If you want to deal with the racists who lay claim to our flag and patron with bad intent, then the way to do this isn’t to attack the idea of the flag or the person of the patron but to pick them up, hold them high and, as Steve Knightly wrote, proclaim “I've lost St. George in the Union Jack It's my flag too and I want it back”. You don’t exclude St George, you do what we did in Bradford and you put on a parade with the symbols of the city as well as the saint and his dragonish foe.Take flag and patron into primary schools, teach their history including Agincourt, vanquishing the Armada, Waterloo and D-Day, say that this is their country and that these men who wore those colours and invoked the spirit of St George are what made it a great place.

I like, despite the fake paganism, Zakia Sewell’s desire to keep those ancient traditions (and some not so ancient) and better still to get us involved with them. But we can do this as well as flying the flag of St George, celebrating king and country, and remembering that the great land where we are so fortunate to live didn’t happen by accident. It happened because of many things - trade, innovation, genius - and one of those things is that men fought to keep the land they call home free. Denying this is an insult to England.