One of the problems with Labour's English regional plans was that the boundaries of the regions had been set by the central government. The people who lived in them have never been asked if they wanted to be in that region.

There has, I believe, been some feeling in Cornwall that they should be a region distinct from the South-West.

There is certainly a feeling in northern Lincolnshire that they would rather be linked with the rest of the historic county (which is in East Midlands Region) rather than with Yorkshire in the Yorkshire and the Humber Region. Now that Humberside Council (which combined the East Riding of Yorkshire with northern Lincolnshire) has been wound up there seems no reason why the natural barrier of the Humber should not be the regional boundary.

If regionalism is to come in England there need to be more powers on offer and the regions should be constructed from the bottom up not the top down.