Bluffers' Briefing: The Isle of Man
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Your support makes all the difference.Derivation: Perhaps from Ellan Mannin, the middle island.
Dimensions: 32.5 miles long, 13.5 miles wide, 227 sq miles in area.
Population: 70,000 (approx).
Significance of the three-legged emblem: Quocunque jeceris stabit.
In plain English: Wherever you throw it, it stands.
Last time a criminal was birched: 1975.
Reason given by Manx MP for keeping birching on statute book: 'We are sending out a clear message to the world that we believe in law and order.'
Description of birching by European Court of Human Rights in 1976: 'Cruel and unusual'.
Requirements for birch: 40-inch lengths of birch twigs.
Year of abolition of hanging: 1993.
Year of legalisation of homosexual acts by consenting adults in private: 1992.
Word for 'homosexuality' in Manx Gaelic: homocheintys.
Other useful phrases: Moghrey mie (Good morning), Ta my phoggaid follym (I am out of cash).
Level of personal income tax: Two bands of 15 per cent and 20 per cent.
Useful fact: There are more runic inscriptions to be found in the Isle of Man than in the whole of Norway.
Another useful fact: It is the location of the only town called Andreas in the British Isles.
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