re = /(\S+) (North East)/m
str = 'North East Isle
London Northwestern
North East Bedfordshire
Southward and North East Bermondsey
Middlesbrough South and Cleveland East'
subst = '\\2 \\1'
result = str.gsub(re, subst)
# Print the result of the substitution
puts result
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for Ruby, please visit: http://ruby-doc.org/core-2.2.0/Regexp.html