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The UK does not de jure have an official language but the predominant spoken language is English, a West Germanic language descended from Old English which features a large number of borrowings from Old Norse, Norman French and Latin. Largely because of the British Empire, the English language has spread across the world, and become the international language of business as well as the most widely taught second language.(146) Scots, a language descended from early northern Middle English, is recognised at European level.(147) There are also four Celtic languages in use in the UK: Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Cornish. In the 2001 Census over a fifth (21%) of the population of Wales said they could speak Welsh,(148) an increase from the 1991 Census (18%).(149) In addition, it is estimated that about 200,000 Welsh speakers live in England.(150) The 2001 census in Northern Ireland showed that 167,487 (10.4%) people "had some knowledge of Irish" (see Irish language in Northern Ireland), almost exclusively in the Catholic/nationalist population. Over 92,000 people in Scotland (just under 2% of the population) had some Gaelic language ability, including 72% of those living in the Outer Hebrides.(151) The number of schoolchildren being taught in Welsh, Gaelic and Irish is increasing.(152) Welsh and Scottish Gaelic are also spoken by small groups around the globe with some Gaelic still spoken in Nova Scotia, Canada, and Welsh in Patagonia, Argentina.Across the United Kingdom, it is generally compulsory for pupils to study a second language to some extent: up to the age of 14 in England,(153) and up to age 16 in Scotland. French and German are the two most commonly taught second languages in England and Scotland. In Wales, all pupils up to age 16 are either taught in Welsh or taught Welsh as a second language.(154)

Religion

{{bar box|title=Religion in the United Kingdom, 2001(155)|titlebar=#ddd|left1=Religion|right1=Percent|float=left|bars={{bar percent|Christianity|blue|71.8}}{{bar percent|None|gray|15.1}}{{bar percent|Not stated|black|7.8}}{{bar percent|Islam|#009000|2.8}}{{bar percent|Hinduism|#FF4500|1.0}}{{bar percent|Sikhism|#FFDF00|0.6}}{{bar percent|Judaism|#0047AB|0.5}}{{bar percent|Buddhism|#013220|0.3}}}}The Treaty of Union that led to the formation of the United Kingdom ensured that there would be a Protestant succession as well as a link between church and state that still remains. Christianity is the largest religion, followed by Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism and then Judaism in terms of number of adherents. In the 2001 Census 71.6% of respondents said that Christianity was their religion,(156) although surveys that employ a "harder" question tend to find lower proportions, such as the 2007 Tearfund Survey which revealed that 53% identified themselves as Christian(157) and the 2007 British Social Attitudes Survey, which found that it was almost 47.5%.(158) However, the Tearfund survey showed only one in ten Britons actually attend church weekly.(159) The 2007 British Social Attitudes Survey, which covers England, Wales and Scotland, but not Northern Ireland, indicated that 20.87% were part of the Church of England, 10.25% non-denominational Christian, 9.01% Roman Catholic, 2.81% Presbyterian/Church of Scotland, 1.88% Methodist, 0.88% Baptist, other Protestant 1.29, URC/Congregational 0.32%, 0.08% Free Presbyterian, Brethren 0.05% and 0.37% other Christian. Among other religions, 3.30% were Muslim, 1.37% Hindu, 0.43% Jewish, 0.37% Sikh and others 0.35%. A large proportion had no religion at 45.67%. 0.50% did not answer or N/A.(160) There is a disparity between the figures for those identifying themselves with a particular religion and for those proclaiming a belief in a God: a Eurobarometer poll conducted in 2005 showed that 38% of the respondents believed that "there is a God", 40% believed that "there is some sort of spirit or life force" and 20% said "I don't believe there is any sort of spirit, God or life force"(161)

Christianity

The largest religious group in England is Christianity, with the Church of England (Anglican) the Established Church:(162) the church retains a representation in the UK Parliament and the British monarch is a member of the church (required under Article 2 of the Treaty of Union) as well as its Supreme Governor. The Church of England also retains the right to draft legislative measures (related to religious administration) through the General Synod that can then be passed into law by Parliament. The Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales is the second largest Christian church with around five million members, mainly in England.(163) There are also growing Orthodox, Evangelical and Pentecostal churches, with Pentecostal churches in England now third after the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church in terms of church attendance.(164) Among the Pentecostal churches are Elim Pentecostal Church and Assemblies of God in the United Kingdom. Other Christian groups include The Salvation Army, United Reformed Church, Assemblies of God, Plymouth Brethren, Baptist Union, Methodists, Congregationalists, Newfrontiers and house churches.The largest religious group in Scotland is also Christianity, though the presbyterian Church of Scotland (known informally as The Kirk), is recognised as the national church. It is not subject to state control and the British monarch is an ordinary member, required to swear an oath to "defend the security" of the church upon his or her accession. The Roman Catholic Church in Scotland is Scotland's second largest Christian church, representing a sixth of the population.(165) The Scottish Episcopal Church, which is part of the Anglican Communion, dates from the final establishment of Presbyterianism in Scotland in 1690, when it split from the Church of Scotland and is not a 'daughter church' of the Church of England. Further splits in the Church of Scotland, especially in the nineteenth century, led to the creation of various other Presbyterian churches in Scotland, including the Free Church of Scotland.In the 1920s, the Church in Wales became independent from the Church of England and became 'disestablished' but remains in the Anglican Communion. Baptist Union of Wales, Methodism and the Presbyterian Church of Wales are present in Wales as well.The main religious groups in Northern Ireland are organised on an all-Ireland basis. Though Protestants and Anglicans are in the overall majority,(166) the Roman Catholic Church of Ireland is the largest single church. The Presbyterian Church in Ireland, closely linked to the Church of Scotland in terms of theology and history, is the second largest church followed by the Church of Ireland (Anglican) which was disestablished in the nineteenth century.Between 2004 and 2008, the Office for National Statistics reported that the number of Christians in Great Britain (rather than the UK as a whole) fell by more than 2 million.(167) The single largest age-cohort in the Christian population is in those over 70 years of age.(168) forming 3% of the population. Muslims in Scotland numbered 42,557 representing 0.84% of the population.(169) There were a further 1,943 Muslims in Northern Ireland.(170) The biggest groups of Muslims are of Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Indian origin. According to a Labour Force Survey estimate, the total number of Muslims in Great Britain in 2008 was 2,422,000, around 4% of the total population.(171) One non-governmental organisation estimates that there are 800,000 Hindus in the UK.(172) Leicester houses one of the world's few Jain temples that are outside of India.(173)According to the 2001 census there are approximately 270,000 Jews in Britain.(174)

Economy

The United Kingdom's economy is made up (in descending order of size) of the economies of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Based on market exchange rates, the UK is today the sixth largest economy in the world and the third largest in Europe after Germany and France.(176)The Industrial Revolution started in the UK with an initial concentration on heavy industries such as shipbuilding, coal mining, steel production, and textiles. The empire created an overseas market for British products, allowing the UK to dominate international trade in the 19th century. However, as other nations industrialised, coupled with economic decline after two world wars, the United Kingdom began to lose its competitive advantage and heavy industry declined, by degrees, throughout the 20th century. Manufacturing remains a significant part of the economy, but accounted for only one-sixth of national output in 2003.(177) UK must also import 40% of its food suplies.(178) The British motor industry is a significant part of this sector, although it has diminished with the collapse of the MG Rover Group and most of the industry is foreign owned. Civil and defence aircraft production is led by the second largest defence contractor in the world, BAE Systems,(179) and the continental European firm EADS, the owner of Airbus. Rolls-Royce holds a major share of the global aerospace engines market. The chemical and pharmaceutical industry is strong in the UK, with the world's second and sixth largest pharmaceutical firms (GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca, respectively)(180) being based in the UK.The UK service sector, however, has grown substantially, and now makes up about 73% of GDP.(181) The service sector is dominated by financial services, especially in banking and insurance. London is the world's largest financial centre with the London Stock Exchange, the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange, and the Lloyd's of London insurance market all based in the City of London. London is a major centre for international business and commerce and is the leader of the three "command centres" for the global economy (along with New York City and Tokyo).(182) It has the largest concentration of foreign bank branches in the world. In the past decade, a rival financial centre in London has grown in the Docklands area, with the HSBC, the world's largest bank,(183)(184) and Barclays Bank relocating their head offices there. Many multinational companies that are not primarily UK-based have chosen to site their European or rest-of-world headquarters in London: an example is the US financial services firm Citigroup. The Scottish capital, Edinburgh, has one of the large financial centres of Europe(185) and is the headquarters of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, one of the world's largest banks. Tourism is very important to the British economy. With over 27 million tourists arriving in 2004, the United Kingdom is ranked as the sixth major tourist destination in the world.(186) London, by a considerable margin, is the most visited city in the world with 15.6 million visitors in 2006, ahead of 2nd placed Bangkok (10.4 million visitors) and 3rd placed Paris (9.7 million).(187)The creative industries accounted for 7% GVA in 2005 and grew at an average of 6% per annum between 1997 and 2005.(188)The UK has a small coal reserve along with significant, yet continuously declining(189) natural gas and oil reserves. Over 400 million tonnes of proven coal reserves have been identified in the UK.(190) In 2004, total UK coal consumption (including imports) was 61 million tonnes,(191) allowing the UK to be self sufficient in coal for just over 6.5 years, although at present extraction rates it would take 20 years to mine.(192) Based on current UK coal consumption, these volumes represent reserves that could last the UK between 200 and 400 years.(193)Government involvement throughout the economy is exercised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer (currently Alistair Darling) who heads HM Treasury, but the Prime Minister (currently The Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP), is First Lord of the Treasury; the Chancellor of the Exchequer is the Second Lord of the Treasury. In recent years, the UK economy has been managed in accordance with principles of market liberalisation and low taxation and regulation. Since 1997, the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee, headed by the Governor of the Bank of England, has been responsible for setting interest rates at the level necessary to achieve the overall inflation target for the economy that is set by the Chancellor each year.(194) The Scottish Government, subject to the approval of the Scottish Parliament, has the power to vary the basic rate of income tax payable in Scotland by plus or minus 3 pence in the pound, though this power has not yet been exercised.In July 2007, the UK had government debt at 35.5% of GDP.(195) This figure rose to 56.8% of GDP by July 2009.(196) The currency of the UK is the pound sterling, represented by the symbol £. The Bank of England is the central bank, responsible for issuing currency. Banks in Scotland and Northern Ireland retain the right to issue their own notes, subject to retaining enough Bank of England notes in reserve to cover the issue. Pound sterling is also used as a reserve currency by other governments and institutions, and is the third-largest after the U.S. dollar and the euro.(197) The UK chose not to join the euro at the currency's launch, and the British Prime Minister, The Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, has ruled out membership for the foreseeable future, saying that the decision not to join had been right for Britain and for Europe.(198) The government of former Prime Minister Tony Blair had pledged to hold a public referendum for deciding membership should "five economic tests" be met. In 2005, more than half (55%) of the UK were against adopting the currency, while 30% were in favour.(199)On 23 January 2009, Government figures from the Office for National Statistics showed that the UK was officially in recession for the first time since 1991.(200) It entered a recession in the final quarter of 2008, accompanied by rising unemployment which increased from 5.2% in May 2008 to 7.6% in May 2009. The unemployment rate among 18 to 24-year-olds has risen from 11.9% to 17.3%.(201)The poverty line in the UK is commonly defined as being 60% of the median household income.(202) In 2007-2008, 13.5 million people, or 22% of the population, lived below this line. This is a higher level of relative poverty than all but four other EU members.(203) In the same year, 4.0 million children, 31% of the total, lived in households below the poverty line, after housing costs were taken into account. This is a decrease of 400,000 children since 1998-1999.(204)

Education

Education in the United Kingdom is a devolved matter, with each country having a separate education system.Education in England is the responsibility of the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families and the Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills, though the day to day administration and funding of state schools is the responsibility of Local Authorities (previously named Local Education Authorities).(205) Universal state education in England and Wales was introduced for primary level in 1870 and secondary level in 1900.(206) Education is mandatory from ages five to sixteen (15 if born in late July or August). The majority of children are educated in state-sector schools, only a small proportion of which select on the grounds of academic ability. State schools which are allowed to select pupils according to intelligence and academic ability can achieve comparable results to the most selective private schools: out of the top ten performing schools in terms of GCSE results in 2006 two were state-run grammar schools. Despite a fall in actual numbers, the proportion of children in England attending private schools has risen to over 7%.(207) However over half of students at the leading universities of Cambridge and Oxford had attended state schools.(208) England has some of the top universities in the world; University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, Imperial College London and University College London are ranked in the global top 10 in the 2008 THE–QS World University Rankings.(209) Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) rated pupils in England 7th in the world for Maths, and 6th for Science. The results put England's pupils ahead of other European countries, including Germany and Scandinavian countries.(210)File:QUB.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Queen's University, BelfastQueen's University, BelfastEducation in Scotland is the responsibility of the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, with day to day administration and funding of state schools the responsibility of Local Authorities. Two non-departmental public bodies have key roles in Scottish education: the Scottish Qualifications Authority is responsible for the development, accreditation, assessment and certification of qualifications other than degrees which are delivered at secondary schools, post-secondary colleges of further education and other centres;(212) and Learning and Teaching Scotland provides advice, resources and staff development to the education community to promote curriculum development and create a culture of innovation, ambition and excellence.(213) Scotland first legislated for compulsory education in 1496.(214) The proportion of children in Scotland attending private schools is just over 4%, although it has been rising slowly in recent years.(215) Scottish students who attend Scottish universities pay neither tuition fees nor graduate endowment charges as the fees were abolished in 2001 and the graduate endowment scheme was abolished in 2008.(216)Education in Northern Ireland is the responsibility of the Minister of Education and the Minister for Employment and Learning, although responsibility at a local level is administered by five education and library boards, covering different geographical areas. The 'Council for the Curriculum, Examinations & Assessment (CCEA) is the body responsible for advising the government on what should be taught in Northern Ireland's schools, monitoring standards and awarding qualifications.(217) The National Assembly for Wales has responsibility for education in Wales. A significant number of Welsh students are taught either wholly or largely in the Welsh language; lessons in Welsh are compulsory for all until the age of 16.(218) There are plans to increase the provision of Welsh Medium schools as part of the policy of having a fully bilingual Wales.

