Isambard Kingdom Brunel FRS was a British civil engineer[...]

Parish?

I had in mind principal authorities - the ones with duties to deliver the bulk of services. What you say is indeed the general rule for /Parish/[1] Councils in England. And was for the voluntary community councils in Scotland and for community[1] councils in Wales (though the latter may well have changed). But then those councils don't deliver a lot of services. And don't exist in London and many other urban areas.

Parish Councils are beginning to appear in London following legislation in

Community Councils.

Of course, Community Councils in Scotland are a diffferent matter.

Thanks. I'd missed the creation of the Queen's Park Community Council in Westminster w.e.f. 2014. Any others?

Nice try. And you've also ignored that devolution in the UK came in under a Labour government.

You right wingers love central control. Except when it suits you to say not.

Shepherds Bush, I think. but I'm not particularly keeping track

Almost no British scientist believes UK research will be improved by leaving the EU.

The full report does focus on the problems.

No reason for it to be improved or made worse. CERN and ESA, for example, are not to do with the EU. And good people have always been able to move around the world.

Er, no, right wing tends to be about reducing excessive government control. Like not being ruled by Europe for example.

I wouldn't be suited to life as an ex-pat. I don't drink, much less drink to excess, I don't insult foreigners and I don't pine endlessly for an England that never really existed.

He was a great engineer but he had some spectacular failures including the Atmospheric Railway and the Great Eastern steam ship. Ultimately his broad gauge lost out to Stephenson's Narrow gauge and it was George Stephenson who designed and built the first Intercity Railway between Liverpool and Manchester as well as the engine - The Rocket.

George Stephenson was a remarkable man. The son of illiterate parents in a working class family he spent his first wages on learning how to read and write and when he was acting as brakesman on the winding gear at the local colliery invented an improvement that saved the mine owners serious money. The owners appointed him as the enginewright for all their collieries. When in that post he invented his own design of safety lamp for the local mines.

He built his first steam locomotive, The Blucher in 1814 when he was 33 years old, In total he built 16 engines between 1814 and 1820, selected what is now standard gauge and set up a foundry to produce iron rails in place of the old wooden rails and converted the Killingworth collieries lines to steam power in place of horse power by 1820. He built the first locomotive depot in history at Shildon before building the first steam powered public railway (the Stockton and Darlington - which is still open) in 1825. It reached the unheard of speed of 25 mph while hauling

The rest as they say is history, as an old and very wealthy man he had his own train but always preferred to ride on the footplate and chat to and the driver and fireman. He also had the ear of the great men of the the day including the Prime Minister - the Duke of Wellington. Not bad for a 19th working class Geordie lad in a class ridden society but then another working class lad from the North East had already blazed a trail. Captain James Cook RN, discoverer of Australia was born the son of a farm labourer in a cottage half a mile from where I live.

George's son Robert was a very good engineer indeed and worked with many other railway pioneers including Brunel and built some of the first railways in South America.