In 1994 we, in the UK, voted in our Counties at the
European Elections for the last time. If you lived in Cornwall, for
instance, you sent an MEP from Cornwall to sit in the European Parliament. But by the next EU election in
1999 as far as the European Union is concerned, the counties had been superseded
and the country split into twelve Regions. The Provinces of Scotland, Wales
and Northern Ireland were considered by the EU to be countries and therefore
were established as one Region each, but England instead of being one country
was now nine Regions. This
meant that if you lived in Newcastle you now lived and voted in the North East
Region of the UK, not England.
This was the start of the NUTS --
Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (nomenclature d’unites
territoriales statistiques), or the division of all EU countries into areas
ostensibly for statistical purposes.
The basic countries have a two letter code --
UK, for instance -- and each Region is an NUTS1 and
has an additional letter. If
you live in the South East Region, then you reside in UKJ, while those living in
Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland reside in UKL, UKM and UKN
respectively.
Then comes the first subdivision of the Regions, or
NUTS2. While Northern Ireland
remains one NUTS2, Wales now has two and Scotland, which believed it could be an
independent country within the European Union, now consists of four NUTS2
subdivisions. The nine
regions of what was England now consist of 30 NUTS2. There is yet one more
sub-division: NUTS3. These consist of five groups of
districts in Northern Ireland, 23 Groups of unitary authorities or LECs in
Scotland, 12 groups of Unitary
Authorities or groups of districts in the nine regions of
England.
All these sub-divisions and sub-subdivisions are
numbered. So this means that
if you once lived in the Isle of Anglesey, you now live in region UK11 of the
European Union or if you once lived in the Shetlands, you now live in UKM66 of
the European Union.
Of course the United Kingdom is not the only country
to be divided in this way and there are now approximately 264 Regions (NUTS1)
covering all the countries which make up the European Union. To take one instance, currently
there are 13 such Regions in Greece. Their personnel are appointed by the Greek government and the duties of
each Region is a miniature of the duties of the central government. In 2008 the current Greek
government announced its plans (as per EU directives) to reduce the number of
Regions from 13 to five, the number
of prefectures from 52 to 16 and the number of municipalities from 1050 to
350. In the meantime came the
financial crisis and these plans were shelved but not
abandoned.
In addition, there are approximately 110 organisations
known as Euroregions or inter-regions which cross national borders and belong to
the Association of European Border Regions. These are said to be for
cross-border co-operation in various fields including the promotion of trade
links, cultural ties, transport policies, tourism, education and spatial
development. However, the
term ‘Euroregion’ does not always clearly show the differences in aims and
objectives, if they exist at all, compared with other trans-frontier structures
which are given different names such as Euregios, Border Regions or Working
Communities. Many of the newly established Euroregions
in the central and eastern European countries seem to be in fact, simply
communities of interest which are forums for informal trans-frontier information
and consultation. Moreover, the legal frameworks within
which the Euroregions operate exhibit such a wide variety of forms that it is
difficult to clearly associate one particular legal framework with the term
‘Euroregion’.
The first inter-region, called ‘Euregio’ which took in
parts of Germany and the Netherlands, was created by Germany in 1958 to ensure,
it stated, that national borders should not be a barrier to the integration of
Europe. Although several of
these date back to the 1960s, it was the 1990s which saw the largest increase in
cross-border regions all over Europe. In fact today there are virtually
no local or regional authorities in border areas which are not somehow involved
in inter-regional co-operation initiatives.
Nor
do these inter-regions stop at the borders of the current European Union. Turkey, which has yet to be formally accepted as a
member of the EU, nevertheless has extensive inter-regional programmes linking
it with Greece. Switzerland with
its substantial banking sector and Norway with its huge resources of oil, are
both particular targets in spite of the fact that they, too, are currently
outside the EU. For instance,
the Nordic Council, which comprises Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark, gets EU
grants for all of its eight Euroregions and the EU says that it is necessary to
include Switzerland so as to integrate it into European regional planning. According to the August 2009
Current Concerns, the English edition of the Swiss magazine Zeit-Fragen, largely
unknown to the Swiss population (and certainly not voted for by them), this most
democratic of countries is being split into three huge Metropolitan Areas --
Zurich, Geneva and Basel
-- ready to act as ‘European
Motors’ and to play leading roles in Europe in a number of respects such as
economic performance, decision-making, etc.
But of particular interest to us here in Britain is the
fact that three of these Euroregions cross our borders: the Arc Manche, the Atlantic Region and
the North Sea Region.
The Arc Manche was originally set up in
1966. It currently includes
the French areas of Brittany, Nord-pas de Calais, Lower Normandy, Upper Normandy
and Picardy together with the English counties of Dorset, Hampshire, the Isle of
Wight, Kent, and West and East Sussex.
It has created its own forums for conferences, etc. and on
12th October 2005, members of Arc Manche met in Brighton to create
the Channel Arc Manche Assembly.
Inter-regional Assemblies, where they exist, usually consist of regional
heads of governments, commissions of executive officers, general secretariats
and standing commissions on a wide range of issues. These officials are not
elected by the general public.
At
the first meeting of the Arc Manche Assembly, Alain Le Vern from the Upper
Normandy region, was appointed President and Brad Watson, from the West Sussex
County Council, was appointed Vice President.
The North Sea Region was created in 2007 and links
areas of six countries bordering the North Sea: Norway (which is outside of the
EU), Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands and the whole
eastern side of the UK.
The Atlantic Region, which was possibly created in
2008, takes in the west of Scotland, Wales, Cornwall and Devon, Northern Ireland
and Eire, plus parts of south-western France, Spain and
Portugal.
There seems to be no information yet about Assemblies
for the North Sea or Atlantic Euroregions but it is certain that none of the
three will be based in the United Kingdom. The Arc Manche Region will be run
from France, the Atlantic Region from Portugal and the North Sea Region from
Denmark. All three now have
legal status and receive large grants from the central funds of the EU (which,
of course, includes British taxpayers’ money). Between 2007 and 2013, the Arc
Manche Region will receive an annual budget of £261 million, the Atlantic Region
£127 million and the North Sea Region £219 million.
In other words, the EU is busy knitting the
various nations so tightly together, destroying both local and national loyalty,
that it will be difficult to unpick them and retrieve our countries should we
ever wish to leave the European Union.
And that’s the idea."