Healthcare

Healthcare in the United Kingdom is a devolved matter and England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales each has its own system of private and publicly funded healthcare, together with alternative, holistic and complementary treatments. Public healthcare is provided to all UK permanent residents and is free at the point of need being paid for from general taxation. Taken together, the World Health Organisation, in 2000, ranked the provision of healthcare in the United Kingdom as fifteenth best in Europe and eighteenth in the world.(219)(220) Regulatory bodies are organised on a UK-wide basis such as the General Medical Council, the Nursing and Midwifery Council and non-governmental-based, such as Royal Colleges. However, political and operational responsibility for healthcare lies with four national executives; healthcare in England is the responsibility of Her Majesty's Government; healthcare in Northern Ireland is the responsibility of the Northern Ireland Executive; healthcare in Scotland is the responsibility of the Scottish Government; and healthcare in Wales is the responsibility of the Welsh Assembly Government. Each National Health Service has different policies and priorities, resulting in contrasts.(221)(222) Across the UK, there are medical schools and dental schools, and provisions for training nurses and professions allied to medicine.{{Citation needed|date=October 2009}}Since 1979, expenditure on healthcare has been increased significantly to bring it closer to the European Union average.(223) The UK spends around 8.4 per cent of its gross domestic product on healthcare, which is 0.5 per cent below the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development average and about one per cent below the average of the European Union.(224)

Transport

The Highways Agency is the executive agency responsible for trunk roads and motorways in England apart from the privately owned and operated M6 Toll.(227) The Department for Transport states that traffic congestion is one of the most serious transport problems and that it could cost England an extra £22 billion in wasted time by 2025 if left unchecked.(228) According to the government-sponsored Eddington report of 2006, congestion is in danger of harming the economy, unless tackled by road pricing and expansion of the transport network.(229)(230)The Scottish transport network is the responsibility of the Scottish Government's Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning Department with Transport Scotland being the Executive Agency that is accountable to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth for Scotland's trunk roads and rail networks.(231) Scotland's rail network has around 340 railway stations and 3,000 kilometres of track with over 62 million passenger journeys made each year.(232) In 2008, The Scottish Government set out investment plans for the next 20 years, with priorities to include a new Forth Road Bridge and electrification of the rail network.(233) Across the UK, there is a radial road network of {{convert|46904|km|mi|0}} of main roads with a motorway network of {{convert|3497|km|mi|0}}. There are a further {{convert|213750|km|mi|0}} of paved roads. The rail network of 16,116 km (10,072 miles) in Great Britain and 303 route km (189 route mi) in Northern Ireland carries over 18,000 passenger trains and 1,000 freight trains daily. Urban rail networks are well developed in London and other cities. There was once over 48,000 route km (30,000 route mi) of rail network in the UK, however most of this was reduced over a time period from 1955 to 1975, much of it after a report by a government advisor Richard Beeching in the mid 1960s (known as the Beeching Axe). Plans are now being considered to build new high speed lines by 2025.(234)London Heathrow Airport, located 15 miles (24 km) west of the capital, is the UK's busiest airport and has the most international passenger traffic of any airport in the world.(235)

Sport

Major sports including association football, rugby football, boxing, badminton, cricket, tennis and golf originated, or were substantially developed, in the United Kingdom and the states that preceded it. A 2006 poll found that football is the most popular sport in the United Kingdom.(236)In international competitions, separate teams represent England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland in most team sports, as well as at the Commonwealth Games. (In sporting contexts, these teams can be referred to collectively as the Home Nations.) However, there are occasions where a single sports team represents the United Kingdom, including at the Olympics where the UK is represented by the Great Britain team.

Cricket

Cricket is claimed to have been invented in England (though recent research suggests it was actually invented in Belgium)(237) and the England cricket team, controlled by the England and Wales Cricket Board,(238) is the only national team in the UK with Test status. Team members are drawn from the main county sides, and include both English and Welsh players. Cricket is distinct from football and rugby where Wales and England field separate national teams, although Wales had fielded its own team in the past. Irish and Scottish players have played for England because neither Scotland nor Ireland have Test status and have only recently started to play in One Day Internationals. Scotland, England (and Wales), and Ireland (including Northern Ireland) have competed at the Cricket World Cup, with England reaching the Final three times. There is a professional league championship in which clubs representing 17 English counties and 1 Welsh county compete.

Football

Each of the Home Nations has its own football association, national team and league system, though a few clubs play outside their country's respective systems for a variety of historical and logistical reasons.England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland compete as separate countries in international competition and, as a consequence, the UK does not compete as a single team in football events at the Olympic Games. There are proposals to have a UK team take part in the 2012 Summer Olympics but the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish football associations have declined to participate, fearing that it would undermine their independent status—a fear confirmed by FIFA president Sepp Blatter.(240) England has been the most successful of the home nations, winning the World Cup on home soil in 1966, although there has historically been a close-fought rivalry between England and Scotland.The English football league system includes hundreds of inter-linked leagues, consisting of thousands of clubs. The Premiership at the top, is the most-watched football league in the world(241) and is particularly popular in Asia.(242) Below this, The Football League has three divisions and then the Football Conference has a national division and two feeder regional leagues. Thereafter the structure becomes increasing regional. English teams have been successful in European Competitions including some who have become European Cup/UEFA Champions League winners: Liverpool (five times), Manchester United (three times), Nottingham Forest (twice) and Aston Villa. More clubs from England have won the European Cup than any other country (four compared to three from Italy, Germany and the Netherlands). Moreover, England ranks second in the all time list of European club trophies won with 35, one behind Italy's 36. The European Cup competition itself came about as the result of the success of another English club, Wolverhampton Wanderers, against top European sides(243) in the 1950s. The 90,000-capacity Wembley Stadium is England's principal sporting stadium. The Scottish football league system has two national leagues: the Scottish Premier League, the top division, and the Scottish Football League, which has three divisions. Below this, but not connected to the national leagues, are three regional leagues; the Highland Football League, the East of Scotland Football League and the South of Scotland Football League. One English club, Berwick Rangers, plays in the Scottish system. Scotland is home to two world-renowned football clubs in the Old Firm of Celtic and Rangers. Scottish teams that have been successful in European Competitions include Celtic (European Cup in 1967), Rangers (European Cup Winners' Cup in 1972) and Aberdeen (European Cup Winners' Cup and European Super Cup in 1983). Celtic were the first British club to win the European Cup. Hampden Park is the principal stadium and home of the Scottish FA.The Welsh football league system includes the Welsh Premier League and regional leagues. Welsh Premiership club The New Saints play their home matches on the English side of the border in Oswestry. The Welsh clubs of Cardiff City F.C., Colwyn Bay F.C., Merthyr Tydfil F.C., Newport County A.F.C., Swansea City A.F.C. and Wrexham F.C. play in the English system. Cardiff's 76,250 seater Millennium Stadium is the principal sporting stadium of Wales.The Northern Ireland football league system includes the IFA Premiership. One Northern Irish club, Derry City, plays its football outside of the UK in the Republic of Ireland football league system. Windsor Park, Linfield F.C.'s 20,332-seater stadium, is also the home stadium of the national team.

Rugby league

Rugby league is played as a developing sport throughout the UK, but in Northern England, it is the main sport in many areas, particularly in Yorkshire, Cumbria and Lancashire in towns such as Wigan and St Helens. It also has a substantial presence in London and South Wales.It originates from and is generally played in Northern England and a single 'Great Britain Lions' team had competed in the Rugby League World Cup and Test match games, but this changed slightly in 2008 when England, Scotland and Ireland competed as separate nations.(244)Great Britain is still being retained as the full national team for Ashes tours against, Australia, New Zealand and France.In 2013, The United Kingdom will host the Rugby League World Cup for the 5th time.(245)

Rugby union

Rugby union is organised on a separate basis for England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland with each having a league system and a top ranked international team.Rugby union is played as a minority sport throughout the UK, but has a number of heartlands, notably South Wales, the Scottish Borders, the English West Country and so on. It also has a substantial presence in Northern Ireland (RU is organised on an all-Ireland basis), Edinburgh, London, Leicester etc.While England has won the Rugby World Cup, in 2003, Wales has achieved a best of third place and Scotland a best of fourth place. Ireland has not progressed beyond the quarter finals.In 2015, England will host the Rugby World Cup for the second time.(246)

Other sports

Snooker is also one of the UK's sporting exports. The world championships are held annually in Sheffield while the sport continues to expand worldwide, with huge growth in China.The game of tennis first originated from the city of Birmingham between 1859 and 1865. The Championships, Wimbledon are international tennis events held in Wimbledon in south London every summer and are regarded as the most prestigious event of the global tennis calendar.Thoroughbred racing, which originated under Charles II of England as the "sport of kings", is popular throughout the UK with world-famous races including the Grand National, the Epsom Derby and Royal Ascot. The town of Newmarket is considered the centre of English racing, largely because of the famous Newmarket Racecourse.The UK has proved successful in the international sporting arena in rowing. It is widely considered that the sport's most successful rower is Steve Redgrave who won five gold medals and one bronze medal at five consecutive Olympic Games, as well as numerous wins at the World Rowing Championships and Henley Royal Regatta. Golf is the sixth most popular sport, by participation, in the UK. Although The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, in Scotland, is the sport's home course,(247) the world's oldest golf course is actually Musselburgh Links' Old Golf Course.(248) Shinty (or camanachd) is popular in the Scottish Highlands, sometimes attracting crowds numbering thousands in the most sparsely populated region of the UK, especially to watch the final of its premier tournament, the Camanachd Cup.(249)In Northern Ireland, Gaelic football and hurling are popular team sports, both in terms of participation and spectating. Irish expatriates throughout the UK also play them.The UK is closely associated with motorsport. Many teams and drivers in Formula One (F1) are based in the UK and drivers from Britain have won more world titles than any other country. The country hosts legs of the F1 and World Rally Championship and has its own touring car racing championship, the British Touring Car Championship (BTCC). The British Grand Prix takes place at Silverstone each July.

Culture

{{Refimprove|section|date=July 2008}}The culture of the United Kingdom—British culture— may be described as informed by its history as a developed island country, major power, and also as a political union of four countries, with each preserving elements of distinctive traditions, customs and symbolism. As a result of the British Empire, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies such as Canada, Australia, India, and the United States.

Cinema

The United Kingdom has been influential in the development of cinema, with the Ealing Studios claiming to be the oldest studios in the world. Despite a history of important and successful productions, the industry is characterised by an ongoing debate about its identity, and the influences of American and European cinema. Particularly between British and American film, many films are often co-produced or share actors with many British actors now featuring regularly in Hollywood films. The BFI Top 100 British films is a poll conducted by the British Film Institute which ranks what they consider to be the 100 greatest British films of all time.

