BBC Radio Shropshire are talking about Englishness this morning.

They’re on 96FM in Shropshire or online at BBC Shropshire.

Edit:
Had the following email read out on air:

I don’t feel British any more. I’ve always considered myself English/British but a couple of years ago I started to question what this Britishness was about. Generally, the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish don’t feel British and they’re certainly not encourage to do so by the British government unless they start talking about independence or there’s an election to be won!

I’m very proud to be English. English men and women have achieved many great things. England – Shropshire in particular – is the birthplace of both the industrial revolution and modern democracy, both of which have had probably the biggest impact on society since the Romans.

The first English Parliament was held in Acton Burnell near Shrewsbury and this evolved over the years into the full English Parliament that pretty much every modern parliamentary democracy in the world is based on.

Cecil Rhodes once said that to be born English is to have won first prize in the lottery of life. I wonder what he would make of modern day England? We aren’t allowed our own government, you often can’t describe yourself as English without being branded a racist, we can’t even have our own national anthem.

I don’t think you can define what Englishness is. It doesn’t matter if you’re a second generation immigrant or a direct decendent of an Anglo-Saxon king – if you’re English, you know it.

And this one …

England, Scotland and Wales aren’t one race. Lowland Scots are genetically similar to the English, Highland Scots are genetically different to Lowland Scots and the Welsh share their genes with the Irish, Cornish and Bretons in France.

It’s all a bit of a mish-mash now but there are traditional genetic/ethnic groups in the UK.

Your genes are irrelevant anyway, I know plenty of Black and Asian people who describe themselves as English rather than British. Nationality and ethnicity are two different things.

And this one as well in response to someone who said that Englishness is all about ethnicity (who, it turns out, is a prominent member of Shrewsbury BNP) …

My two step children are half-English, a quarter Scottish and a quarter Irish. At 8 and 6 years old, they know the difference between England and Britain and consider themselves English. I think there is some Welsh in me somewhere along the lines as is the case with a lot of Shropshire families. I am an English nationalist and an active member of the Campaign for an English Parliament. Would those people who say that being English is all about ethnicity deny me my right to call myself and my children English?