RM406 made its surprise appearance at Manchester's London Bus Day on 20th April after a 4-week turnaround restoration and repaint at the Blackpool BusWorks. Tomorrow it goes back to Dublin but we will hopefully not have to wait 23 years to see it on the mainland again!

Other BusWorks treated RMs at Manchester were RM471 for Chris Dobbing and RML2290.

Period adverts have been applied to RM406 as illustrated.

Philip Higgs
www.thebusworks.co.uk

Do you realise how ignorant you are? 'Mainland' Maybe it would be wise to get some education before you make such thick statements

Who is thick?
The pure geographic term for a larger island is mainland. Nothing to do with politics, history or borders.
Europe can be referred to mainland as well in the same geographic sphere.
And before anyone takes a snipe I am Irish by birth and descent.
No wonder we have a reputation for being thick when such rapture is made by those who cannot understand our common language.

I will simply say this , Phil Higgs is a good friend to this forum as is Tony Waller so for this kind of statement seems somewhat OTT with everyone entitled to have their say in whatever way they wish within the ' rules ' . To pickup such an insignificant point seems even stranger as it falls well within the realms of correctness .

Moderator .

From Wikipedia:

Mainland is usually the continental part of a region, as opposed to the islands nearby. Sometimes the residents are called "the Mainlanders". As a result of the usually larger area of mainland, there are significantly more mainlanders than islanders, and mainlander culture and politics sometimes threaten to dominate those of the islands.


Prominent uses of the term include:

# British Mainland (i.e. the island of Great Britain), as opposed to the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man, Northern Ireland (although when used to differentiate Britain from Ireland it can be considered an offensive usage) or any other British island.
# Mainland Ireland as opposed to its offshore islands. Note that "the mainland" in Northern Ireland is ambiguous between this sense and the preceding one; using the phrase to mean "Great Britain as opposed to Northern Ireland" is considered objectionable by many Nationalists.

Tony,

With your logic it proves my point from a geographical perspective, so the statement should have read the 'smaller island of the two largest' off the mainland(Continental Europe) not Britain.

Fact of the matter is the Republic of Ireland is not some island off 'the mainland' and until British people stop refering to it as such then thick Micks like myself will continue to take offence.

Tony, Like it or not, Eire is part of the British Isles. That's very different from the United Kingdom or Great Britain which are political names.
Scandinavia is similar, 3 separate nations.

Wickipedia is not as is often quite correct with it's facts though.

The larger mass is always the Mainland. So it is correct for England, Wales and Scotland to be referred Geographically as 'the mainland' as we are all Islands. Europe is the true mainland but defined as a continent.

Anglesey refers to Wales as the mainland and the IoW, IoM refer to the mainland in the same way.

The trouble is and it blights way too many of Irish extraction is the old chip on the shoulder deference to the British.
Mixing politics and bad blood has nothing to do with geography. But it blights this country.

Unlike the Irish, most Brits don't consider the Irish inferior or different in any way, they moved on from that long before we have.
But every time I go home the same old stuff about the Black and Tans and 300 years of stuff gets raised and we need to look within rather than just curse the English, Welsh or Scots

Tony,

True the British Isles is a geographical reference, however Anglesea is off the mainland of mainland Britain as it is part of Britain. Same can be said for Northern Ireland however the Republic is not part of the 'British Empire'. By your logic Britain is infact an off shoot of Europe so when people of the collective British Isles refer to it we should call it the mainland. How many British people would be happpy to refer to France or Germany as the mainland and be happy about it? The term mainland in this way is an old colony term used to describe offshore lands controlled by Britain such as Ireland, Girbralta and even Montseratt

The Republic of Ireland should be given the respect it deserves and should be refered to as the independent nation it is. In general in modern Ireland you will find most people are happy to be Irish in Ireland and they are only too happy to see the great relationship devloping between our great countries. However if British people dont recognise and respect the Republic it will only bring back up memories of stuff like black and tans or even more recent stuff than that.

I dont want to go on about this as its not the place for it. Right or wrong I can tell any British person who reads this that the majority of people will take offence at the term 'mainland' being used in a reference to Ireland. Ireland will do just fine thank you very much!

As co-owner of RM406 is am totally disgusted at the comments made in relation to 406's appearance at the Manchester event.

Tony Martin has no association whatsoever with 406 and does not speak for me or anyone else associated with the bus. Whatever values this man holds are his own and he speaks for himself and he alone.

What appeared was a generalised term and in no way was it a political statement to do with situations past or present. This is an attempt to high-jack the return of RM406 to the preservation world for the sake of pointing out political correctness.

All I will say is people on both sides of the Irish Sea who were associated with the return of RM406 were nothing but exeptional in the attitude and offer of help and valued assistance. I am very grateful for this because without this help RM406 would be nowhere near completed. It is with this spirit of co-operation that as a movement we, as preservationists can actually get things done.

As I said above I wish to distance RM406 and myself from comments made and I would ask the moderator to LOCK THIS THREAD before someone says something that will cause offence.

To all who gave help in the restoration, a sincere Thank you. It was a pleasure to be part of the team who brought the bus back over the Irish Sea since it departed 22 years ago. It is now back in Ireland where a very secure future in preservation lies ahead.

Who knows, in the future it would be nice to bring the bus over the sea before another 22 years go by before it is seen outside of Ireland again.

Gerry,
Co-owner RM406

Amazing isn't it - the person making the most 'offensive' comments is the one with no login!

Can we keep this forum for Routemasters and not geography, semantics, politics etc and if you do want to make a point to an individual then at least have the decency to either email directly, call me on mobile (provided on almost every posting of mine) or drive up to Blackpool and sort it out face-to-face if it causes you so much offence. Don't hide behind 'no login' and don't vent your anger on the entire forum.

Fact remains, RM406 looks superb and Gerry has a bus is very proud of.

Perhaps our critic could show us the examples of his superb Routemaster efforts to restore the balance.....We're all waiting....

Philip Higgs
www.thebusworks.co.uk
07880 507636

What has my involvement with Routemasters got to do with this? I saw the bus in Manchester and it looks great, I dont recall saying it didnt?

Im just telling you that the word mainland in relation to Ireland is an offensive term to use and if you knew any better you wouldnt use it!

If you wish to continue to use it I cant stop you nor will I try!

My inital tone by the offence I took to your comments was too sharp and for that Im sorry! The rest I stand over.

Thank you.