Literature

'British literature' refers to literature associated with the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands as well as to literature from England, Wales and Scotland prior to the formation of the United Kingdom. Most British literature is in the English language. The UK publishes some 206,000 books each year, making it the largest publisher of books in the world.(250) The English playwright and poet William Shakespeare is widely regarded as the greatest dramatist of all time.(251)(252)(253) Among the earliest English writers are Geoffrey Chaucer (14th century), Thomas Malory (15th century), Sir Thomas More (16th century), and John Milton (17th century). In the 18th century, Samuel Richardson is often credited with inventing the modern novel. In the 19th century, there followed further innovation by Jane Austen, the gothic novelist Mary Shelley, children's writer Lewis Carroll, the Brontë sisters, the social campaigner Charles Dickens, the naturalist Thomas Hardy, the visionary poet William Blake and romantic poet William Wordsworth. Twentieth century writers include the science fiction novelist H. G. Wells, writers of children's classics Rudyard Kipling, A. A. Milne, the controversial D. H. Lawrence, the modernist Virginia Woolf, the satirist Evelyn Waugh, the prophetic novelist George Orwell, the popular novelist Graham Greene, crime novelist Agatha Christie, and the poets Ted Hughes and John Betjeman. Most recently, the children's fantasy Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling has recalled the popularity of J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis. Scotland's contribution includes the detective writer Arthur Conan Doyle, romantic literature by Sir Walter Scott, children's writer J. M. Barrie and the epic adventures of Robert Louis Stevenson. It has also produced the celebrated poet Robert Burns, as well as William McGonagall, regarded by many as one of the world's worst.(254) More recently, the modernist and nationalist Hugh MacDiarmid and Neil M. Gunn contributed to the Scottish Renaissance. A more grim outlook is found in Ian Rankin's stories and the psychological horror-comedy of Iain Banks. Scotland's capital, Edinburgh, is UNESCO's first worldwide City of Literature.(255)File:Dickens by Watkins detail.jpg|thumb|left|upright|A photograph of Victorian era novelist Charles DickensCharles DickensThe oldest known poem from the area now known as Scotland, Y Gododdin, was composed in Cumbric or Old Welsh in the late sixth century and contains the earliest known reference to King Arthur. A great role in the development of Arthurian legend, and early development of British history, was played by Geoffrey of Monmouth. The greatest Welsh poet of all time is generally held to be Dafydd ap Gwilym. Owing to the dominance of the Welsh language in Wales until the late nineteenth century, the majority of Welsh literature was in Welsh, and much of the prose was religious in character; Daniel Owen is credited as the first Welsh-language novelist, publishing Rhys Lewis in 1885. In the twentieth century, the poets R. S. Thomas and Dylan Thomas became well known for their English-language poetry, Richard Llewellyn and children's works by Roald Dahl. Modern writers in Welsh include Kate Roberts.Authors from other nationalities, particularly from Ireland, or from Commonwealth countries, have lived and worked in the UK. Significant examples through the centuries include Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker, George Bernard Shaw, Joseph Conrad, T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound, and more recently British authors born abroad such as Kazuo Ishiguro and Sir Salman Rushdie.In theatre, Shakespeare's contemporaries Christopher Marlowe and Ben Jonson added depth. More recently Alan Ayckbourn, Harold Pinter, Michael Frayn, Tom Stoppard and David Edgar have combined elements of surrealism, realism and radicalism.

Media

The prominence of the English language gives the UK media a widespread international dimension.

Broadcasting

There are five major nationwide television channels in the UK: BBC One, BBC Two, ITV, Channel 4 and Five—currently transmitted by analogue terrestrial, free-to-air signals with the latter three channels funded by commercial advertising. In Wales, S4C the Welsh Fourth Channel replaces Channel 4, carrying Welsh language programmes at peak times. It also transmits Channel 4 programmes at other times.The BBC is the UK's publicly funded radio, television and internet broadcasting corporation, and is the oldest and largest broadcaster in the world. It operates several television channels and radio stations in both the UK and abroad. The BBC's international television news service, BBC World News, is broadcast throughout the world and the BBC World Service radio network is broadcast in thirty-three languages globally, as well as services in Welsh on BBC Radio Cymru and programmes in Gaelic on BBC Radio nan Gàidheal in Scotland and Irish in Northern Ireland.The domestic services of the BBC are funded by the television licence. The international targeted BBC World Service Radio is funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the international television broadcast services are operated by BBC Worldwide on a commercial subscription basis over cable and satellite services. It is this commercial arm of the BBC that forms half of UKTV along with Virgin Media. The UK now has a large number of digital terrestrial channels including a further six from the BBC, five from ITV and three from Channel 4, and one from S4C which is solely in Welsh, among a variety of others.The vast majority of digital cable television services are provided by Virgin Media with satellite television available from Freesat or British Sky Broadcasting and free-to-air digital terrestrial television by Freeview. The entire UK will switch to digital by 2012.Radio in the UK is dominated by BBC Radio, which operates ten national networks and over forty local radio stations. The most popular radio station, by number of listeners, is BBC Radio 2, closely followed by BBC Radio 1. There are hundreds of mainly local commercial radio stations across the country offering a variety of music or talk formats.

Internet

The Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the United Kingdom is .uk. The most popular ".uk" website is the British version of Google, followed by online BBC.(257)

Print

Traditionally, British newspapers could be split into quality, serious-minded newspaper (usually referred to as "broadsheets" because of their large size) and the more populist, tabloid varieties. For convenience of reading, many traditional broadsheets have switched to a more compact-sized format, traditionally used by tabloids. The Sun has the highest circulation of any daily newspaper in the UK: 3.1 million, approximately a quarter of the market.(258) Its sister paper, the News of the World has the highest circulation in the Sunday newspaper market, and traditionally focuses on celebrity-led stories.(259) The Daily Telegraph, a centre-right broadsheet paper, is the highest-selling of the "quality" newspapers.(260)Aside from newspapers, British magazines and journals have achieved worldwide circulation including The Economist and Nature.Scotland has a distinct tradition of newspaper readership (see list of newspapers in Scotland). The tabloid Daily Record has the highest circulation of any daily newspaper outselling The Scottish Sun by four to one while its sister paper, the Sunday Mail similarly leads the Sunday newspaper market. The leading "quality" daily newspaper in Scotland is The Herald, though it is the sister paper of The Scotsman, the Scotland on Sunday, that leads in the Sunday newspaper market.(261)

Music

{{See also|British rock}} Various styles of music are popular in the UK, from the indigenous folk music of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, to heavy metal.Notable composers of classical music from the United Kingdom and the countries that preceded it include William Byrd, Henry Purcell, Sir Edward Elgar, Gustav Holst, Sir Arthur Sullivan (most famous for working with librettist Sir W. S. Gilbert), Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Benjamin Britten, pioneer of modern British opera. Sir Peter Maxwell Davies is one of the foremost living composers and current Master of the Queen's Music. The UK is also home to world-renowned symphonic orchestras and choruses such as the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the London Symphony Chorus. Notable conductors include Sir Simon Rattle, John Barbirolli and Sir Malcolm Sargent. Some of the notable film score composers include John Barry, Clint Mansell, Mike Oldfield, John Powell, Craig Armstrong, David Arnold, John Murphy, Monty Norman and Harry Gregson-Williams. George Frideric Handel, although born German, was a naturalised British citizen(265) and some of his best works, such as Messiah, were written in the English language.(266)Prominent British contributors to have influenced popular music over the last 50 years include The Beatles, Queen, Cliff Richard, Elton John, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and The Rolling Stones, all of whom have world wide record sales of 200 million or more.(267)(268)(269)(270)(271)(272)(273) The Beatles have international record sales of more than one billion.(274)A number of UK cities are known for their music scenes. Acts from Liverpool have had more UK chart number one hit singles (54) per capita than any other city worldwide.(275) Glasgow's contribution to the music scene was recognised in 2008 when it was named a UNESCO City of Music, one of only three cities in the world to have this honour.(276)

Philosophy

The United Kingdom is famous for the tradition of "British Empiricism", a branch of the philosophy of knowledge that states that only knowledge verified by experience is valid, and "Scottish Philosophy", sometimes referred to as the ‘Scottish School of Common Sense’. The most famous philosophers of British Empiricism are John Locke, George Berkeley and David Hume, while Dugald Stewart, Thomas Reid and William Hamilton were major exponents of the Scottish “common sense” school. Britain is also notable for a theory of moral philosophy, Utilitarianism, first used by Jeremy Bentham and later by John Stuart Mill, in his short work Utilitarianism. Other eminent philosophers from the UK and the states that preceded it include Duns Scotus, John Lilburne, Mary Wollstonecraft, Sir Francis Bacon, Adam Smith, Thomas Hobbes, William of Ockham, Bertrand Russell and Alfred Jules Ayer. Foreign-born philosophers who settled in the UK include Isaiah Berlin, Karl Marx, Karl Popper, and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Science, engineering and innovation

The United Kingdom led the industrial revolution and has produced scientists and engineers credited with important advances, including;

• The laws of motion and illumination of gravity, by English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist and theologian, Sir Isaac Newton
• The unification of electromagnetism, by James Clerk Maxwell
• The discovery of hydrogen, by Henry Cavendish
• The steam locomotive, by Richard Trevithick and Andrew Vivian
• The theory of aerodynamics, by Sir George Cayley
• The world's first working television system, and colour television, by Scottish engineer and inventor John Logie Baird.(277)(278)
• The invention of the jet engine, by Frank Whittle
• Evolution by natural selection, by Charles Darwin
• The Turing machine, by Alan Turing, the basis of the modern computer
• The invention of the hovercraft, by Christopher Cockerell
• The electric motor, by Michael Faraday, who largely made electricity viable for use in technology
• First practical telephone, by Scottish inventor Alexander Graham Bell.(279)
• The structure of DNA, by Francis Crick and others
• The invention of the World Wide Web, by Tim Berners-Lee
• The first commercial electrical telegraph, co-invented by Sir William Fothergill Cooke and Charles Wheatstone.(280)(281)
• The invention of the incandescent light bulb, by Joseph Swan
• The creation of postage and modern postal service, by Sir Rowland Hill
• The discovery of penicillin, by Scottish biologist and pharmacologist, Sir Alexander Fleming.(282)

Notable civil engineering projects, whose pioneers included Isambard Kingdom Brunel, contributed to the world's first national railway transport system. Other advances pioneered in the UK include the marine chronometer, the jet engine, modern bicycle, electric lighting, steam turbine, electromagnet, stereo sound, motion picture, the screw propeller, the internal combustion engine, military radar, electronic computer, aeronautics, soda water, IVF, nursing, antiseptic surgery, vaccination, antibiotics.Scientific journals produced in the UK include Nature, the British Medical Journal and The Lancet. In 2006, it was reported that the UK provided 9 percent of the world's scientific research papers and a 12 per cent share of citations, the second highest in the world after the US.(283)

Visual art

The Royal Academy is located in London. Other major schools of art include the Slade School of Fine Art; the six-school University of the Arts London, which includes the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design and Chelsea College of Art and Design; the Glasgow School of Art, and Goldsmiths, University of London. This commercial venture is one of Britain's foremost visual arts organisations. Major British artists include Sir Joshua Reynolds, Thomas Gainsborough, John Constable, William Blake, J. M. W. Turner, William Morris, L. S. Lowry, Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud, David Hockney, Gilbert and George, Richard Hamilton, Peter Blake, Howard Hodgkin, Antony Gormley, and Anish Kapoor. During the late 1980s and 1990s, the Saatchi Gallery in London brought to public attention a group of multigenre artists who would become known as the Young British Artists. Damien Hirst, Chris Ofili, Rachel Whiteread, Tracey Emin, Mark Wallinger, Steve McQueen, Sam Taylor-Wood, and the Chapman Brothers are among the better known members of this loosely affiliated movement.

Symbols

The flag of the United Kingdom is the Union Flag. It was created by the superimposition of the Flag of England, the Flag of Scotland and Saint Patrick's Flag in 1801. Wales is not represented in the Union Flag as Wales had been conquered and annexed to England prior to the formation of the United Kingdom. However, the possibility of redesigning the Union Flag to include representation of Wales has not been completely ruled out.(284) The national anthem of the United Kingdom is "God Save the King", with "King" replaced with "Queen" in the lyrics whenever the monarch is a woman. Britannia is a national personification of the United Kingdom, originating from Roman Britain.(285) Britannia is symbolised as a young woman with brown or golden hair, wearing a Corinthian helmet and white robes. She holds Poseidon's three-pronged trident and a shield, bearing the Union Flag. Sometimes she is depicted as riding the back of a lion. At and since the height of the British Empire, Britannia has often associated with maritime dominance, as in the patriotic song Rule, Britannia!. The lion symbol is depicted behind Britannia on the British fifty pence coin and one is shown crowned on the back of the British ten pence coin. It is also used as a symbol on the non-ceremonial flag of the British Army. The bulldog is sometimes used as a symbol of the United Kingdom and has been associated with Winston Churchill's defiance of Nazi Germany.(286)

International rankings

{| class="wikitable"! Organization! Survey! Ranking| United Nations Development Programme| Human Development Index| 21 out of 182| Transparency International| Corruption Perceptions Index| 17 out of 180| World Economic Forum| Global Competitiveness Report| 13 out of 133

See also

{{United Kingdom portal}}{{clear}}

Notes

1. It is sometimes claimed by those from legislative traditions that God Save the Queen is only the de facto anthem because no law was passed making it so. In the British tradition such laws are not necessary. Proclamation and usage are sufficient to make it the official national anthem. God Save the Queen also serves as the Honors music>Royal anthem for several other countries.



2. English is established by de facto usage. In Wales, the Welsh Language Board is legally tasked with ensuring that, "in the conduct of public business and the administration of justice, the English and Welsh language>Welsh languages should be treated on a basis of equality". HTTP://WWW.OPSI.GOV.UK/ACTS/ACTS1993/UKPGA_19930038_EN_2.HTM>TITLE=WELSH LANGUAGE ACT 1993ACCESSDATE=2007-09-03, . Bòrd na Gàidhlig is tasked with "securing the status of the Scottish Gaelic language as an official language of Scotland commanding equal respect to the English language" HTTP://WWW.OPSI.GOV.UK/LEGISLATION/SCOTLAND/ACTS2005/ASP_20050007_EN_1PUBLISHER=OFFICE OF PUBLIC SECTOR INFORMATION, 2007-03-09,



3. Under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages the Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, Cornish language>Cornish, Irish language, Ulster Scots and Scots language>Scots languages are officially recognised as Regional language or Minority language>Minority languages by the United Kingdom Government (SCOTTISH EXECUTIVETITLE=EUROPEAN CHARTER FOR REGIONAL OR MINORITY LANGUAGES, 2007-08-23, ) See also Languages of the United Kingdom.



