The current national flag-waving by the English is hugely gratifying for those of us who feel that our beloved country has been sidelined for too long.

Along with that visible symbol of English patriotism, may I make another plea – for I don’t want to live in an abbreviated country!

That country used to be called Britain, now usually described as ‘the UK’ – and we see ‘Great Britain’ even less.

Britain, the very name of which resonates with history, and of which I am very proud, has been reduced to a two-letter abbreviation – ugly-looking when written, and something akin to a cheerleader’s chant when spoken: ‘Yoo-Kay’, and bearing a sad resemblance to ‘Yukky’.

Almost every country in the world has a ‘real’ name that helps its residents feel a sense of identity. But ‘I live in the UK’? It has a horribly soulless feel about it, like something a faceless quango has drawn up on the spur of the moment – certainly not a name rich in tradition that has been carried down the millennia.

It was not always so. This reduction of the title of our glorious islands has happened insidiously over the past two or three decades without most folk noticing it. One has only to glance through old newspapers and magazines, or listen to old broadcasts on radio and TV, to notice that 30 years ago the term ‘UK’ was rarely used.

It is ironic that our national broadcaster, the BBC, has ‘British’ enshrined in its very name, yet that organisation is among the worst offenders, almost always preferring ‘UK’ over ‘Britain’ or ‘British’!

How has this happened? There are perhaps many reasons; but the most obvious has been the use of .uk as the terminator in website addresses. If .gb had been the standard, as originally proposed, things may now be quite different.

One of the odd things about all this is that foreigners mostly still use the term ‘Britain’ rather than ‘the UK’ – putting us to shame.

Some may ask: ‘Why does this matter?’

It matters greatly, for the very word ‘Britain’ conveys the feeling of being connected to ancient history. It’s a name with centuries of glorious tradition behind it, a history which we should never be ashamed of proclaiming.

And what about England? Perhaps even worse than the reduction of our islands to an abbreviation is the widespread lack of recognition for my homeland, England.

The use of ‘England’ in many walks of life has all but disappeared in the past few decades, now usually subsumed under the blanket ‘UK’. Here are a few examples from radio programmes in just one morning, where the dreadful ‘UK’ is used when the person using it means ‘England’:

‘When I return to the UK’ (the speaker lives in Hertfordshire);

‘This stretch of the UK coastline’ (in Dorset);

‘As a teenager living in the UK in the sixties’ (the speaker lived in Manchester).

This rarely happens when the location is in Wales or Scotland; in such cases ‘This stretch of the Welsh coastline’, for example, would be used without hesitation. It is only when England is the subject that the speaker refers to it as ‘UK’.

Until 20 or 30 years ago, manufacturers based in England proudly displayed the line ‘Made in England’ on their wares. Nowadays, one rarely sees this: more usually it is ‘Made in the UK’. Every summer, supermarkets display English-grown strawberries with the prominent label ‘British strawberries’, but label Scottish-grown strawberries as ‘Scottish strawberries’, as if England does not exist.

And according to the Netweather website, England definitely doesn’t exist, for their radar map of the British Isles shows Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, but not England!

So what can we do about it?

First, we should continue to display our flags high and widely.

Write to manufacturers who use ‘UK’ in their address and ask them to change it. Similarly, ask friends in England who use ‘UK’ in conversations why they don’t use ‘England’, and persuade them to do so.

And along with the need to re-emphasise England as a nation, let us battle with all our strength to get rid of .uk as our internet country name. Instead, let us fight for the adoption of .eng as an identifier for all internet users based in England, and similarly for the other British nations.

I am proud to be a British citizen (not, you will note, a Yoo-Kay citizen); but am even prouder to be an English citizen; my roots, my heart and my life are founded here in this small but amazing nation. Scots are proud to say the same, as indeed are the Welsh and the Irish; and so we need to encourage Englishmen and women to identify and to celebrate our nationhood in patriotic ways at every opportunity – not just by displaying our flags!

https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/call-us-england-or-britain-but-never-uk/

ED - This article by Ken Burnley describes well the EUisation of England. Yet fails to see the underlying legal threat and coming destruction of England into eleven regions each beholden to non-democratic power, not to mention mass immigration. British does not exist other than as a land mass, a geographical term. I am not British. I am English.

https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/call-us-england-or-britain-but-never-uk/