Civics - A British Subject

It is essential for all our children to learn history, to understand how this country came to be, to grasp the ideas that have shaped and continue to shape its descendants, the Anglospheric countries.

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Instead, our government is going to implement another version of the discredited “citizenship lessons”. These, if you please, will focus on “core British values”. As nobody knows what those core values are (Britishness is by definition indefinable) and anyone can pretend what they like on the subject, this is going to be an exercise in futility.

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Once upon a time most our children were taught in our schools how Parliament works, how the British Constitution works (oh yes, we do have one), how the United States Constitution works, how NATO and the United Nations are structured and so on.

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Of course, teachers today would, if they were to teach the same lessons would have to tell that Parliament legislates in only a small proportion of cases in this country; they would have to tell that the House of Lords is no longer the highest appeal court in this country; they would have to explain that our democracy is something of a joke and not because President Bush is such a nasty man.

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The teaching of history together with a serious and truthful course in civics in our schools, should open many eyes as to what being British should be about and to what it is actually about these days.