4. HTTP://WWW.STATISTICS.GOV.UK/STATBASE/EXPODATA/SPREADSHEETS/D6588.XLSPUBLISHER=OFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATISTICSWORK=UNITED KINGDOM CENSUS 2001, 2009-04-15,



5. HTTP://EPP.EUROSTAT.EC.EUROPA.EU/TGM/TABLE.DO?TAB=TABLE&LANGUAGE=EN&PCODE=TPS00001&TABLESELECTION=1&FOOTNOTES=YES&LABELING=LABELS&PLUGIN=1PUBLISHER=EUROSTAT, 2010-02-09,



6. Population Estimates at www.statistics.gov.uk



7. HTTPS://WWW.CIA.GOV/LIBRARY/PUBLICATIONS/THE-WORLD-FACTBOOK/RANKORDER/2001RANK.HTML PUBLISHER=CIA.GOV ACCESSDATE=2009-04-26,



8. GDP - per capita (PPP), The World Factbook, Central Intelligence Agency. Accessed on January 28, 2010.



9. Field listing - GDP (official exchange rate), CIA World Factbook



10. GDP (official exchange rate) & Population, The World Factbook, Central Intelligence Agency, accessed on February 4, 2010.



11. Human Development Report 2009. The United Nations. Retrieved 5 October 2009.



12. |Gini_year=2005|Gini_rank=|currency=Pound sterlingThe Euro is accepted in many payphones and some larger shops.



13. British dependencies drive on the left except for British Indian Ocean Territory>BIOT and Gibraltar.



14. ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 states that this should be Great Britain>GB and .gb was initially used by the Government, but registration has been suppressed in favour of .uk. The .eu domain is shared with other European Union member states.



15. WEB,weblink Encyclopaedia Britannica, Island country located off the north-western coast of mainland Europe, 2007-09-25,



16. WEB,weblink Countries within a country, www.number-10.gov.uk, 2007-06-13, Countries within a country,



17. WEB,weblink UK Region – Northern Ireland - UK, Ukinvest.gov.uk, 2009-07-08,



18. WEB, Published: 9:05PM BST 24 Jul 2008,weblink Border checks between Britain and Ireland proposed, Telegraph, 2008-07-24, 2009-07-08,



19. WEB,weblink The Countries of the UK, www.statistics.gov.uk, 2008-10-10,



20. WEB,weblink Key facts about the United Kingdom, 2008-06-26, Government, citizens and rights, Directgov, The full title of this country is 'the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland'. 'The UK' is made up of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. 'Great Britain' (or just 'Britain') does not include Northern Ireland. The Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are not part of the UK.,



21. WEB,weblink FCO global network, FCO in Action, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 2008-06-26,



22. Field listing - GDP (official exchange rate), CIA World Factbook



23. WEB,weblink CIA - The World Factbook - Country Comparisons - GDP (purchasing power parity), Cia.gov, 2009-04-26,



24. P. Mathias, The First Industrial Nation: the Economic History of Britain, 1700-1914 (London: Routledge, 2nd edn., 2001), ISBN 0415266726.



25. BOOK, Ferguson, Niall, 2004, Empire, The rise and demise of the British world order and the lessons for global power, Basic Books, 0465023282,



26. WEB,weblink Welcome, www.parliament.uk, dmy, 7 October 2008,



27. WEB,weblink The treaty or Act of the Union, www.scotshistoryonline.co.uk, dmy, 27 August 2008,



28. WEB,weblink Articles of Union with Scotland 1707, www.parliament.uk, dmy, 19October 2008,



29. WEB,weblink The Act of Union, Act of Union Virtual Library, 2006-05-15,



30. BOOK, Chronology of Scottish History, Geddes & Grosset, 1855343800, Ross, David, 2002, 1603: James VI becomes James I of England in the Union of the Crowns, and leaves Edinburgh for London, 56,



31. BOOK, Claiming Scotland: National Identity and Liberal Culture, Edinburgh University Press, 1902930169, Hearn, Jonathan, 2002, Inevitably, James moved his court to London, 104,



32. BOOK, Ferguson, Niall, Niall Ferguson, 2003, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order, Basic Books, 0465023282,



33. Sailing against slavery. By Jo Loosemore BBC



34. NEWS,weblink The history of BBC News: 1920s, BBC News, 29 November 2009,



35. and went on to become the world's first large-scale international broadcasting network.{{Citation needed|date=November 2009}}File:Royal Irish Rifles ration party Somme July 1916.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Black and white photo of two dozen men in military uniforms and metal helmets sitting or standing in a muddy trench.|Infantry of the Royal Irish Rifles during the Battle of the Somme. More than 885,000 British soldiers lost their lives on the battlefields of World War IWorld War IDisputes within Ireland over the terms of Irish Home Rule led eventually to the partition of the island in 1921.SR&O 1921, No. 533 of 3 May 1921



36. WEB,weblink The Anglo-Irish Treaty, 6 December 1921, CAIN, 2006-05-15,



37. "Britain to make its final payment on World War II loan from U.S.". The New York Times. December 28, 2006.



38. NEWS,weblink Modest progress but always on back foot, Times Online, 2005-12-02, 2006-05-16,



39. WEB,weblink Foreign Affairs and Europe, Conservative Party, 2008-10-17,



40. {{citation|url=http://publius.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/28/1/217|title=Reforging the Union: Devolution and Constitutional Change in the United Kingdom|accessdate=2009-02-04|journal=Publius: the Journal of Federalism|volume=28|issue=1|page=217|last=Keating|first=Michael|date=1998-01-01}}



41. WEB,weblink A Guide To the UK Legal System, Sarah, Carter, University of Kent, University of Kent at Canterbury, dmy, 16 May 2006,



42. WEB,weblink Official UK Parliament web page on parliamentary sovereignty,



43. WEB, The Government, Prime Minister and Cabinet, Public services all in one place, Directgov,weblink 12 February 2010,



44. NEWS,weblink Brown is UK's new prime minister, 27 June 2007, 23 January 2008, BBC News, BBC News, news.bbc.co.uk,



45. For elections to the House of Commons, the UK is currently divided into 646 constituencies, with 529 in England, 18 in Northern Ireland, 59 in Scotland and 40 in Wales,Westminster Parliamentary Constituencies statistics.gov.uk. Retrieved 10 October 2008.



46. However, the current five Sinn Féin MPs have since 2002 made use of the offices and other facilities available at Westminster.NEWS,weblink Sinn Fein moves into Westminster, BBC, 2002-01-21, 2008-10-17,



47. European Election: United Kingdom Result BBC News, 8 June 2009



48. NEWS,weblink Europe Wins The Power To Jail British Citizens, The Times, 2005-09-14, 2008-10-20,



49. NEWS,weblink Scots MPs attacked over fees vote, BBC News, 27 January 2004, dmy, 21 October 2008,



50. NEWS,weblink UK Politics: Talking Politics The West Lothian Question, BBC News, 1998-06-01, 2008-10-21,



51. NEWS,weblink Scotland's Parliament - powers and structures, BBC News, 1999-04-08, 2008-10-21,



52. NEWS,weblink Salmond elected as first minister, BBC News, 2007-05-16, 2008-10-21,



53. NEWS,weblink Devolution review body launched, BBC News, 2008-03-25, 2008-10-21,



54. 'Radical' Holyrood powers urged BBC News, 15 June 2009



55. NEWS,weblink Structure and powers of the Assembly, BBC News, 1999-04-09, 2008-10-21,



56. WEB,weblink What powers does the Welsh Assembly have?, Guardian, 2007-07-16, 2008-10-21,



57. WEB,weblink Devolved Government - Ministers and their departments, Northern Ireland Executive, 2008-10-17,



58. {{citation |url=http://www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=387871&resourceID=5 |author=Heritage Gateway |title=Town Hall |accessdate=2010-01-21|heritagegateway.org.uk}}



59. WEB, Manchester Town Hall,weblink Images of England, imagesofengland.org.uk, 2010-01-21,



60. WEB,weblink Ninth United Nations Conference on the standardization of Geographical Names, August, 2007, United Nations Economic and Social Council, unstats.un.org, 2008-10-21, PDF,



61. Barlow, I., Metropolitan Government, (1991)



62. WEB,weblink gos.gov.uk, 2008-07-03, Welcome to the national site of the Government Office Network,



63. WEB,weblink A short history of London government, www.london.gov.uk, 2008-10-04,



64. "The Government is now expected to tear up its twelve-year-old plan to create eight or nine regional assemblies in England to mirror devolution in Scotland and Wales."NEWS,weblink Prescott's dream in tatters as North East rejects assembly, 2008-02-15, The Times,



65. WEB,weblink Local Authority Elections, Local Government Association, 2008-10-03,



66. WEB,weblink History - City Hall, Cardiff, Cardiffcityhall.com, 2010-01-27,



67. NEWS,weblink NI local government set for shake-up, BBC, 2005-11-18, 2008-11-15,



68. WEB,weblink Foster announces the future shape of local government, NI Executive, 2008-10-20,



69. WEB,weblink Local Government elections to be aligned with review of public administration, www.nio.gov.uk, 2008-08-02,



70. WEB,weblink STV in Scotland:Local Government Elections 2007, Political Studies Association, PDF, dmy, 2 August 2008, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



71. Ethical Standards in Public Life framework: WEB, Ethical Standards in Public Life,weblink The Scottish Government, 2008-10-03,



72. WEB,weblink About COSLA, cosla.gov.uk, 2008-10-03,



73. WEB,weblink Local Authorities, Local Authorities in Wales, new.wales.gov.uk, dmy, 31 July 2008,



74. WEB,weblink Local government elections in Wales, How do I vote?, www.aboutmyvote.co.uk, dmy, 3 October 2008,



75. WEB,weblink Welsh Local Government Association, Welsh Local Government Association, 2008-03-20,



76. WEB,weblink Global Power Europe, Globalpowereurope.eu, 2008-10-17,



77. WEB,weblink Defence Spending, MOD, dmy, 6 January 2008,



78. WEB,weblink The Royal Navy: Britain’s Trident for a Global Agenda - The Henry Jackson Society, Henry Jackson Society, dmy, 17 October 2008,



79. NEWS,weblink £3.2bn giant carrier deals signed, BBC News, 3 July 2008, dmy, 23 October 2008,



80. WEB,weblink House of Commons Hansard, www.publications.parliament.uk, 2008-10-23,



81. Office for National Statistics UK 2005: The Official Yearbook of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, p. 89



82. WEB,weblink The Treaty (act) of the Union of Parliament 1706, www.scotshistoryonline.co.uk, dmy, 5 October 2008,



83. UK Supreme Court judges sworn in BBC News, 1 October 2009



84. {{PDFlink|Constitutional reform: A Supreme Court for the United Kingdom|252 KB}}, Department for Constitutional Affairs. Retrieved on 22 May 2006



85. NEWS,weblink Police-recorded crime down by 9%, BBC News, 17 July 2008, dmy, 21 October 2008,



86. NEWS,weblink New record high prison population, BBC News, 8 February 2008, dmy, 21 October 2008,



87. WEB,weblink Court of Session - Introduction, www.scotcourts.gov.uk, 2008-10-05,



88. WEB,weblink High Court of Justiciary - Introduction, www.scotcourts.gov.uk, dmy, 5 October 2008,



89. WEB,weblink House of Lords - Practice Directions on Permission to Appeal, www.publications.parliament.uk, 2009-06-22,



90. WEB,weblink Introduction, www.scotcourts.gov.uk, 2008-10-05,



91. NEWS,weblink The case for keeping 'not proven' verdict, www.timesonline.co.uk, 2008-10-05,



92. WEB,weblink Scottish Cabinet and Ministers, www.scotland.gov.uk, dmy, 5 October 2008,



93. NEWS,weblink Scottish crime 'lowest since 80s', BBC News, 2008-09-30, 2008-10-21,



94. WEB,weblink Prisoner Population at Friday 22 August 2008, www.sps.gov.uk, dmy, 28 August 2008,



95. NEWS,weblink Scots jail numbers at record high, BBC News, 2008-08-29, 2008-10-21,



96. WEB,weblink United Kingdom, The World Factbook, CIA, 2008-09-23,



97. It lies between the North Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea, coming within {{convert|35|km|mi|0}} of the northwest coast of France, from which it is separated by the English Channel. Great Britain lies between latitudes 49° and 59° N (the Shetland Islands reach to nearly 61° N), and longitudes 8° W to 2° E. The Royal Greenwich Observatory, in London, is the defining point of the Prime Meridian. When measured directly north-south, Great Britain is a little over {{convert|1100|km|mi|-2}} in length and is a fraction under {{convert|500|km|mi|-2}} at its widest, but the greatest distance between two points is {{convert|1350|km|mi|-1}} between Land's End in Cornwall (near Penzance) and John o' Groats in Caithness (near Thurso). Northern Ireland shares a {{convert|360|km|mi|0|adj=on}} land boundary with the Republic of Ireland.The United Kingdom has a temperate climate, with plentiful rainfall all year round. The temperature varies with the seasons but seldom drops below {{convert|-10|C|lk=on}} or rises above {{convert|35|C}}. The prevailing wind is from the southwest, bearing frequent spells of mild and wet weather from the Atlantic Ocean. Eastern parts are most sheltered from this wind and are therefore the driest. Atlantic currents, warmed by the Gulf Stream, bring mild winters, especially in the west, where winters are wet, especially over high ground. Summers are warmest in the south east of England, being closest to the European mainland, and coolest in the north. Snowfall can occur in winter and early spring, though it rarely settles to great depth away from high ground.England accounts for just over half of the total area of the UK, covering {{convert|130410|km2|sqmi|-1}}. Most of the country consists of lowland terrain, with mountainous terrain north-west of the Tees-Exe line including the Cumbrian Mountains of the Lake District, the Pennines and limestone hills of the Peak District, Exmoor and Dartmoor. The main rivers and estuaries are the Thames, Severn and the Humber. England's highest mountain is Scafell Pike ({{convert|978|m|ft|0}}), which is in the Lake District. England has a number of large towns and cities, including six of the top 50 Larger Urban Zones in the European Union.
    missing image!
    - BenNevis2005.jpg -
    Ben Nevis, in Scotland, is the highest point in the British Isles
    (File:United Kingdom labelled map7.png|thumb|175px|left|alt=The northern 40% of the largest island is Scotland, the southern 60% is England and Wales. Wales is a peninsula about 15% the size of England. Northern Ireland is shown as the north-east of the western island, taking about one-sixth the area.|The four countries of the United Kingdom.)Scotland accounts for just under a third of the total area of the UK, covering {{convert|78772|km2|sqmi|-1}},WEB,weblink Scotland Facts, www.scotland.org, 16 July 2008,



