Ernie Clark. Hilperton Division, Wiltshire Council.

I guess that 'Wessex' would be stretching it a tad...

Planning rules have been changed to allow councils to put up boundary signs marking traditional English counties.

To mark St. George’s Day, Eric Pickles announced a new initiative to support the ‘tapestry’ of traditional English counties, including getting rid of a Whitehall ban on the names of traditional counties being displayed on street and road signs.

The government is also publishing a new online interactive map of England’s county boundaries.

England’s traditional counties date back over a thousand years of English history, but many of the counties have been sidelined by Whitehall and municipal bureaucrats in recent decades, including the municipal restructuring by Edward Heath’s government in 1972.

Mr. Pickles announced that planning rules have been changed to allow for councils to put up boundary signs marking traditional English counties – including the likes of Cumberland, Huntingdonshire, Westmorland and Middlesex.