Under a false flag

Displaying your patriotism is a fine thing. That is not our flag though.

Go back a few decades, and the St George flag was rarely seen It was known, but few would think of flying it, let alone vandalising a roundabout with it, as a patriotic display. Our flag is the Union Jack. The old flag of England started appearing at football matches, perhaps in the 1980s, and has gone on from there.

I have a large box of flags. At events like the Coronation, and Her Late Majesty’s last Jubilee that preceded it, I put on a grand display of red-white-and-blue. I have our county flag too, flown when occasion demands it. I have the flags and bunting ready to hand for the next festivities or a national occasion. My heart is cheered by the Union Flag catching the wind – it says Home, and all that has made our nation great.

I am not having any part in this latest round of flag protest. I might cheer a display of patriotism in defiance of a government that seems determined to betray the most sacred things entrusted to them, but there is something wrong. It is too political. I can raise the flag on political occasions – I did to celebrate the Brexit result, and the end of the Scottish referendum. I may pull out my BIOT flag when the dark day comes, or if it is averted. This latest thing is not mine though, and certainly not with the wrong flag.

Much has been said about the England flags that have sprung up bound to lampposts and sprayed on roundabouts, and motives have been asserted – but really every individual has his own reasons. Why that bicoloured flag though? It is a pretty flag no doubt, but it is not our national flag.

The Union Jack is the flag of our nation. How many times can I say that? It might have started out as a combination of mediaeval crosses, but it is a single pattern, undivided, and a flag all of itself, that has become far more than its origins. The Union Flag has been carried to the uttermost corners of the map, marking Britain’s power on every continent and in every ocean. No other flag has shown such might.

To fly the flag of England is to reject all that we have become and achieved over the centuries. It is as if to say too that only part of the country counts. It seems a studied insult to Scots, Ulstermen and Welshmen. Why do that? We are all one nation.

The name of England is redolent of poetry. “There’ll always be an England”; “A corner of a foreign field that is forever England” and much more. To the insular, or rather sub-insular, Englishman, I should give a reminder that before the mid-twentieth century the name “England” was used as a synonym for the whole of the United Kingdom – sometimes by extension even for the Empire – so the poetry is talking of all of Britain. Brook’s “richer dust” concealed is a dust whom Britain bore, shaped, made aware; and the hearts at peace are under a British heaven.

I can guess reasons why the red-and-white flag has become prominent. Firstly, I would say it is familiarity from football. Some too may feel separated from our fellow Britons because of the socio-political shenanigans of separatists – it would be most patriotic though to protest against those malicious souls undermining our nation, and insist on the Union Flag.

Also though, it may come down to ethnicity. Gordon Brown (a sound patriot though he is) and many others would emphasis the label ‘British’ for the growing number belonging to ethnic minorities, provoking perhaps withdrawal of native folk from that identity and a search for a new identity, which is reflected in the English flag.

It may be different for different people. I can guess how some think, but everyone involved in this latest outbreak of flags will have their own ideas and motives for their choice of emblem. I am not one.

I am a Briton, born and raised under a British Heaven: my dust will be a dust whom our United Kingdom bore, shaped, made aware, Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam, A body of Britain’s, breathing British air, Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home. My only flag is the Union Jack.