Darren Collins

If I moved to Japan, and lived in Japan for decades, speaking the language, integrating into society, contributing to the economy. Would I be ethnically Japanese? No. No I would not. I would never pretend to be. Nor would that apply to India, Thailand, Mexico, Denmark or anywhere else. So why is England different? Of course there is an English ethnicity. I am entirely bemused by how so many argue against that. It’s just a fact. Politicians who say otherwise are cowards. This is painfully obvious. Restore Britain’s position is clear. English ethnicity exists - it’s the only sodding data point that the Government collects on anything. Of course someone who is not of that ethnicity can be British, obviously. But it equally does not mean that the English ethnicity is imaginary. Those two things can be true at the same time. I got in trouble years ago for suggesting that the footballer Paul Pogba was French, but not ethnically French. It’s insanity. That is just a factual position. Common sense, clearly. Separately, Restore Britain has said from the very start - owning a British passport does not make you British. We have seen how lazily those documents have been frittered away. Holding that piece of paper does not automatically make you British, we are very clear on that. Is the Egyptian lunatic Alaa Abd El-Fattah British? He has a passport. Restore Britain says NO. No, he is not and he should be stripped of that paper and deported. Being British encompasses so much more than that, it means so much more than that. It is not simply a piece of paper. It is culture, shared beliefs, patriotism, language, a common understanding of what is right and wrong. That has nothing to do with ethnicity, obviously. But for even daring to suggest that English ethnicity exists I’ll be roundly attacked. It is just a fact. Every other country in the world manages to acknowledge ethnicities exist without descending into hysteria. England should be able to do the same.