Think Brexit is a fair vote? Think again...

All of us have an opinion on the current situation regarding the UK's badly-conceived looming referendum on whether they wish to remain part of the EU or not. Sides are being formed and defences are being reinforced ready for the approaching battle. Unfortunately, it seems, even your allies should not be trusted...

David Cameron is a wilier old fox than you would give such a man who, through his parents' riches, never really needed to be talented. Some people say he is a male Margaret Thatcher (but without the balls). I think to view him so favourably to the Iron Lady is to compare suicide by messy drug overdose to a slight fever caused by a dodgy mushroom. He is a very, very cheap imitation of her, and just a sponsored high-ranking civil servant who has obviously been promised a cushy job or two on a few boards of directors once he leaves politics.

Anyhow, he seems to have continued that tradition of saying one thing while doing another. Think I'm being paranoid? Let's see the facts:

1. They'll take anyone's vote
Read this little beauty from the Guardian, which has arrived just in time for the referendum. In essence, it says that anyone not from the EU who wishes to remain in the country needs to earn over £35,000 to do so. It is a perfect vote-grabber. How do we stop so many of our good friends from Australia and Canada being kicked out? We vote for Brexit. Then we'll kick all the Poles and Lithuanians out and keep the Anglophones. See this in the news much? No. After the Tories' conduct in the general election, where every single vote counted, this is another one of those little toppers-up. Commonwealth citizens can vote in the election, so this is sure to help gain a few tens of thousands to the cause.

2. They'll upset a few people
To get the President of the United States to come to your country and tell everyone you are going to the back of the queue (a British word), is to get up the nostrils of hundreds of thousands of people who think it's none of his business. Forget those who are persuaded by him - this is about gaining numbers on the "no" side.

3. They'll make it harder for those likely to vote "in" to do so
The referendum takes place during Glastonbury and the European Football Championships, thus thousands of young people, who are more likely to vote "in" will unfortunately be away. Furthermore, the government recently changed the way people can vote - before the last general election, the PM thought it was a good idea to cancel the previous system of automatic registration, and introduce a process whereby newcomers and those who reach 18 have to consciously register. Out go several thousand more potential voters.

4. They'll put a lot of people off voting so many times in a short period
If my theory is right, there is one way to test it - the Scottish elections are coming up, as are the London elections, the Northern Irish and Welsh Assembly elections, the Police Commissioner elections, and the local government elections in England. They take place on 5th May. Election fatigue will set in when immediately after those, the EU referendum campaign really kicks off and people will be so fed up by 23rd June that there will be very few who will really feel like voting. Except, of course, those who are really passionate about it, which would be almost entirely made up of Brexiteers... there go some more potential voters.

5. They'll play to Pro-independence Scots - without lifting a finger
I can see it now - while they're upsetting a lot of Brits by getting Obama in on the act, they can also recruit hundreds of thousands of Scots by dropping a few verbal bombs on life after Brexit. And they don't need a Tory to do it for them... Nicola Sturgeon said she would think it almost certain that a new push for independence will be sought if there was a vote in favour of leaving the EU. How convenient. It is therefore in the interest of as many as 1.6 million people who voted to leave the UK in 2014 to vote Brexit and then trigger a second Scottish referendum almost immediately. What will be the result? The Scots will declare independence, apply to remain in the EU, as might the Welsh and Northern Irish, and the English will unilaterally leave both the UK and the EU.

6. They don't really care about your country
If those seeking the UK's withdrawal from the EU had patriotism in mind, they would be wise to remember that an awful lot of Scots, Welsh, Northern Irish and indeed English, don't think they do. In fact, I personally think it is all to do with money. England would become a test ground for extreme neo-liberal policy experiments. Where better than the home of the world's banks where nearly every commodity has been privatised and the National Health Service and education system are ripe for a sell-off? If you can't see the stitch-up here, then you undoubtedly see the goodness in everyone, even a Tory...

Conclusion:
So before you put your cross on the "Leave" side of the ballot paper, just remember this: what will be the true cost of Brexit? All the propaganda about saving money is phoney. You will not save money, and if you did, it will be minuscule - you won't even notice the difference. You think a Tory government is going to invest the money in the country? Don't make me laugh! They will invest it in their cronies and back-slapping maties in the City of London.

Project Fear, as it has been dubbed, is just that, but it is focusing on the wrong things. The UK is a testing ground for the future of democracy. They are importing Viktor Orban's style of garnering votes and many are being hoodwinked by it. Don't be fooled - if you genuinely are tired of the EU and its decadencies, vote "Remain" and ask for - no, demand - reforms. But fight from the inside!

Pick on someone your own size, Salmond!