98. The complete guide to Scottish Islands independent.co.uk, 19 May 2001



99. WEB,weblink Ben Nevis Weather, www.bennevisweather.co.uk, 2008-10-26,



100. WEB,weblink Geography of Northern Ireland, University of Ulster, dmy, 22 May 2006,



101. WEB,weblink Census Geography, www.statistics.gov.uk, 2008-10-10,



102. WEB,weblink Census, www.ons.gov.uk, dmy, 11 October 2008, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



103. NEWS,weblink Population Estimates: August 2009, 2009-08-27, Office for National Statistics, 2009-08-28,



104. Between 2001 and 2008, the population increased by an average annual rate of 0.5 per cent. This compares to 0.3 per cent per year in the period 1991 to 2001, and 0.2 per cent in the decade 1981 to 1991. Published in 2008, the mid-2007 population estimates revealed that, for the first time, the UK was home to more people of pensionable age than children under the age of 16.NEWS,weblink Ageing Britain: Pensioners outnumber under-16s for first time, Travis, Alan, 2008-08-22, The Guardian, 2008-08-23,



105. It is one of the most densely populated countries in the world with 383 people resident per square kilometre in mid-2003,NEWS,weblink Population: UK population grows to 59.6 million, 28 January 2005, Office for National Statistics, 2008-08-20,



106. WEB, England is most crowded country in Europe,weblink Telegraph.co.uk, 2009-09-05,



107. with much lower population densities than England. Compared to England's {{convert|383|PD/km2|PD/sqmi}}, the corresponding figures were {{convert|142|PD/km2|PD/sqmi|abbr=on}} for Wales, {{convert|125|PD/km2|PD/sqmi|abbr=on}} for Northern Ireland and just {{convert|65|PD/km2|PD/sqmi|abbr=on}} for Scotland in mid-2003. Northern Ireland had the fastest growing population in percentage terms of all of the four constituent countries of the UK in each of the four years to mid-2008.In 2008, the average total fertility rate (TFR) across the UK was 1.96 children per woman.NEWS,weblink Fertility: Rise in UK fertility continues, Office for National Statistics, 2009-08-27, 2009-08-28,



108. NEWS,weblink The question: What's behind the baby boom?, Boseley, Sarah, 2008-07-14, The Guardian, 3, 2009-08-28,



109. Scotland had the lowest fertility at only 1.8 children per woman, while Northern Ireland had the highest at 2.11 children in 2008.

     Migration

     {{See also|Foreign-born population of the United Kingdom}}The proportion of foreign-born people in the UK remains slightly below that of some other European countries,WEB,weblink Europe: Population and Migration in 2005, Rainer Muenz, Migration Policy Institute, June, 2006, 2007-04-02,



110. Immigration and births to non-British mothers pushes British population to record high, This is London, 22 August 2008



111. Right of Union citizens and their family members to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States europa.eu. Retrieved 6 November 2008.



112. WEB,weblink Emigration soars as Britons desert the UK,



113. Record numbers leave the country for life abroad. The Guardian. November 16, 2007.



114. Net migration gain boosts Britain's population by 500 people every day. Scotsman.com News. November 3, 2006.



115. Thousands more Britons join the exodus to live and work abroad. Times Online. April 20, 2007.



116. NEWS,weblink Home Office shuts the door on Bulgaria and Romania, Doward, Jamie, Temko, Ned, 2007-09-23, The Observer, 2, 2008-08-23,



117. Third World migrants behind our 2.3m population boom, Daily Mail, 3 June 2008



118. Tories call for tougher control of immigration, This is London, 20 October 2008



119. Immigration: Phil Woolas admits Labour responsible for string of failures, Telegraph, 21 October 2008



120. Minister rejects migrant cap plan, BBC News, 8 September 2008



121. WEB,weblink Immigration 'far higher' than figures say, The Telegraph, 2007-01-05, 2007-04-20,



122. NEWS,weblink Emigration reaches record high in 2008, 26 November 2009, Office for National Statistics, 27 November 2009,



123. WEB,weblink Brits Abroad: Mapping the scale and nature of British emigration, Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah and Catherine Drew, Institute for Public Policy Research, 2006-12-11, 2007-01-20,



124. NEWS,weblink Brits Abroad, BBC News, 2007-04-20, 6 December 2006,



125. NEWS,weblink 5.5 m Britons 'opt to live abroad', BBC, 2006-12-11, 2007-04-20,



126. "Brits Abroad: Country-by-country". BBC News. December 11, 2006.



127. John Freelove Mensah, Persons Granted British Citizenship United Kingdom, 2006, Home Office Statistical Bulletin 08/07, 22 May 2007. Retrieved 21 September 2007.



128. Fertility rate highest for 26 yearsNational Statistics. Retrieved 13 April 2008.



129. BOOK,weblink The UK's new Europeans: Progress and challenges five years after accession, Sumption, Madeleine, Somerville, Will, January 2010, Equality and Human Rights Commission Policy Report, Equality and Human Rights Commission, 13, 19 January 2010, 9781842062524,



130. NEWS,weblink Young, self-reliant, educated: portrait of UK's eastern European migrants, Doward, Jamie, Rogers, Sam, 17 January 2010, The Observer, 19 January 2010,



131. Packing up for home: Poles hit by UK's economic downturn. This is London. October 20, 2008.



132. NEWS,weblink Migrants to UK 'returning home', 2009-09-08, BBC News, 2009-09-08,



133. Review of "The Tribes of Britain" James Owen, National Geographic 19 July 2005.



134. Stephen Oppenheimer, Myths of British ancestry{{Dead link|date=January 2010}}, Prospect, October 2006. Retrieved 21 September 2006.



135. NEWS,weblink Scientist – Griffin hijacked my work to make race claim about 'British aborigines', Henderson, Mark, 2009-10-23, The Times, 2009-10-26,



136. BOOK, Costello, Ray, Black Liverpool: The Early History of Britain's Oldest Black Community 1730-1918, Picton Press, Liverpool, 2001, 1873245076,



137. WEB,weblink Culture and Ethnicity Differences in Liverpool - Chinese Community, Chambré Hardman Trust, 2009-10-26,



138. 'Why I left UK to return to Poland', BBC News



139. WEB,weblink Ethnicity: 7.9% from a non-White ethnic group, Office for National Statistics, 2004-06-24, 2007-04-02,



140. WEB,weblink Resident population estimates by ethnic group (percentages): London, Office for National Statistics, 2008-04-23,



141. WEB,weblink Resident population estimates by ethnic group (percentages): Leicester, Office for National Statistics, 2008-04-23,



142. WEB,weblink Census 2001 - Ethnicity and religion in England and Wales, Office for National Statistics, 2008-04-23,



143. WEB,weblink Schools and Pupils in England, January, 2007, PDF, 2008-10-17,



144. WEB,weblink One fifth of children from ethnic minorities, The Daily Telegraph, Graeme Paton, 2007-10-01, 2008-03-28,



145. WEB,weblink Official EU languages, 2009-05-08, European Commission, ec.europa.eu, 2009-10-16,



146. WEB,weblink English-Language Dominance, Literature and Welfare, Jacques Melitz, Centre for Economic Policy Research, 1999, 2006-05-26,



147. WEB,weblinkweblink 2007-06-23, Eurolang - Language Data - Scots, Eurolang.net, 2008-11-02,



148. National Statistics Online at www.statistics.gov.uk



149. WEB, PDF,weblink Differences in estimates of Welsh Language Skills, 2008-12-30,



150. Welsh today by Prof. Peter Wynn Thomasbbc.co.uk



151. Scotland's Census 2001 - Gaelic Report gro-scotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 15 October 2008.



152. Local UK languages 'taking off' BBC News 12 February 2009



153. Fall in compulsory language lessons BNC News 4 November 2004



154. The School Gate for parents in Wales BBC Wales. Retrieved 11 October 2008.



155. Religious Populations



156. WEB,weblink UK Census 2001, 2007-04-22,



157. WEB,weblink PDF, Tearfund Survey 2007, 2007-05-05,



158. Religion by year British Social Attitudes Survey. 2007. Retrieved on 2009-11-29.



159. "Research published this week by the British Charity, Tearfund, makes somber reading for church leaders. It found only one in 10 people in the United Kingdom attend church on a weekly basis even though 53 percent of the British population identify themselves as Christian."{{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



160. In the 2001 census, 9.1 million (15% of the UK population) claimed no religion, with a further 4.3 million (7% of the UK population) not stating a religious preference.Religion: 2001 Census National Statistics website.



161. {{PDFlink|Eurobarometer poll conducted in 2005|1.64 MB}}. Page 9. European Commission. Retrieved on 7 December 2006



162. The History of the Church of England The Church of England. Retrieved 23 November 2008.



163. The Church in England and Wales catholic-ew.org.uk. Retrieved 27 November 2008.



164. 'Fringe' Church winning the believers Timesonline, 19 December 2006



165. Analysis of Religion in the 2001 Census: Summary Report scotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 6 December 2008.



166. Communities in Northern Ireland statistics.gov.uk. Retrieved 29 October 2008.



167. NEWS,weblink Muslim population 'rising 10 times faster than rest of society', Kerbaj, Richard, 30 January 2009, The Times, 29 December 2009,




168. Other religions

     missing image!
     - ELM and LMC Angled View 1.jpg -
     The East London Mosque, one of the country's largest Islamic places of worship.
     At the 2001 census, there were 1,536,015 Muslims in England and Wales,KS07 Religion: Key Statistics for urban areas, results by population size of urban area statistics.gov.uk. Retrieved 6 December 2008.



169. weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20080506102959weblink">Analysis of Religion in the 2001 Census: Summary Report scotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 6 December 2008.



170. Northern Ireland Census 2001 Key Statistics



171. Between 2004 and 2008, the Muslim population grew by more than 500,000. The largest age-bracket within the British Muslim population were those under the age of 4, at 301,000 in September 2008.Over 1 million people follow religions of Indian origin: 560,000 Hindus, 340,000 Sikhs with about 150,000 practising Buddhism.WEB,weblink Census 2001 - Profiles, 2007-01-27, Office for National Statistics,



172. WEB,weblink Hinduism in Britain today, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, 2007-04-22,



173. The Jain Centre, Leicester. UK jaincentre.com. Retrieved 29 October 2008.



174. WEB,weblink Census 2001 - Profiles, 2007-12-02, Office for National Statistics,



175. WEB,weblink THE GLOBAL FINANCIAL CENTRES INDEX 6, 2009, PDF, City of London, 2009-11-03,



176. WEB,weblink United Kingdom, International Monetary Fund, 2009-10-01,



177. WEB,weblink TUC Manufacturing Conference, Patricia Hewitt, Department of Trade and Industry, 2004-07-15, 2006-05-16,



178. "Food prices". BBC.co.uk.



179. NEWS,weblink Military spending sets new record, 2009-06-08, www.BBC.co.uk, 8 June 2009,



180. WEB,weblink The Pharmaceutical sector in the UK, 2007-02-27, Department of Trade and Industry,



181. WEB, 2006-04-26,weblink Index of Services (experimental), Office for National Statistics, 2006-05-24,



182. BOOK, Saskia Sassen, Sassen, Saskia, The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo, 2001, Princeton University Press, 2nd,



183. "Special Report - The Global 2000," Forbes, April 2, 2008.



