Rise up, Englishmen

28 April 2007

Liam Byrne says the English must be less apathetic about the United Kingdom, and about the threat of Scottish independence that looms in next week’s elections

As another celebration of our patron saint passes and the Scottish elections loom, now is the time to hear a few more English patriots raising a glass not just to England but to our United Kingdom.

It feels a little odd at times that we do not hear more English voices speak out against the error of Scottish independence. We know the Union is hugely important to Scotland. Two and a half million Scots have relatives in England; hundreds of thousands work south of the border and the ‘Union dividend’ is worth some £10 billion.

But the Union is of fundamental importance to England too, not just economically but for English society. There is perhaps no better illustration of our economic ties than the UK’s huge financial services powerhouse. The UK has rapidly consolidated its global leadership of the industry in the last decade. But £8 billion pounds of the business is based in Scotland, 90 per cent of which is linked to the rest of the UK.

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Marcus Perry

February 10th, 2008 2:54pm Report this comment

Bull, I have a thousand years of British ancestry and my wife does too. She was born in South Africa but maintained a British identity. My family is British but Liam Byrne insists on her removal from Britain in spite of our 24 year marriage and here he mouths off about how important being British is. My advice to the Highlanders-run to the Hills and put as much distance between yourselves and the English Government. They are anti-family and anti British.

Peter Dunkley

June 4th, 2008 11:50am Report this comment

Byrne is embarrassing himself with this pursuit of Britishness, presumably on the instructions of Gordon Brown. A public holiday to celebrate our 'Britishness' is just dreadful. It is amusing that the political beneficiaries of a break up of the Union would be the Tories, the traditional party of union, and that Labour, the proponents of devolution, are now so desperate to get the genie back in the bottle.

Personally I feel that the Northern Irish, the Welsh and the Scots will feel much happier without the burden of all that resentment against the English. Anyway, along with most English folk, I spend a lot of time on the continent and never venture into Scotland, Wales or NI. Even the French aren't as anti-English as the Scots...

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