Medieval county boundaries are one thing, economic geography another | Letters

As chief executive of Barnsley council up to 2012 I was party to the early, difficult discussions about the formation of the Sheffield city region; difficult because Derbyshire county council (and, similarly, Nottinghamshire county council) refused to engage in a sensible discussion about adapting institutional arrangements to reflect the reality of the economic geography of the sub-region. Economic data shows that Chesterfield is indeed part of the Sheffield city region economic area. The econo