184. "HSBC tops Forbes 2000 list of world's largest companies," HSBC website, 4 April 2008



185. WEB,weblink Financial Services Industry, Mark, Lazarowicz (Labour MP), 2003-04-30, United Kingdom Parliament, 2008-10-17,



186. {{PDFlink|International Tourism Receipts|1.10 MB}}. UNWTO Tourism Highlights, Edition 2005 Page 12. World Tourism Organisation. Retrieved on 24 May 2006



187. NEWS,weblink Top 150 city destinations: London leads the way, Caroline, Bremner, Euromonitor International, 2007-10-11, 2008-08-28,



188. WEB, 2007-03-09,weblink From the Margins to the Mainstream - Government unveils new action plan for the creative industries, DCMS, 2007-03-09,



189. WEB, 2006-11-30,weblink The architecture of UK offshore oil production in relation to future production models, The Oil Drum, 2008-08-27,



190. WEB, Coal Around the World, UK Coal,weblinkpublisher=UK Coalwork=UK Coal website,



191. CHAPTER 2: LONG TERM TRENDS SOLID FUELS AND DERIVED GASES>AUTHOR=UK COALACCESSDATE=2008-09-23FORMAT=PDFWORK=BERR WEBSITE,



192. An alternative to Coal#Coal as fuel electricity generation is Underground coal gasification>underground coal gasification (UCG). UGC involves injecting steam and oxygen down a borehole, which extracts gas from the coal and draws the mixture to the surface—a potentially very low carbon method of exploiting coal. Identified onshore areas that have the potential for UGC amount to between 7 billion tonnes and 16 billion tonnes.COAL RESERVES IN THE UNITED KINGDOM>AUTHOR=THE COAL AUTHORITYACCESSDATE=2008-09-23FORMAT=PDFWORK=RESPONSE TO ENERGY REVIEW,



193. BBC NEWS ENGLAND EXPERT PREDICTS 'COAL REVOLUTION'>AUTHOR=BBCACCESSDATE=2008-09-23DATE=2007-10-16, BBC News website,



194. More About the Bank www.bankofengland.co.uk. Retrieved 8 August 2008.



195. "Britain's public debt since 1974". Guardian.co.uk.



196. "Britain owes £801,000,000,000". Scotsman.com. August 21, 2009.



197. NEWS, Chavez-Dreyfuss, Gertrude,weblink Reuters, Global reserves, dollar share up at end of 2007-IMF, 2008-04-01, 2009-12-21,



198. NEWS, 2007-07-24,weblink Puritanism comes too naturally for 'Huck' Brown, Times Online, 2007-07-24,



199. WEB, 2005-02-28,weblink EMU Entry and Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, EU Constitution, MORI, 2006-05-17, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



200. NEWS,weblink UK in recession as economy slides, BBC, 2009-01-23, 2009-01-23,



201. No way to start out in life. The Economist. July 16, 2009.



202. In 2007-2008, this was calculated to be £115 per week for single adults with no dependent children; £199 per week for couples with no dependent children; £195 per week for single adults with two dependent children under 14; and £279 per week for couples with two dependent children under 14



203. WEB, United Kingdom: Numbers in low income,weblink poverty.org.uk, 25 September 2009,



204. WEB, United Kingdom: Children in low income households,weblink poverty.org.uk, 25 September 2009,



205. WEB,weblink Local Authorities, DCSF, 2008-12-21,



206. WEB,weblink United Kingdom, Humana, 2006-05-18,



207. WEB,weblink Private school pupil numbers in decline, Guardian, 2007-11-09,



208. NEWS,weblink More state pupils in universities, BBC News, 2007-07-19,



209. WEB,weblink The top 200 world universities, Times Higher Education, 2008-10-09, 2009-05-14,



210. England's pupils in global top 10 BBC News, 10 December 2008



211. F. Davenport, C. Beech, T. Downs and D. Hannigan, Ireland (Lonely planet, 7th edn., 2006), ISBN 1-74059-968-3, p. 564.



212. About SQA sqa.org.uk. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



213. About Learning and Teaching Scotland ltscotland.org.uk. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



214. Brain drain in reverse scotland.org. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



215. NEWS,weblink Increase in private school intake, BBC News, 2007-04-17,



216. MSPs vote to scrap endowment fee BBC News, 28 February 2008



217. About Us - What we do ccea.org.uk. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



218. What will your child learn? wales.gov.uk. Retrieved 22 January 2010.



219. {{Citation | editor-last = Haden | editor-first = Angela | editor2-last = Campanini | editor2-first = Barbara | title = The world health report 2000 - Health systems: improving performance | year = 2000 | place = Geneva, Switzerland | publisher = World Health Organisation | url =weblink | isbn = 92 4 156198 X | author = World Health Organisation, World Health Staff, }}



220. {{citation|url=http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~wgreene/Statistics/WHO-COMP-Study-30.pdf|title=Measuring overall health system performance for 191 countries|author=World Health Organization|authorlink=World Health Organization|format=PDF|date=|publisher=pages.stern.nyu.edu}}



221. 'Huge contrasts' in devolved NHS BBC News, 28 August 2008



222. NHS now four different systems BBC 2 January 2008



223. {{citation|url=http://www.healthp.org/node/71|title=The NHS from Thatcher to Blair|first=Peter|last=Fisher|work=NHS Consultants Association|publisher=healthp.org|quote=The Budget was presented to Parliament on 17th April and was even more generous to the NHS than had been expected amounting to an annual rise of 7.4% above the rate of inflation for the next 5 years. This would take us to 9.4% of GDP spent on health ie around EU average.}}



224. OECD Health Data 2009- How Does the United Kingdom Compare



225. NEWS,weblink Heathrow 'needs a third runway', BBC, 2008-10-17, 25 June 2008,



226. WEB,weblink Statistics: Top 30 World airports, PDF, Airports Council International, 2008-10-15,



227. M6Toll Frequently asked questions www.m6toll.co.uk. Retrieved 13 July 2008.



228. WEB, Tackling congestion on our roads,weblink Department for Transport,



229. WEB, Delivering choice and reliability,weblink Department for Transport,



230. WEB, The Eddington Transport Study, Rod Eddington, 2006, December,weblink UK Treasury,



231. Transport Scotland - Keeping Scotland moving www.transportscotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 1 July 2008.



232. Transport Scotland - Rail www.transportscotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 10 July 2008.



233. Transport blueprint at-a-glance BBC News, 10 December 2008



234. Major new rail lines considered BBC News, 21 June 2008



235. It is the hub for the flag carrier British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, and BMI.NEWS, BBMI being taken over by Lufthansa, BBC,weblink 2009-12-23, BBC, 2008-10-29, BBC News website,



236. WEB,weblink Crowded Summer Of Sport, Ipsos Mori, 2008-10-17, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



237. Cricket 'was invented in Belgium' BBC News, 2 March 2009



238. About ECB www.ecb.co.uk. Retrieved 4 August 2008.



239. NEWS, 2007-03-09,weblink Wembley kick-off: Stadium is ready and England play first game in fortnight, Daily Mail, 2007-03-19,



240. NEWS,weblink Blatter against British 2012 team, BBC News, 2008-03-09, 2008-04-02,



241. Premier and Champions League history watch-football.net. Retrieved 1 October 2008.



242. NEWS,weblink Chinese phone maker's fancy footwork, BBC News, 2003-10-27, 2006-08-09,



243. WEB,weblinkweblink 2007-10-01, The Beginning of Champions Cup,



244. WEB,weblink Official Website of Rugby League World Cup 2008,



245. UK to host Rugby League World Cup BBC News, 28 July 2009



246. England will host 2015 World Cup, BBC News, 28 July 2009



247. WEB,weblink Tracking the Field, PDF, Ipsos MORI, 2008-10-17, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



248. Links plays into the record books BBC News, 17 March 2009



249. Shinty scottishsport.co.uk. Retrieved 2 October 2008.



250. Goldfarb, Jeff. "Bookish Britain overtakes America as top publisher", Reuters Entertainment, May 10, 2006.



251. WEB,weblink Encyclopedia Britannica article on Shakespeare, 2006-02-26,



252. ENCYCLOPEDIA,weblinkweblink 2006-02-09, MSN Encarta Encyclopedia article on Shakespeare, 2006-02-26,



253. WEB,weblink Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia article on Shakespeare, 2006-02-26,



254. How to Celebrate 'The World's Worst Poet'? washingtonpost.com, 1 August 2007



255. Edinburgh, UK appointed first UNESCO City of Literature unesco.org. Retrieved 20 August 2008.



256. WEB, BBC website: About the BBC - What is the BBC,weblink 2008-06-14,



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259. WEB,weblink ABCs: National Sunday newspaper circulation September 2008, Audit Bureau of Circulations, 2008-10-10, 2008-10-17,



260. The Guardian is a more liberal "quality" broadsheet and the Financial Times is the main business newspaper, printed on distinctive salmon-pink broadsheet paper.First printed in 1737, The News Letter from Belfast, is the oldest known English-language daily newspaper still in publication today. One of its fellow Northern Irish competitors, The Irish News, has been twice ranked as the best regional newspaper in the United Kingdom, in 2006 and 2007.WEB,weblink The Newspaper Awards, 2007-05-19,



261. Scottish newspaper readership falls Business7, 11 February 2008



262. WEB,weblink 1960–1969, EMI Group Ltd, 2008-05-31,



263. NEWS,weblink Paul At Fifty, Time (magazine), 1992-06-08,



264. WEB,weblink In This Month: June, uktv, 2008-08-15,



265. WEB,weblink British Citizen by Act of Parliament: George Frideric Handel, 2009-07-20, UK Parliament, 2009-09-11,



266. NEWS,weblink Handel all'inglese, Andrews, John, 2006-04-14, Playbill, 2009-09-11,



267. WEB,weblink British rock legends get their own music title for PLAYSTATION3 and PlayStation2, EMI,



268. WEB, Encyclopædia Britannica,weblink the Bee Gees (British-Australian pop-rock group) - Britannica Online Encyclopedia, Britannica.com, 2010-01-12,



269. The Times on Cliff Richard



270. The Telegraph on Elton John



271. WEB,weblink Rock group Led Zeppelin to reunite, The Daily Telegraph, 2008-04-19,



272. NEWS, Pink Floyd founder Syd Barrett dies at home,weblink Times Online, 2006-07-11,



273. NEWS, Kate, Holton, Rolling Stones sign Universal album deal,weblink Reuters, Reuters.com, 2008-01-17, 2008-10-26,



274. According to research by Guinness World Records, eight of the ten acts with the most UK chart singles are British: Status Quo, Queen, The Rolling Stones, UB40, Depeche Mode, the Bee Gees, the Pet Shop Boys and the Manic Street Preachers.NEWS,weblink Status Quo hold UK singles record, 2005-09-19, BBC News, 2009-08-02,



275. NEWS,weblink A tale of two cities of culture: Liverpool vs Stavanger, Hughes, Mark, 2008-01-14, The Independent, 2009-08-02,



276. NEWS,weblink Glasgow gets city of music honour, BBC News, 2008-08-20, 2009-08-02,



277. WEB,weblink BBC - History - John Logie Baird, 2010-03-07,



278. The World's First High Definition Colour Television System. McLean, p. 196.



279. WEB,weblink Scottish Science Hall of Fame - Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922), 2010-03-07,



280. Hubbard, Geoffrey (1965) Cooke and Wheatstone and the Invention of the Electric Telegraph, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London p. 78



281. The electric telegraph, forerunner of the internet, celebrates 170 years BT Group Connected Earth Online Museum. Accessed March 2010



282. WEB,weblink Nobelprize.org: Sir Alexander Fleming - Biography, 07-03-2010,



283. WEB,weblink Britain second in world research rankings, The Guardian, MacLeod, Donald, 2006-03-21, 2006-05-14,



284. NEWS,weblink Welsh dragon call for Union flag, BBC, 2007-11-27, 2008-10-17,



285. WEB,weblink Britannia on British Coins, Chard, 2006-06-25,



286. BOOK, Baker, Steve, Picturing the Beast, University of Illinois Press, 2001, 52, 0252070305,

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2. English is established by de facto usage. In Wales, the Welsh Language Board is legally tasked with ensuring that, "in the conduct of public business and the administration of justice, the English and Welsh language>Welsh languages should be treated on a basis of equality". HTTP://WWW.OPSI.GOV.UK/ACTS/ACTS1993/UKPGA_19930038_EN_2.HTM>TITLE=WELSH LANGUAGE ACT 1993ACCESSDATE=2007-09-03, . Bòrd na Gàidhlig is tasked with "securing the status of the Scottish Gaelic language as an official language of Scotland commanding equal respect to the English language" HTTP://WWW.OPSI.GOV.UK/LEGISLATION/SCOTLAND/ACTS2005/ASP_20050007_EN_1PUBLISHER=OFFICE OF PUBLIC SECTOR INFORMATION, 2007-03-09,



3. Under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages the Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, Cornish language>Cornish, Irish language, Ulster Scots and Scots language>Scots languages are officially recognised as Regional language or Minority language>Minority languages by the United Kingdom Government (SCOTTISH EXECUTIVETITLE=EUROPEAN CHARTER FOR REGIONAL OR MINORITY LANGUAGES, 2007-08-23, ) See also Languages of the United Kingdom.



