TODAY’S the day when Liverpudlians can hug their Manc cousins - and mean it. It's a day when lobscouse is off and hotpot is on - and you can’t spot a Merseysider for love nor money. Today (November 27) is Lancashire Day.
It’s a reminder that no matter what politicians do to fiddle with boundaries, the historic borders of the County Palatine of Lancashire are set in stone.
People from Liverpool and Manchester may battle it out on the M62, but both are true Lancastrians, along with people from St Helens, Kirkby and Huyton, and those faraway one-time cotton towns this side of the Pennines.
For an organisation known as the Friends of Real Lancashire, today is more important than Christmas Day, Easter Day and FA Cup Final Day all rolled into one.
By rights it ought to be a public holiday for workers and schoolchildren, topped by a regal tour of the palatine by the Duke of Lancaster, who also happens to be the Queen.
Lancashire Day commemorates the day in 1295 when the county sent its first representatives to what was the first proper English Parliament set up by King Edward I.
In parts of Lancashire today, town criers in their colourful regalia will bellow out the following proclamation.....
“Know ye also, and rejoice, that by virtue of Her Majesty's County Palatine of Lancaster, the citizens of the Hundreds of Lonsdale, North and South of the Sands, Amounderness, Leyland, Blackburn, Salford and West Derby are forever entitled to style themselves Lancastrians.
“Throughout the County Palatine, from the Furness Fells to the River Mersey, from the Irish Sea to the Pennines, this day shall ever mark the peoples' pleasure in that excellent distinction - true Lancastrians, proud of the Red Rose and loyal to our Sovereign Duke.”
Even Yorkshireman Eric Pickles, in his role as Secretary of State for Communities, has sprung to the defence of Lancashire, stating: "English counties continue to form an important part of our cultural and local identity in this country and many people remain deeply attached to their home county ... This sense of pride and shared identity is one of the things that binds communities together and it's right that the Government department responsible for communities and local government should be actively recognising the important role they play."
Say cheese, it's Lancashire Day
Only two local politicians are listed as patrons of the Friends – John Pugh, the Liberal Democrat MP for Southport, and Merseysider Brian Simpson who is a Labour MEP.
Liverpool Pier Head is the southernmost border of the Lancashire boundary, but there will be no celebrations in Liverpool, or Manchester.
Hopscotch up to Southport today for 1pm to catch the Lancashire proclamation being read outside the Scarisbrick Hotel in Lord Street. Warrington's proclamation is being read at 11am in the town centre and Thwaites Brewery will be celebrating Lancashire Day by brewing a beer called Flying Shuttle, a name linked to cotton industry in Lancashire. It'll be available in Wetherspoon pubs in the Palatine of Lancashire.
In Hale Village, which was allowed to have a Lord Mayor 600 years before Liverpool, the Freemen of Hale will be having a members' Lancashire Night at the Wellington Hotel with a competition for the best Lancashire story to win the silver model of Stephenson's Rocket.
The Friends of Real Lancashire want signs erected at the traditional boundaries to tell people they are entering the old Red Rose county.
What the Friends of Real Lancashire say
'The Government, when it reorganised the boundaries in 1974, stated that the "new counties" were administrative areas only, and that the boundaries of traditional counties such as Lancashire had not been changed.
The old boundaries'Unfortunately, the media refer to these administrative areas all too frequently and ignore the fact that places such as Barrow-in-Furness, Liverpool, Manchester, Warrington, etc. are still in Lancashire.'If administrative areas had not been called counties much of this confusion would have been avoided.
'The Royal Mail has at last dropped the use of administrative county names in postal addresses, and names such as Cumbria and Merseyside do not appear in the current Royal Mail Postal Address Book.
'Greater Manchester was never a postal address, as in 1974 the Royal Mail told people living in that administrative area to continue to include Lancashire in their address. Royal Mail have confirmed that people living in any part of the county can now include Lancashire in their address, without this affecting the way that mail is handled, providing the post code is used.'
