Key facts about the United Kingdom :Cross Stitch – Government, citizens and rights
If you’re looking for key facts about the UK and its overseas territories, there are good sources of information available online and elsewhere.
The full title of this country is ‘the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’:
- Great Britain is made up of England, Scotland and Wales
- the United Kingdom (UK) is made up of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
‘Britain’ is used informally, usually meaning the United Kingdom.
The Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are not part of the UK. The geographical term ‘British Isles’ covers the UK, all of Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.
Reference sources
The British Council is the UK’s international organisation for educational opportunities and cultural relations and promotes UK culture and language abroad.
Non-government sources of information
Britain’s 14 Overseas Territories, spread throughout the globe, are diverse communities. They range from the tiny island of Pitcairn with its 47 inhabitants, set in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, to Bermuda, which has a population of 62,059 and is one of the world’s major financial centres.
The Overseas Territories are: Anguilla, British Antarctic Territory, Bermuda, British Indian Ocean Territory, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Falkland Islands, Gibraltar, Montserrat, St Helena and Dependencies (Ascension Island and Tristan da Cunha), Turk and Caicos Islands, Pitcairn Island, South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands, Sovereign Base Areas on Cyprus.
The Crown Dependencies are not part of the United Kingdom but are internally self-governing dependencies of the Crown. The Crown Dependencies are the Isle of Man, the Bailiwick of Jersey and the Bailiwick of Guernsey.