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63. WEB,weblink A short history of London government, www.london.gov.uk, 2008-10-04,



64. "The Government is now expected to tear up its twelve-year-old plan to create eight or nine regional assemblies in England to mirror devolution in Scotland and Wales."NEWS,weblink Prescott's dream in tatters as North East rejects assembly, 2008-02-15, The Times,



65. WEB,weblink Local Authority Elections, Local Government Association, 2008-10-03,



66. WEB,weblink History - City Hall, Cardiff, Cardiffcityhall.com, 2010-01-27,



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68. WEB,weblink Foster announces the future shape of local government, NI Executive, 2008-10-20,



69. WEB,weblink Local Government elections to be aligned with review of public administration, www.nio.gov.uk, 2008-08-02,



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71. Ethical Standards in Public Life framework: WEB, Ethical Standards in Public Life,weblink The Scottish Government, 2008-10-03,



72. WEB,weblink About COSLA, cosla.gov.uk, 2008-10-03,



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79. NEWS,weblink £3.2bn giant carrier deals signed, BBC News, 3 July 2008, dmy, 23 October 2008,



80. WEB,weblink House of Commons Hansard, www.publications.parliament.uk, 2008-10-23,



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85. NEWS,weblink Police-recorded crime down by 9%, BBC News, 17 July 2008, dmy, 21 October 2008,



86. NEWS,weblink New record high prison population, BBC News, 8 February 2008, dmy, 21 October 2008,



87. WEB,weblink Court of Session - Introduction, www.scotcourts.gov.uk, 2008-10-05,



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89. WEB,weblink House of Lords - Practice Directions on Permission to Appeal, www.publications.parliament.uk, 2009-06-22,



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91. NEWS,weblink The case for keeping 'not proven' verdict, www.timesonline.co.uk, 2008-10-05,



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93. NEWS,weblink Scottish crime 'lowest since 80s', BBC News, 2008-09-30, 2008-10-21,



94. WEB,weblink Prisoner Population at Friday 22 August 2008, www.sps.gov.uk, dmy, 28 August 2008,



95. NEWS,weblink Scots jail numbers at record high, BBC News, 2008-08-29, 2008-10-21,



96. WEB,weblink United Kingdom, The World Factbook, CIA, 2008-09-23,



97. It lies between the North Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea, coming within {{convert|35|km|mi|0}} of the northwest coast of France, from which it is separated by the English Channel. Great Britain lies between latitudes 49° and 59° N (the Shetland Islands reach to nearly 61° N), and longitudes 8° W to 2° E. The Royal Greenwich Observatory, in London, is the defining point of the Prime Meridian. When measured directly north-south, Great Britain is a little over {{convert|1100|km|mi|-2}} in length and is a fraction under {{convert|500|km|mi|-2}} at its widest, but the greatest distance between two points is {{convert|1350|km|mi|-1}} between Land's End in Cornwall (near Penzance) and John o' Groats in Caithness (near Thurso). Northern Ireland shares a {{convert|360|km|mi|0|adj=on}} land boundary with the Republic of Ireland.The United Kingdom has a temperate climate, with plentiful rainfall all year round. The temperature varies with the seasons but seldom drops below {{convert|-10|C|lk=on}} or rises above {{convert|35|C}}. The prevailing wind is from the southwest, bearing frequent spells of mild and wet weather from the Atlantic Ocean. Eastern parts are most sheltered from this wind and are therefore the driest. Atlantic currents, warmed by the Gulf Stream, bring mild winters, especially in the west, where winters are wet, especially over high ground. Summers are warmest in the south east of England, being closest to the European mainland, and coolest in the north. Snowfall can occur in winter and early spring, though it rarely settles to great depth away from high ground.England accounts for just over half of the total area of the UK, covering {{convert|130410|km2|sqmi|-1}}. Most of the country consists of lowland terrain, with mountainous terrain north-west of the Tees-Exe line including the Cumbrian Mountains of the Lake District, the Pennines and limestone hills of the Peak District, Exmoor and Dartmoor. The main rivers and estuaries are the Thames, Severn and the Humber. England's highest mountain is Scafell Pike ({{convert|978|m|ft|0}}), which is in the Lake District. England has a number of large towns and cities, including six of the top 50 Larger Urban Zones in the European Union.
    missing image!
    - BenNevis2005.jpg -
    Ben Nevis, in Scotland, is the highest point in the British Isles
    (File:United Kingdom labelled map7.png|thumb|175px|left|alt=The northern 40% of the largest island is Scotland, the southern 60% is England and Wales. Wales is a peninsula about 15% the size of England. Northern Ireland is shown as the north-east of the western island, taking about one-sixth the area.|The four countries of the United Kingdom.)Scotland accounts for just under a third of the total area of the UK, covering {{convert|78772|km2|sqmi|-1}},WEB,weblink Scotland Facts, www.scotland.org, 16 July 2008,



98. The complete guide to Scottish Islands independent.co.uk, 19 May 2001



99. WEB,weblink Ben Nevis Weather, www.bennevisweather.co.uk, 2008-10-26,



100. WEB,weblink Geography of Northern Ireland, University of Ulster, dmy, 22 May 2006,



101. WEB,weblink Census Geography, www.statistics.gov.uk, 2008-10-10,



102. WEB,weblink Census, www.ons.gov.uk, dmy, 11 October 2008, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



103. NEWS,weblink Population Estimates: August 2009, 2009-08-27, Office for National Statistics, 2009-08-28,



104. Between 2001 and 2008, the population increased by an average annual rate of 0.5 per cent. This compares to 0.3 per cent per year in the period 1991 to 2001, and 0.2 per cent in the decade 1981 to 1991. Published in 2008, the mid-2007 population estimates revealed that, for the first time, the UK was home to more people of pensionable age than children under the age of 16.NEWS,weblink Ageing Britain: Pensioners outnumber under-16s for first time, Travis, Alan, 2008-08-22, The Guardian, 2008-08-23,



105. It is one of the most densely populated countries in the world with 383 people resident per square kilometre in mid-2003,NEWS,weblink Population: UK population grows to 59.6 million, 28 January 2005, Office for National Statistics, 2008-08-20,



106. WEB, England is most crowded country in Europe,weblink Telegraph.co.uk, 2009-09-05,



107. with much lower population densities than England. Compared to England's {{convert|383|PD/km2|PD/sqmi}}, the corresponding figures were {{convert|142|PD/km2|PD/sqmi|abbr=on}} for Wales, {{convert|125|PD/km2|PD/sqmi|abbr=on}} for Northern Ireland and just {{convert|65|PD/km2|PD/sqmi|abbr=on}} for Scotland in mid-2003. Northern Ireland had the fastest growing population in percentage terms of all of the four constituent countries of the UK in each of the four years to mid-2008.In 2008, the average total fertility rate (TFR) across the UK was 1.96 children per woman.NEWS,weblink Fertility: Rise in UK fertility continues, Office for National Statistics, 2009-08-27, 2009-08-28,



108. NEWS,weblink The question: What's behind the baby boom?, Boseley, Sarah, 2008-07-14, The Guardian, 3, 2009-08-28,



109. Scotland had the lowest fertility at only 1.8 children per woman, while Northern Ireland had the highest at 2.11 children in 2008.

     Migration

     {{See also|Foreign-born population of the United Kingdom}}The proportion of foreign-born people in the UK remains slightly below that of some other European countries,WEB,weblink Europe: Population and Migration in 2005, Rainer Muenz, Migration Policy Institute, June, 2006, 2007-04-02,



110. Immigration and births to non-British mothers pushes British population to record high, This is London, 22 August 2008



111. Right of Union citizens and their family members to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States europa.eu. Retrieved 6 November 2008.



112. WEB,weblink Emigration soars as Britons desert the UK,



113. Record numbers leave the country for life abroad. The Guardian. November 16, 2007.



114. Net migration gain boosts Britain's population by 500 people every day. Scotsman.com News. November 3, 2006.



115. Thousands more Britons join the exodus to live and work abroad. Times Online. April 20, 2007.



116. NEWS,weblink Home Office shuts the door on Bulgaria and Romania, Doward, Jamie, Temko, Ned, 2007-09-23, The Observer, 2, 2008-08-23,



117. Third World migrants behind our 2.3m population boom, Daily Mail, 3 June 2008



118. Tories call for tougher control of immigration, This is London, 20 October 2008



119. Immigration: Phil Woolas admits Labour responsible for string of failures, Telegraph, 21 October 2008



120. Minister rejects migrant cap plan, BBC News, 8 September 2008



121. WEB,weblink Immigration 'far higher' than figures say, The Telegraph, 2007-01-05, 2007-04-20,



122. NEWS,weblink Emigration reaches record high in 2008, 26 November 2009, Office for National Statistics, 27 November 2009,



123. WEB,weblink Brits Abroad: Mapping the scale and nature of British emigration, Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah and Catherine Drew, Institute for Public Policy Research, 2006-12-11, 2007-01-20,



124. NEWS,weblink Brits Abroad, BBC News, 2007-04-20, 6 December 2006,



125. NEWS,weblink 5.5 m Britons 'opt to live abroad', BBC, 2006-12-11, 2007-04-20,



126. "Brits Abroad: Country-by-country". BBC News. December 11, 2006.



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129. BOOK,weblink The UK's new Europeans: Progress and challenges five years after accession, Sumption, Madeleine, Somerville, Will, January 2010, Equality and Human Rights Commission Policy Report, Equality and Human Rights Commission, 13, 19 January 2010, 9781842062524,



130. NEWS,weblink Young, self-reliant, educated: portrait of UK's eastern European migrants, Doward, Jamie, Rogers, Sam, 17 January 2010, The Observer, 19 January 2010,



131. Packing up for home: Poles hit by UK's economic downturn. This is London. October 20, 2008.



132. NEWS,weblink Migrants to UK 'returning home', 2009-09-08, BBC News, 2009-09-08,



133. Review of "The Tribes of Britain" James Owen, National Geographic 19 July 2005.



134. Stephen Oppenheimer, Myths of British ancestry{{Dead link|date=January 2010}}, Prospect, October 2006. Retrieved 21 September 2006.



135. NEWS,weblink Scientist – Griffin hijacked my work to make race claim about 'British aborigines', Henderson, Mark, 2009-10-23, The Times, 2009-10-26,



136. BOOK, Costello, Ray, Black Liverpool: The Early History of Britain's Oldest Black Community 1730-1918, Picton Press, Liverpool, 2001, 1873245076,



137. WEB,weblink Culture and Ethnicity Differences in Liverpool - Chinese Community, Chambré Hardman Trust, 2009-10-26,



138. 'Why I left UK to return to Poland', BBC News



139. WEB,weblink Ethnicity: 7.9% from a non-White ethnic group, Office for National Statistics, 2004-06-24, 2007-04-02,



140. WEB,weblink Resident population estimates by ethnic group (percentages): London, Office for National Statistics, 2008-04-23,



141. WEB,weblink Resident population estimates by ethnic group (percentages): Leicester, Office for National Statistics, 2008-04-23,



142. WEB,weblink Census 2001 - Ethnicity and religion in England and Wales, Office for National Statistics, 2008-04-23,



143. WEB,weblink Schools and Pupils in England, January, 2007, PDF, 2008-10-17,



144. WEB,weblink One fifth of children from ethnic minorities, The Daily Telegraph, Graeme Paton, 2007-10-01, 2008-03-28,



145. WEB,weblink Official EU languages, 2009-05-08, European Commission, ec.europa.eu, 2009-10-16,



146. WEB,weblink English-Language Dominance, Literature and Welfare, Jacques Melitz, Centre for Economic Policy Research, 1999, 2006-05-26,



147. WEB,weblinkweblink 2007-06-23, Eurolang - Language Data - Scots, Eurolang.net, 2008-11-02,



148. National Statistics Online at www.statistics.gov.uk



149. WEB, PDF,weblink Differences in estimates of Welsh Language Skills, 2008-12-30,



150. Welsh today by Prof. Peter Wynn Thomasbbc.co.uk



151. Scotland's Census 2001 - Gaelic Report gro-scotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 15 October 2008.



152. Local UK languages 'taking off' BBC News 12 February 2009



153. Fall in compulsory language lessons BNC News 4 November 2004



154. The School Gate for parents in Wales BBC Wales. Retrieved 11 October 2008.



155. Religious Populations



156. WEB,weblink UK Census 2001, 2007-04-22,



157. WEB,weblink PDF, Tearfund Survey 2007, 2007-05-05,



158. Religion by year British Social Attitudes Survey. 2007. Retrieved on 2009-11-29.



159. "Research published this week by the British Charity, Tearfund, makes somber reading for church leaders. It found only one in 10 people in the United Kingdom attend church on a weekly basis even though 53 percent of the British population identify themselves as Christian."{{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



160. In the 2001 census, 9.1 million (15% of the UK population) claimed no religion, with a further 4.3 million (7% of the UK population) not stating a religious preference.Religion: 2001 Census National Statistics website.



161. {{PDFlink|Eurobarometer poll conducted in 2005|1.64 MB}}. Page 9. European Commission. Retrieved on 7 December 2006



162. The History of the Church of England The Church of England. Retrieved 23 November 2008.



163. The Church in England and Wales catholic-ew.org.uk. Retrieved 27 November 2008.



164. 'Fringe' Church winning the believers Timesonline, 19 December 2006



165. Analysis of Religion in the 2001 Census: Summary Report scotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 6 December 2008.



