Britain: An official handbook > 1993

BRITAIN 1993: AN OFFICIAL HANDBOOK
various efforts were made by British
governments to achieve stability. In 1782 the
Irish Parliament (dating from medieval times)
was given legislative independence; the only
constitutional tie with Great Britain was the
Crown. The Parliament represented,
however, only the privileged Anglo-Irish
minority and Catholics were excluded from
it. An abortive rebellion took place in 1798,
and in 1801 Ireland was unified with Great
Britain.
The ‘Irish question’ continued as one of
the major problems of British politics during
the nineteenth century. In 1886 the Liberal
Government introduced a Home Rule Bill
which would have given an Irish Parliament
authority over most internal matters while
reserving to Britain control over external
affairs. This led to a split in the Liberal Party
and the failure of the Bill. In 1914 Home
Rule was enacted by the Government of
Ireland Act. Its implementation was
prevented by the threat of armed resistance on
the part of the Protestant majority in Ulster
and by the outbreak of the first world war.
Although a nationalist rising in Dublin in
1916 was suppressed, a guerrilla force known
as the Irish Republican Army (IRA) began
operations against the British administration
at the end of the first world war. The
Government of Ireland Act 1920 provided for
the establishment of two Home Rule
parliaments, one in Dublin and the other in
Belfast. The Act was implemented in 1921 in
Northern Ireland, when six of the nine
counties of the province of Ulster received
their own Parliament and remained
represented in, and subject to the supreme
authority of, the British Parliament. In the
South the IRA continued to fight for
independence from the British administration.
After the signature of a truce in June, the
Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 1921
established the Irish Free State, which
became a republic in 1949.
Channel Islands and Isle of Man
Although the Channel Islands and the Isle of
Man are not part of the United Kingdom,
Table IT: General Statistics
England Wales Scotland
Northern
Ireland
United
Kingdom
Population (mid-1990)
(’000)
Area
(sq km)
Population density
(persons per sq km)
Gross domestic product
(per head, 1990)
Employees in employment
(’000, June 1991)
Percentage of employees
(June 1991) in:
services
manufacturing
construction
energy and water supply
agriculture, forestry and fishing
Unemployment rate
(per cent, seasonally
adjusted, June 1992)
47,837 2,881 5,102
130,478 20,768 77,167
367 139 66
8,408 6,960 7,592
18,755 985 1,984
7L0
2L8
4-2
L9
1-2
9-5
67-1
24-3
4-2
2-4
2-0
9-6
70-3
19-4
5-9
3-0
L4
9-4
1,589
14,121
113
6,181
525
7L0
19-5
4-4
L5
3-6
14-5
57,411
242,534
237
8,201
22,268
70-7
21-7
4-3
20
L3
9-6
Sources: Regional Trends, Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, Department of employment.
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