Talk:United Kingdom

message: We have a whole subsection in the Politics section on a dozen and a half peripheral (mostly) island territories that are not part of the UK. The level of coverage in this article (4 paragraphs and a very large and intrusive map - by far the largest map in the article) is a mystery. Their total population (BOTs and CDs combined) is only c. half a million and, in any case, we have full coverage in Crown Dependencies and British Overseas Territories. It's out of scope of this article and, for such a minor part of British governance, has far too much detail for WP:BALASP and WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. In fact, it gives the impression of some sort of residual 1970s-style post-imperial angst. 
I suggest deleting the Dependencies section and replacing it with this additional 5th paragraph in the beginning of the Politics section:   Any support for this? DeCausa (talk) 21:34, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Support the proposal. GoodDay (talk) 21:44, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

text: I would support any concision here. Clearly an area undue at this level, and as can be seen by the latest sentence a magnet for cruft. CMD (talk) 08:51, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

text: Another support. I think it's very important that they're mentioned, but a passing mention with appropriate wikilinks is sufficient. WaggersTALK 11:33, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

text: I would lend my support to this. I have always felt the dependencies section is rather large and somewhat intrusive, not least because of that large map. Goodreg3 (talk) 16:29, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks all. I've gone ahead and made the change. I added in 'mainly/'principally' in relation to the Home and Foreign Office involvement (per the source) as other departments are also involved. DeCausa (talk) 07:50, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dependencies. Why? 

message: Under the transport sub-section of the economy section, the sentence about the Elizabeth line: 
"It was Europe's largest construction project at the time and will bring in an estimated £42 billion to the UK economy."
should have a wording change as the predicted income is speculative. I suggest changing to:
"It was Europe's largest construction project at the time and is estimated to bring in £42 billion to the UK economy." Wind Orange (talk) 02:38, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: HansVonStuttgart (talk) 06:26, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 11 April 2024 

message: Does the current structure make sense? I'd imagine if you're not British (or even if you are) you'd be left quite confused by it. We have Scot/NI/Welsh local govt. covered in both sections. In terms of hierarchy it goes from top (UK) level in the previous section to lowest level (local govt) then middle (devolved) level but that "middle" level only tells you about 3 countries. You have to guess what the situation in England is. 
It seems to me more logical for there to be an Admin divisions section which (1) starts off with the historical paragraph as now albeit expanded to say that the UK pre-1998 was highly centralized. (2) Then talk about how Devolution developed in general terms. (3) then have sections on each of the 4 countries (with heading for each) which covers not only the devolved institutions but also local government. In the England section it would explicitly cover how the UK institutions effectively continue to cover England - with something about the West Lothian question issues. I was going to go ahead and WP:BEBOLD but I know that some might have issue with not having a specific section on Devolution. I'll press on unless there are objections.
DeCausa (talk) 21:15, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: That certainly sounds more logical. I don't think we need to go into too much detail about local government structures as that's handled in the appropriate country articles and doesn't have much bearing on the UK as a whole. Just pointing out that the four countries each have different local government structures is probably all we need to say here, with links to the relevant articles for details. WaggersTALK 11:07, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: True. As an aside, the article seems often to be written as though WP:SUMMARYSTYLE doesn't exist. There are dozens of relevant sub-articles.  It could be (at least) half the size but has always suffered from drive-by pet add-ons. DeCausa (talk) 11:56, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

text: Go for it. GoodDay (talk) 16:57, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Admin divisions/Devolved governments sections 

message: Wikipedia constantly lies and is full of chronic misinformation. Out of respect for all those that you, Wikipedia, have been disrespecting world wide, I request you delete all pages with statements about the English language being American, and International English being the English language. English is from England. Not America. English is not International English, it is English! Call the American language what it is. American. Never call the UK a country! The UK is four different countries united! Stop being one of the most disrespectful, lying website's in the internet, full of chronic misinformation.
 I am tired of correcting your pages and having my words replaced with lies! Name7528798543 (talk) 09:12, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Kahastok talk 09:18, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 14 April 2024 

message: In the phrase: "Other major cities include Birmingham, Liverpool, Nottingham, Sheffield, Bristol, Glasgow and Leicester." I would definitely include Manchester. You may argue whether Manchester or Birmingham should be regarded the UK's second city, but for example: Manchester Airport is the busiest UK airport outside London 89.242.197.200 (talk) 17:21, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Based on the citation, I presume the original author intended to use population as a measure of "majorness". If following that vein, Edinburgh, Leeds, and Cardiff would have to be listed before Manchester, but clearly that would unnecessarily bloat the lead. Of course, we could devise some alternative standard of deciding which cities to include, but is this really that important? Liu1126 (talk) 20:35, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: This goes back to the old problem of how to define a "city" - in Britain (and elsewhere) administrative boundaries rarely coincide with contiguously built-up urban areas. The cited source seems to use a strange (and unexplained) definition - the population figure for Manchester is much lower than that in any other definition I have seen.  Outside London, most would consider the largest or most important British cities to include Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and Glasgow - see this source for instance - with places like Liverpool, Sheffield, Newcastle, Leicester, Bristol, Cardiff and Edinburgh at the next tier.  But, definitions will vary.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 21:00, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: The novel source should be removed from the lead, and the lead should follow the body. Currently, the body text does not bother with cities, with the only coverage being a template. That said, the template in question looks at urban areas and lists Manchester as second. CMD (talk) 01:04, 22 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with CMD. But if we are to get into a decision about which places might merit a mention, in my opinion we should do it based on notability not population - i.e. which cities are more prominently / more frequently mentioned by reliable sources? That gets us away from the whole boundaries/population thing (but potentially opens a different can of worms). WaggersTALK 09:17, 22 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that one problem is that, given that we mention Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast as capitals, it would seem a little odd not to mention some of the other cities that are larger and in many respects more significant internationally.  Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow stand out for me.  But, they should be mentioned in the main text as well, and they need to be included based on defensible criteria and reliable sources.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 09:03, 23 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 21 April 2024 

message: "The Bank of England is the UK's central bank and is responsible for issuing notes and coins in the pound sterling." 
BoE are responsible for issuing notes, The Royal Mint is responsible for issuing coins. 92.237.50.201 (talk) 21:07, 23 May 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Bank of England is not responsible for coins.  

message: Please update the percentages in the infobox relating to the population's racial composition according to the latest census data as seen in the infobox for Demographics of the United Kingdom.
According to the 2021 British Census, (now that Scotland has finally released its racial data), the racial composition of the U.K.'s population is as follows.
:White: 83.0%
:Asian: 8.6%
:Black: 3.7%
:Mixed: 2.7%
:Other: 2.0%
Star VV Cephei A (talk) 22:18, 23 May 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: —TechnoSquirrel69 (sigh) 22:52, 25 May 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you! Star VV Cephei A (talk) 19:59, 28 May 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Updating The Racial Composition Of The U.K.'s Population