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‘It was a momentous event. It feels odd sitting down with people you have spent your whole life opposing, but we have to pool our resources to save the Union. It is a referendum, not a rerun of Bannockburn as the SNP would have us believe. But like wars, elections are usually won by the side with the best leaders, resources and tactics.’

Almost one in three people who voted Conservative at the last election are ready to back the UK Independence Party, or have switched already, according to a devastating new opinion poll revealing the danger posed to David Cameron by a growing anti-Europe sentiment across Britain.

A CONTROVERSIAL new law designed to tackle bigotry and disorder in football will be powerless against anti-English racism and violence during this summer’s European Championships. Fans of the Auld Enemy who are abused while watching games in Scotland will not be protected by the Offensive Behaviour at Football Act, which came into force earlier this year.

The democracy that we have has never been representative. As Bagehot says, the British Government gets its authority from the awe invested by the people into the Monarchy – it’s nothing to do with a vote. Voting has never really swayed what the ruling class wants to do, and only now are people beginning to find this out. So, the utilitarian end of Government is merely a veil of decency for the all-powerful Crown in a supposed age of liberalism; the parliament that we have is just window dressing. We are not free, we are slaves in a system that mostly benefits one set of people.

Exactly what is wrong with being British? As a wise man called Hugh Grant once said, in a scene which rivals Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous for its believability, and – let's face it – its heartwarming factor, 'we may be a small country, but we are a great one. A country of Shakespeare, Churchill, The Beatles, Sean Connery, Harry Potter, David Beckham's right foot, David Beckham's left foot come to that...'

WHETHER Scotland is to become independent or remain as part of the union, we must acknowledge there would be both gains and losses, writes Gerry Hassan THIS week has seen important developments in the pro-union campaign.

There is much that makes us British beyond the existence of the United Kingdom: there’s our shared love of curry, beer, football and talking about the weather; our stoic and dry sense of humour; our healthy cynicism towards attempts at authority; and of course our shared languages. Using these and other positives, it’s time to shed the negative aspects of the image and redefine Britishness as something more about a broad basis of cooperation between good neighbours, rather than something imposed upon grumpy, claustrophic housemates.

I am a mum and a wife. In point of fact, I’m an English wife married to a Scottish husband, with three English children from my first marriage and two Scottish children from my current marriage. Why would I even bother to mention that at all, you might wonder – surely it doesn’t matter where my children were born, surely I love them just the same? And you would be right.

Despite having the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh and Northern Ireland Assemblies, we continue to have Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland questions in the House, which are often dominated by English MPs asking questions provided by the Whips Office. If we are to continue with this, is it not time to have English questions, too, so that English MPs can raise questions important to the English people?

It is one of those strange ironies that the patron Saint of England is half Turkish and half Palestinian. That he has become an emblem of the English nation despite his “foreign blood” is deeply symbolic given current debates on belonging. In this special feature on St. George, emel looks at the man, what he means to people here and abroad, and why he is the perfect patron for Britain today.

THE Welsh are among the positive people in the UK about the upcoming Royal Jubilee celebrations, new research reveals as the Queen celebrates 60 years of service to the nation

England in 1707 was a miserably backward country recently conquered by their naval rivals the Dutch and committed to choosing their future kings from Germans knowing no English, but was saved by brave Scots who kindly undertook the most important jobs the Union could provide from which they educated their uncouth but biddable protégés. Realising the English were incapable of understanding themselves, they kindly invented English models such as Dr Johnson, Ivanhoe, Dr Jekyll (and Mr Hyde), Sherlock Holmes, Peter Pan, Richard Hannay and Harry Potter. The Scots sent kindly rulers such as Rosebery, Balfour, Campbell- Bannerman, Ramsay MacDonald, MacMillan, Home, Blair, Brown and Cameron. The English are still too incompetent to govern themselves.

Scottish MPs put party differences aside today to urge the Government to protect the historic names and cap badges of regiments in their constituencies.

There is no 'British' higher education system, argues Alan Trench: there are four. Expect increasing political problems as a result

The chancellor quoted from a recent Cruddas lecture at the University of East Anglia in which he said: "What interests me is not policy as such; rather the search for political sentiment, voice and language; of general definition within a national story. Less The Spirit Level, more What Is England." Osborne said to laughter: "Well, that is clear then. Perhaps when they find out what is England they will let us all have the answer."

Englishness has long been a puzzle both to philosophers and to historians. As long ago as 1741, David Hume declared: "The English, of any people in the universe, have the least of a national character, unless this very singularity may pass for such." In his 2001 book England: An Elegy, the philosopher Roger Scruton asked: "What was England? A territory? A language? A culture? An empire? An idea?", but concluded rather lamely: "All answers seem inadequate." Often, Englishness has been explained by what it is not - to be English, it is said, is not to be Scottish, Welsh or Irish; more recently, it has been suggested that to be English is not to be European.

Dafydd Wigley examines proposals to reform the Lords and says the UK is heading for a constitutional quagmire

English democracy has also been absorbing IPPR of late. In England and the Union: How and Why to Answer the West Lothian Question, the thinktank swings behind an ‘English grand committee’ system, versions of which have been devised by Tory grandees Malcolm Rifkind and Ken Clarke and which would in part answer the vexed question. But the tank goes further, arguing that this will be necessary but insufficient to give a greater voice to what it has previously called ‘the dog that finally barked: England as an emerging political community’.

England has the highest population density of any large European country, and is one of the world’s most crowded countries.  It also has a high current population growth rate, running at its highest for fifty years and accounting for one third of European growth.  It is estimated that there could be another ten million people living in Britain by 2030.  As a result, land prices are high, properties are expensive and our new homes and room sizes are some of the smallest in Europe.

Union – as an alternative means of controlling English imperial ambitions – was the brainchild of the 16th century Scottish philosopher and historian John Mair. And when union finally came into being it was not an English takeover – in some ways it was quite the reverse. In return for amalgamating with the English parliament, the Scots were allowed a large measure of institutional autonomy, including their established Presbyterian kirk and distinctive system of law. Furthermore, the Scots gained membership of a large free-trading area and access to England’s overseas colonies under the protection of the Royal Navy.