December 2: A quest to find the boundaries of ‘the North’

THERE are lots of references in The Yorkshire Post to the North but different articles give a confusing picture as to where the North actually is. Jayne Dowle (The Yorkshire Post, November 26) writes that until recently the Chancellor, with his focus on the North of England and the “Northern Powerhouse”, actually believed that the North was Manchester.

Ms Dowle, on the other hand, seems to think that the North is a little larger and also includes the cities of Leeds, Sheffield, Hull and Liverpool.

Jayne Dowle also states that HS2 will run between London and the North. This statement is completely misleading: HS2 is planned to run from London to Birmingham and then it will fork, ending in Leeds and Manchester.

An online search informs me that Northern England is a region with a southern boundary stretching roughly between the rivers Dee and Trent, with a northern boundary at the Scottish border.

Although the North is not an official government region, it does contain three Euro constituencies: Yorkshire and the Humber, the North East and the North West. It therefore follows that there is an awful lot of the North between the M62 corridor and the Scottish border.