There is a sliding scale of things it's best not to be if you don't want to be shot at. Firstly, being white. Then able-bodied, followed by middle or upper class, and finally being male. However, there is one heinous crime above all others: being English.
Not any old English, as regional dialects give you an oppressed edge about you. I mean, from the South-East corner, the Home Counties, the bit of England that's rarely covered in cloud. It's the way they speak. It's not cool to be clever in the UK, and it's certainly not cool to sound it, even if you're not. Even within the South East, there is a divide in the perceptions amongst various speakers. Sound like you're ready to go for auditions to EastEnders, and you're all right. Make the most basic of grammatical mistakes (we was, I would of/should of, etc.) and you're immediately accepted to the human race. But do your best to speak properly or lose your regional accent (Andrew Marr, for example) and you're mockfodder to the masses, a pull for the polemic pursuer, a target for the tormentor. When I say speak properly, I don't mean sound like a posher version of Prince Charles, but generally grammatically correct and sounding like you're from the South East.

And so everyone else in the country thinks you are an oppressor, a politically incorrect incarnation of imperial oppression in human form, a grotesque being who likes treading on hungry proles. There are several things that made me sit up and take note this week - one was an article in the Guardian about political correctness (not the article but the posts of left-wing indignity after it) and the other was the merciless right-wing press stories about Scottish independence. Is nobody reasonable any more?

The Scots who want independence, and I do not think there are as many of them as we are led to believe, don't really want independence from the Liverpudlian or the Newcastrian English, but more from the Kentish and the Oxfordian English.

Although I don't profess to being English but British, I have had to follow my geographical birthplace around with me. I remember well the various times I have been confronted with people from different parts of the English-speaking world and there has never been a problem until someone turns up with a chip on his or her shoulder about either my accent or my place of birth. Once, an Australian, a Scot and a Canadian all set upon me because I don't have the accent of a colonially oppressed individual. This was more bizarre because the fourth person was from Manchester. It's a southern English thing. And it's really just jealousy.

Scottish people want independence, do they? I'm not really so sure. I think a lot of English would be very happy to see them go, but despite all their bluster, I think they realise what a waste it would be to ditch England. Some English, though, see them as economic millstones around their necks, or creamers of the milk of social welfare and education.

SNP supporters talk about being independent, but I have a message for them: be careful what you wish for... Have you thought about how your standing in the world will be after separation? You'll be half the size of Belgium, population-wise, and the same size as the Czech Republic, size-wise. Your position now, as part of the United Kingdom, means you punch above your weight in international organisations. Scottish people have the opportunity to be candidates for the UK's seat on the UN Security Council, to be the UK's Prime Minister with all the functions that entails and to be part of a powerful national bloc of seats in the EU which is taken far more seriously due to its size than a country with the population of, say, Slovakia. For England, Wales and Northern Ireland, however, losing 8% of the people will be no big deal.

Concerning your currency, you will need to set up your own, because I do not think a country can truly call itself independent without finding its place in the world financially. It is also terribly unfair to the country whose currency tailcoat you are hanging on to, and I do not think the Chancellor in London will permit you anyhow. The euro may beckon for you, but you would be wiser joining NAFTA or EFTA, I think, and setting up the Scottish Pound to float on its own. While we're at it, I think you should be informed about the Northern Irish question. The Protestants of the proud province of Ulster claim to be mainly of British descent. Many of them were originally Scottish crofters. So as far as the people of Northern Ireland are concerned, you will be the natural inheritors of that little debate too.

Actually, it is starting to look quite sunny for the English. I have personally always abhorred your infatuation with cheering English sporting misery and your openly discriminatory nature towards your southern naighbours, despite benefiting quite nicely from the union, so maybe as a separate country, you will mature and see England as a friendly neighbour, like the Irish, and the English will one day forgive you for being so boorish in the past. I take particular offence in anyone getting picked upon for no good reason, and the English get it from everyone. The French, Australians, Scottish, Argentinians, Spanish and Russians have all recently had a bone to pick with the English, (not the British, please note), and it's time they got a little sympathy. I touched this a while ago with this blog.

I have always called myself British. It is a proud, all-inclusive word that distinguishes us from other European nations in that you can be any colour, have any origin, and still be British. French people have had a much greater problem integrating non-French people precisely because "French" is an ethnie as well as a nationality, whereas "British" means you can be English, Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish and British, but also Indian, Jamaican, Ghanaian or Canadian and British. I think the UK is stronger in Europe and the world when the whole island is united but I think I am becoming less against the idea of Scottish independence, simply because I am slowly getting tired of Alex "Bravebelly" Salmond and his party wittering on about how they would love independence from the UK. Well, I do not think they really do. And deep down, I don't think the English do either, but they would be less affected by Scotland leaving than the Scottish themselves.

Let's not be beastly to the English

All successful people are targets for being shot down by their detractors and those who are jealous of them. It has happened to me recently by certain self-important busybodies at a university where I was until recently injecting some badly-needed motivation and charisma into their rather humdrum, banal and ineffective courses. Some just didn't like the fact that I had a good relationship with the students and that my courses were over-subscribed. Oh yes, and one of the lesser staff members (whose whole philosophy on life is already a little backward-thinking) was investigating my private life, trying to find something to prove I was unsuitable for the position. Eventually they got me on the fact that I didn't have the word "doctor" before my name... As if a higher qualification matters to the overall ability to train and nurture 90 university undergraduates. All the qualifications in the universe do not make a good coach. I wrote a departure letter to my colleagues and left them to stew in their own self-obsessed juices. Still, whatever floats their boat.

