Lancashire Day was of course yesterday but as the House of Commons was not sitting the day has been marked today with a celebration of Lancashire produced food and drink held in the Jubilee Room off Westminster Hall in the Palace of Westminster.
I was particularly pleased to be able to welcome to Westminster Paul Morris from The Chocolate Cafe in Ramsbottom. The Chocolate Cafe was joined by representatives from Dewlay Cheese in Garstang, Crossmoor Honey Farm, Drinkwaters Mushrooms, the Fuzzy Duck Brewery and the Lancaster Brewery, Uncle Joe’s Mintballs from Wigan and Williams a family run bakery from Preston.
We were joined by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Lord Strathclyde and as proof that the War of the Roses is over I was invited to read the Lancashire Declaration as follows:
” Know ye also, and rejoice, that by virtue of Her Majesty’s County Palatine of Lancaster, the citizens of the Hundreds of Lonsdale, North and South of the Sands. Amounderness, Leyland, Blackburn, Salford and West Derby are forever entitled to style themselves Lancastrians. Throughout the County Palatine, from the Furness Fells to the River Mersey, from the Irish Sea to the Pennines, this day shall ever mark the peoples’ pleasure in that excellent distinction – true Lancastrians, proud of the Red Rose and loyal to our Sovereign Duke”.
With this the first elected representatives from Lancashire were summoned to Westminster by King Edward I on 27th November 1295.
David Nuttall 