In early March I visited Dublin and although St Patrick’s Day was weeks away, the party had already begun.
The city was awash with the Irish tricolour and preparations for March 17th were well under way for a host of events to pay homage to the Apostle of Ireland and celebrate everything Irish.
I returned to London and was delighted to see a wholesome itinerary of lively events in our capital in a hat tip to our Irish friends.
It was a bit of a let-down therefore, to see that April 23rd has been given the same understated treatment we have grown accustomed to.
The demise of St George’s Day and English patriotism is often attributed to the gross abuse by neo- Nazi factions.
In reality, the blame should lie with the pompous liberals who used the neo-Nazis as an excuse to sneer the St George’s Cross and subject genuine patriots who celebrate everything that is great about England with accusations of racism.
The Labour Party has been a prominent force in the assault on English patriotism.
Whether it was the deeply unpleasant sentiment adopted by Labour’s Emily Thornberry who ridiculed a family who proudly flew the flag, or the Labour Councillor in Radstock who banned the England flag from being flown in her entire town in case it offended the 16 Muslims who lived there (Muslims living there actually came out and said the ban was political correctness gone mad), Labour are consistently ashamed of English patriotism.
Thankfully, the more sinister elements of the Left have failed in their mission to destroy the celebration of Englishness and we are beginning to see a resurgence of patriotism.
Every country should be proud to celebrate its existence at least once a year.
There are many disaffected Tory voters who would have been overjoyed to see the Prime Minister announce that if he is returned to Number 10, St George’s Day will become a Bank holiday.
Unfortunately, it was left to Mr Farage to make this pledge and David Cameron missed out again.
Cameron is fighting the battle of his life against Nicola Sturgeon and Ed Miliband’s Scottish rebellion and if he wants to avoid being thrown on the scrapheap on May 8th, he should start showing the English a bit of leg for that is where his chances lie.
To their credit, Nicola Sturgeon and Leanne Wood have cottoned on and their enthusiasm for Scottish and Welsh populist policies has worked a treat.
English patriotism is on the rise and St George’s Day should be celebrated up and down this magnificent country unashamedly.
So go out, fly the cross of St George, slurp back the Somerset cider and scoff the Melton Mowbray.
Celebrate this St George’s Day as if it were the last. It could well be.
With Ed and Nicola running England out of Scotland, we will be celebrating Alex Salmond Day this time next year.