And now, to my disbelief, I need to come to the aid of a group of people whom I have not considered to be a part of, but are the indigenous tribe to the place I was born, the English. I have forever classed myself as a British citizen. I think the word "British" is an inclusive, universal term for people who live in the British Isles and even beyond. You can be Scottish first and British second, or the other way round. Same for English, Welsh and dare I say Irish. But you can also be Jamaican and British, Kenyan and British, Canadian and British, Pakistani and British and even Polish and British, why not? It is an advantage we have over other countries in Europe, and makes us more ethnically versatile, tolerant and multi-faceted than the United States.

And this is why I consider it a crying shame that now the English (let's face it, the central pivots on whom their co-inhabitants spin) are feeling threatened, intimidated, spurned and unloved in their own backyard as well as far away.

There is firstly the West Lothian Question, the term coined by Enoch Powell about the paradox that Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish MPs in Westminster have as much say over what happens in England as an English MP, but the same is not afforded to the English themselves as their own local questions are debated in Cardiff, Edinburgh and Stormont. This was tolerated until recently but more and more English people are becoming disenchanted with this situation. Why can that be?

It is simple. For ages now, the Scottish have always enjoyed support from the other Home Nations when competing in sports tournaments. The same for Wales and Northern Ireland, but the English have always been out on their own. This year, one Edinburgh company has made some t-shirts for the World Cup called "ABE", meaning "Anyone But England", a blatant message to those down south about where the Scottish loyalties lie. The English kind of know who they are and are quite comfortable with this, unlike the other areas of the UK, so they could swallow this type of tongue-in-cheek banter.

But the fact that the English are starting to feel that the Scottish are creaming state funds away from English areas to support their own projects, with a cry of indignation and a new round of discussions over independence if they don't get their wish is making the average English a little tired of the continual barrage of anti-Sassenach rhetoric. Taking into account that a person resident in Scotland can go to any university in the UK for free whilst English residents must pay (often running into ten thousand pounds of debt) is forcing English hearts to turn to stone.

And who can blame them?

But it is not just the Scots who are cranking up the anti-English sentiment. The Australians are playing their part too. In the recent Olympic Games in Beijing, the Australians fell behind the British in terms of medals and that made them determined to do something about it. So, as the British won a lot of cycling medals, the Australians have invested hundreds of thousands of their Australian dollars into building up their cycling unit, to the extent that only two years later they have gained three times more medals at the World Cycling Championships as the British team. OK, this is aimed at the British in general, but deep in their minds, it is because the English make up most of the team. The truth of this can be seen in the final of the Australian Open tennis in Melbourne, where the crowd took to singing support for Andy Murray. When asked why this should be so, many said because he's a non-English, English speaker, and therefore one of them.

How cynical.

So, let me tell you this: I have always stuck up for the underdog, if the cause was justified. That means even French and Russians, Poles and Americans, when being needlessly picked upon. The English have put up with others' detractions for a long time but nobody has defended them. This has caused a notable rise in the amount of English people who, even only ten years ago would have never considered the dissolution of the United Kingdom, see it as a necessary step in their rights to reclaim some dignity. You can impose yourself on one nation's hospitality and tolerance for only so long, before they tell you to go off and bother someone else. That is where England happens to be today.

Beware, the Scottish National Party, you may just get your wish, and then who will subsidise your lavishly extravagant social democratic state?

Reasons to be proud of being British:
1. The BBC.2. The tolerance and open-mindedness afforded to all-comers of any nation if they are prepared to work.
3. Religious freedom, even to the point of being over-tolerant to fundamentalists.
4. British philanthropy and charity rundraising - Comic Relief, Sport Relief, Band Aid, eccentric events and feats to raise money for worthy causes.
5. Christie, Hardy, Thomas, Burns, Austen, Rowling, Pratchett, Bateman, McDermid, etc...
6. John Cleese, Rowan Atkinson, Billy Connolly, Dawn French, Tommy Cooper, etc...
7. Sir Chris Hoy, Jenson Button, Gareth Edwards, George Best, Ryan Giggs, Sir Steve Redgrave.
8. The pound Sterling.
9. The Commonwealth.
10. The English language.
11. Keynes, Rutherford, Newton, Macadam, Darwin, Berners Lee, Brunel, Adams, etc...
12. Flower of Scotland, Land of my Fathers, Danny Boy, Land of Hope and Glory
13. The Sunday trip to the garden centre
14. Womens' Institute, Scouts, Girl Guides, Salvation Army, etc...
15. Rugby, Curling, Tennis, Golf, Snooker, Badminton, Bobsleigh, Cricket, Darts, Table Tennis.
16. Sir Mick Jagger, Sir Elton John, Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Tom Jones
17. The Industrial Revolution.
18. Common Law and precedence
19. Sir Winston Churchill, Clement Attlee, Margaret Thatcher, Benjamin Disraeli
20. Fair play.

These are just some reasons why we should be immensely proud of our heritage, why we need to put our differences behind us and start working again as a team. Because although the British saved the world from the ravages of totalitarianism, nobody will save her from herself.