166. Communities in Northern Ireland statistics.gov.uk. Retrieved 29 October 2008.



167. NEWS,weblink Muslim population 'rising 10 times faster than rest of society', Kerbaj, Richard, 30 January 2009, The Times, 29 December 2009,




168. Other religions

     missing image!
     - ELM and LMC Angled View 1.jpg -
     The East London Mosque, one of the country's largest Islamic places of worship.
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169. weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20080506102959weblink">Analysis of Religion in the 2001 Census: Summary Report scotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 6 December 2008.



170. Northern Ireland Census 2001 Key Statistics



171. Between 2004 and 2008, the Muslim population grew by more than 500,000. The largest age-bracket within the British Muslim population were those under the age of 4, at 301,000 in September 2008.Over 1 million people follow religions of Indian origin: 560,000 Hindus, 340,000 Sikhs with about 150,000 practising Buddhism.WEB,weblink Census 2001 - Profiles, 2007-01-27, Office for National Statistics,



172. WEB,weblink Hinduism in Britain today, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, 2007-04-22,



173. The Jain Centre, Leicester. UK jaincentre.com. Retrieved 29 October 2008.



174. WEB,weblink Census 2001 - Profiles, 2007-12-02, Office for National Statistics,



175. WEB,weblink THE GLOBAL FINANCIAL CENTRES INDEX 6, 2009, PDF, City of London, 2009-11-03,



176. WEB,weblink United Kingdom, International Monetary Fund, 2009-10-01,



177. WEB,weblink TUC Manufacturing Conference, Patricia Hewitt, Department of Trade and Industry, 2004-07-15, 2006-05-16,



178. "Food prices". BBC.co.uk.



179. NEWS,weblink Military spending sets new record, 2009-06-08, www.BBC.co.uk, 8 June 2009,



180. WEB,weblink The Pharmaceutical sector in the UK, 2007-02-27, Department of Trade and Industry,



181. WEB, 2006-04-26,weblink Index of Services (experimental), Office for National Statistics, 2006-05-24,



182. BOOK, Saskia Sassen, Sassen, Saskia, The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo, 2001, Princeton University Press, 2nd,



183. "Special Report - The Global 2000," Forbes, April 2, 2008.



184. "HSBC tops Forbes 2000 list of world's largest companies," HSBC website, 4 April 2008



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186. {{PDFlink|International Tourism Receipts|1.10 MB}}. UNWTO Tourism Highlights, Edition 2005 Page 12. World Tourism Organisation. Retrieved on 24 May 2006



187. NEWS,weblink Top 150 city destinations: London leads the way, Caroline, Bremner, Euromonitor International, 2007-10-11, 2008-08-28,



188. WEB, 2007-03-09,weblink From the Margins to the Mainstream - Government unveils new action plan for the creative industries, DCMS, 2007-03-09,



189. WEB, 2006-11-30,weblink The architecture of UK offshore oil production in relation to future production models, The Oil Drum, 2008-08-27,



190. WEB, Coal Around the World, UK Coal,weblinkpublisher=UK Coalwork=UK Coal website,



191. CHAPTER 2: LONG TERM TRENDS SOLID FUELS AND DERIVED GASES>AUTHOR=UK COALACCESSDATE=2008-09-23FORMAT=PDFWORK=BERR WEBSITE,



192. An alternative to Coal#Coal as fuel electricity generation is Underground coal gasification>underground coal gasification (UCG). UGC involves injecting steam and oxygen down a borehole, which extracts gas from the coal and draws the mixture to the surface—a potentially very low carbon method of exploiting coal. Identified onshore areas that have the potential for UGC amount to between 7 billion tonnes and 16 billion tonnes.COAL RESERVES IN THE UNITED KINGDOM>AUTHOR=THE COAL AUTHORITYACCESSDATE=2008-09-23FORMAT=PDFWORK=RESPONSE TO ENERGY REVIEW,



193. BBC NEWS ENGLAND EXPERT PREDICTS 'COAL REVOLUTION'>AUTHOR=BBCACCESSDATE=2008-09-23DATE=2007-10-16, BBC News website,



194. More About the Bank www.bankofengland.co.uk. Retrieved 8 August 2008.



195. "Britain's public debt since 1974". Guardian.co.uk.



196. "Britain owes £801,000,000,000". Scotsman.com. August 21, 2009.



197. NEWS, Chavez-Dreyfuss, Gertrude,weblink Reuters, Global reserves, dollar share up at end of 2007-IMF, 2008-04-01, 2009-12-21,



198. NEWS, 2007-07-24,weblink Puritanism comes too naturally for 'Huck' Brown, Times Online, 2007-07-24,



199. WEB, 2005-02-28,weblink EMU Entry and Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, EU Constitution, MORI, 2006-05-17, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



200. NEWS,weblink UK in recession as economy slides, BBC, 2009-01-23, 2009-01-23,



201. No way to start out in life. The Economist. July 16, 2009.



202. In 2007-2008, this was calculated to be £115 per week for single adults with no dependent children; £199 per week for couples with no dependent children; £195 per week for single adults with two dependent children under 14; and £279 per week for couples with two dependent children under 14



203. WEB, United Kingdom: Numbers in low income,weblink poverty.org.uk, 25 September 2009,



204. WEB, United Kingdom: Children in low income households,weblink poverty.org.uk, 25 September 2009,



205. WEB,weblink Local Authorities, DCSF, 2008-12-21,



206. WEB,weblink United Kingdom, Humana, 2006-05-18,



207. WEB,weblink Private school pupil numbers in decline, Guardian, 2007-11-09,



208. NEWS,weblink More state pupils in universities, BBC News, 2007-07-19,



209. WEB,weblink The top 200 world universities, Times Higher Education, 2008-10-09, 2009-05-14,



210. England's pupils in global top 10 BBC News, 10 December 2008



211. F. Davenport, C. Beech, T. Downs and D. Hannigan, Ireland (Lonely planet, 7th edn., 2006), ISBN 1-74059-968-3, p. 564.



212. About SQA sqa.org.uk. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



213. About Learning and Teaching Scotland ltscotland.org.uk. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



214. Brain drain in reverse scotland.org. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



215. NEWS,weblink Increase in private school intake, BBC News, 2007-04-17,



216. MSPs vote to scrap endowment fee BBC News, 28 February 2008



217. About Us - What we do ccea.org.uk. Retrieved 7 October 2008.



218. What will your child learn? wales.gov.uk. Retrieved 22 January 2010.



219. {{Citation | editor-last = Haden | editor-first = Angela | editor2-last = Campanini | editor2-first = Barbara | title = The world health report 2000 - Health systems: improving performance | year = 2000 | place = Geneva, Switzerland | publisher = World Health Organisation | url =weblink | isbn = 92 4 156198 X | author = World Health Organisation, World Health Staff, }}



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221. 'Huge contrasts' in devolved NHS BBC News, 28 August 2008



222. NHS now four different systems BBC 2 January 2008



223. {{citation|url=http://www.healthp.org/node/71|title=The NHS from Thatcher to Blair|first=Peter|last=Fisher|work=NHS Consultants Association|publisher=healthp.org|quote=The Budget was presented to Parliament on 17th April and was even more generous to the NHS than had been expected amounting to an annual rise of 7.4% above the rate of inflation for the next 5 years. This would take us to 9.4% of GDP spent on health ie around EU average.}}



224. OECD Health Data 2009- How Does the United Kingdom Compare



225. NEWS,weblink Heathrow 'needs a third runway', BBC, 2008-10-17, 25 June 2008,



226. WEB,weblink Statistics: Top 30 World airports, PDF, Airports Council International, 2008-10-15,



227. M6Toll Frequently asked questions www.m6toll.co.uk. Retrieved 13 July 2008.



228. WEB, Tackling congestion on our roads,weblink Department for Transport,



229. WEB, Delivering choice and reliability,weblink Department for Transport,



230. WEB, The Eddington Transport Study, Rod Eddington, 2006, December,weblink UK Treasury,



231. Transport Scotland - Keeping Scotland moving www.transportscotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 1 July 2008.



232. Transport Scotland - Rail www.transportscotland.gov.uk. Retrieved 10 July 2008.



233. Transport blueprint at-a-glance BBC News, 10 December 2008



234. Major new rail lines considered BBC News, 21 June 2008



235. It is the hub for the flag carrier British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, and BMI.NEWS, BBMI being taken over by Lufthansa, BBC,weblink 2009-12-23, BBC, 2008-10-29, BBC News website,



236. WEB,weblink Crowded Summer Of Sport, Ipsos Mori, 2008-10-17, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



237. Cricket 'was invented in Belgium' BBC News, 2 March 2009



238. About ECB www.ecb.co.uk. Retrieved 4 August 2008.



239. NEWS, 2007-03-09,weblink Wembley kick-off: Stadium is ready and England play first game in fortnight, Daily Mail, 2007-03-19,



240. NEWS,weblink Blatter against British 2012 team, BBC News, 2008-03-09, 2008-04-02,



241. Premier and Champions League history watch-football.net. Retrieved 1 October 2008.



242. NEWS,weblink Chinese phone maker's fancy footwork, BBC News, 2003-10-27, 2006-08-09,



243. WEB,weblinkweblink 2007-10-01, The Beginning of Champions Cup,



244. WEB,weblink Official Website of Rugby League World Cup 2008,



245. UK to host Rugby League World Cup BBC News, 28 July 2009



246. England will host 2015 World Cup, BBC News, 28 July 2009



247. WEB,weblink Tracking the Field, PDF, Ipsos MORI, 2008-10-17, {{Dead link|date=July 2009}}



248. Links plays into the record books BBC News, 17 March 2009



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250. Goldfarb, Jeff. "Bookish Britain overtakes America as top publisher", Reuters Entertainment, May 10, 2006.



251. WEB,weblink Encyclopedia Britannica article on Shakespeare, 2006-02-26,



252. ENCYCLOPEDIA,weblinkweblink 2006-02-09, MSN Encarta Encyclopedia article on Shakespeare, 2006-02-26,



253. WEB,weblink Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia article on Shakespeare, 2006-02-26,



254. How to Celebrate 'The World's Worst Poet'? washingtonpost.com, 1 August 2007



255. Edinburgh, UK appointed first UNESCO City of Literature unesco.org. Retrieved 20 August 2008.



256. WEB, BBC website: About the BBC - What is the BBC,weblink 2008-06-14,



257. weblink



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259. WEB,weblink ABCs: National Sunday newspaper circulation September 2008, Audit Bureau of Circulations, 2008-10-10, 2008-10-17,



260. The Guardian is a more liberal "quality" broadsheet and the Financial Times is the main business newspaper, printed on distinctive salmon-pink broadsheet paper.First printed in 1737, The News Letter from Belfast, is the oldest known English-language daily newspaper still in publication today. One of its fellow Northern Irish competitors, The Irish News, has been twice ranked as the best regional newspaper in the United Kingdom, in 2006 and 2007.WEB,weblink The Newspaper Awards, 2007-05-19,



261. Scottish newspaper readership falls Business7, 11 February 2008



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263. NEWS,weblink Paul At Fifty, Time (magazine), 1992-06-08,



264. WEB,weblink In This Month: June, uktv, 2008-08-15,



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266. NEWS,weblink Handel all'inglese, Andrews, John, 2006-04-14, Playbill, 2009-09-11,



267. WEB,weblink British rock legends get their own music title for PLAYSTATION3 and PlayStation2, EMI,



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269. The Times on Cliff Richard



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271. WEB,weblink Rock group Led Zeppelin to reunite, The Daily Telegraph, 2008-04-19,



272. NEWS, Pink Floyd founder Syd Barrett dies at home,weblink Times Online, 2006-07-11,



273. NEWS, Kate, Holton, Rolling Stones sign Universal album deal,weblink Reuters, Reuters.com, 2008-01-17, 2008-10-26,



274. According to research by Guinness World Records, eight of the ten acts with the most UK chart singles are British: Status Quo, Queen, The Rolling Stones, UB40, Depeche Mode, the Bee Gees, the Pet Shop Boys and the Manic Street Preachers.NEWS,weblink Status Quo hold UK singles record, 2005-09-19, BBC News, 2009-08-02,



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277. WEB,weblink BBC - History - John Logie Baird, 2010-03-07,



278. The World's First High Definition Colour Television System. McLean, p. 196.



279. WEB,weblink Scottish Science Hall of Fame - Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922), 2010-03-07,



280. Hubbard, Geoffrey (1965) Cooke and Wheatstone and the Invention of the Electric Telegraph, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London p. 78



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283. WEB,weblink Britain second in world research rankings, The Guardian, MacLeod, Donald, 2006-03-21, 2006-05-14,



284. NEWS,weblink Welsh dragon call for Union flag, BBC, 2007-11-27, 2008-10-17,



285. WEB,weblink Britannia on British Coins, Chard, 2006-06-25,



286. BOOK, Baker, Steve, Picturing the Beast, University of Illinois Press, 2001, 52, 0252070305,

External links

{{sisterlinks|United Kingdom}}

Government

• Official website of the British Monarchy
• Official website of HM Government
• Chief of State and Cabinet Members
• Official Yearbook of the United Kingdom statistics

General information

• {{CIA World Factbook link|uk|United Kingdom}}
• Economic and Social Data Ranking
• United Kingdom from UCB Libraries GovPubs
• {{dmoz|Regional/Europe/United_Kingdom}}
• {{wikiatlas|United Kingdom}}

Travel

• Official tourist guide to Britain
• {{wikitravel}}

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