On St George's Day, I went on the Jimmy Young show. I travelled from Brixton to the studio in central London, scanning the landscape for exhibitions of flag-waving. There was just one person who displayed the flag on his back; otherwise the capital was clean.
Jimmy asked why, if the Irish can have their St Patrick's Day, we can't have our St George's Day? He could have added that many former colonial countries celebrate an independence day to mark their escape from the dominance of the land that once ruled the waves and whose citizens never ever shall be slaves, slavery being for all except the English.
And that is precisely the point. Englishness was associated with dominance; and that needs no celebration in post-imperial culture. St George's Day should be heading in the other direction, creating a mood of penitence, though also a quiet appreciation of the best that was imparted in the period of empire. There should be no chest-beating or foot-stamping. But St George's Day is irrevocably tainted with right-wing nationalism and it would need a miracle to get away from it. The trouble with these moments of national celebration is that they tend to express themselves as against someone else and never for anything positive - they are the opposite of May Day, which celebrates an international culture of revolt.
It was on the eve of St George's Day in 1993 that, pumped up with national pride, the assailants of Stephen Lawrence drew the blood of the enemy, the immigrant from a former colonial country.
And there, perhaps, lies the answer. After Stephen Lawrence's murder, the traditions of revolt, which won our independence, were brought to the capital of England and forced changes in one of the country's major institutions, the police. The campaign was characterised by its international and multiracial mix. So can we now drop St George's Day and commemorate Stephen Lawrence Day instead? Not St Stephen, mark you; we are in the realm of the secular.
Further to last week's column, I wish to make it clear that Jane Griffiths MP did not express reservations about Blue Sky Arts's guns debate in Reading. On the contrary, Ms Griffiths accepted an invitation to attend. I apologise to her for my error.
