Should we safeguard our heritage?

There is a campaign in the town where I live at the moment.  I am not sure of the exact details, but it appears that a historic building is under threat.  I don't know how old the building is, and neither do I greatly care.  This is not because I do not care at all about Britain's heritage, but rather because I have a strong sense of futility.

Many years ago I was reading a magazine which reported a survey into people's attitudes to Britain's heritage.  The magazine's editor noted with regret that a black woman who was interviewed said That is the white man's - appearing to imply that she did not care about it.

I do sometimes feel a surge of pride when looking at - for example - a Victorian railway bridge.  Although it is unlikely that any of my ancestors helped to build it, I know that British minds designed it, and that British hands built it.    Immigrants who look at the same bridge are unlikely to feel that sense of pride, but they might nevertheless admire the achievement.

But do they?  I have just looked at the websites of English Heritage and the National Trust, complete with photographs of children visiting their various properties.  Just one photograph features a non-white child.

Being indifferent to our heritage is not the same as being opposed to it, but I cannot help but wonder if an ongoing policy of open door immigration to this country is really conducive to protecting our historic buildings.  Also, the fact that ISIS fighters are destroying historic monuments in Iraq makes me wonder if the same thing could happen here.

But then I have to reflect that this is ultimately an issue of little importance in the great scheme of things.  As I write, a Slovakian man is about to be sentenced for the particularly vicious rape of a teenage girl in Leeds.  I've got a good idea.  Maybe the authorities should lock him inside a historic building, and then knock it down.

One year on ...

This blog was launched last year on St George's Day, and the first entry was about the fact that a government minister had expressed support for using traditional county names.  My comment was that:

I suspect that most people in this country care little for traditional county names, and are far more interested in things like the state of the economy or the condition of their local roads.

The full comment can be read here.

Today I looked at the websites of the Conservative Party, the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, the United Kingdom Independence Party, the British National Party, and the Green Party (of England and Wales).  Of these, only two mentioned St George's Day.

While I have no objection to the BNP and UKIP mentioning that today is St George's Day, the fact remains that there are many far more important issues.  Mentioning a saint's day does not make you worth voting for.  Not mentioning it does not make you not worth voting for.

A lot has changed in the last year, and yet so much stays the same.  Writing this blog can sometimes seem like a repetitive task, but that is no reason not to continue with it.  I look forward to its second year.

In search of Rutland

When I was a child, my parents had a map of Britain on which the counties of England were labelled.  One of them was called Rutland - a small county which has long since been swallowed up by Leicestershire.  Other lost counties of England include Middlesex, Westmoreland, and Huntingdonshire.

It is reported that a goverment minister called Eric Pickles - a Conservative - wants us to start using these old county names once again.  As it happens it was a Conservative government back in the 1970s which was largely responsible to redrawing the local government map so as to alter the boundaries of many of our historic counties.

But then of course not that many people nowadays are in a position to remember the county boundaries that existed in England in 1970, and even those boundaries were not the same as those that had existed just ten years previously.

So is this change aimed at winning the votes of the small number of voters who can remember the good old days?  Maybe.  I suspect that most people in this country care little for traditional county names, and are far more interested in things like the state of the economy or the condition of their local roads.