” which no-one had any affinity to or identity with.”

West Cornwall MP Andrew George added: “This is welcome. The south west never was a “region”, in the sense that it had integrity and identity. It was just a “Government Zone” created for administrative convenience. The south west is dead. Long live the Region of Cornwall!”

And St Austell & Newquay’s MP, Stephen Gilbert, commented: “Trying to compare Bodmin and Bournemouth or St Austell and Swindon was always an artificial construct and nobody will mourn the demise of an artificial region that had no depth on the ground or community feeling.”