The Telegraph's editorial says that they had been urged
by many readers to make a song and a dance about St George's day but even
though they say "the present Government seems to treat the Scots,
Welsh and Irish more favourably than the English…" they decided
against it as they deemed it to be a little un-English. They went on to
say "one of the characteristics of the English is that most of them
have never felt any particular need to shout about there separate nationhood.
WATE Comment: It's true. Shouting about who
we are may be a little un-English but it may also prove to be our greatest
weakness. It is precisely for this reason that no one thinks twice about
upsetting us or taking liberties with our culture or our country. They
know that nothing will be said and they can continue to treat us as virtual
second class citizens. The very fact that we do wear our patriotism lightly
has now been taken advantage of. Look where it has got us. The Welsh,
Scottish and Northern Irish now have their own parliaments to fight the
corner of their own people while we are disadvantaged because we have
no one.
Massive spending discrepancies go unchallenged, the
Welsh bring back grants for students and scrap prescription charges, Scottish
students pay no tuition fees while at university, they have smaller class
sizes shorter hospital waiting lists and have further proposed that Scottish
citizens in care homes will get free nursing and personal care. The other
home countries are free to set their own education syllabus, taught from
a Scottish, Welsh or Irish perspective, while we are the only ones who
have the national curriculum hoisted upon. And this is just the tip of
the iceberg. It's about time that the English did a little shouting for
themselves, if only to counter the fact that much of the media, political
establishment, education system, local councils see English as a dirty
word. If we don't shout about ourselves, no one else is going to do it
for us.
