Merriam-Webster  announced that “austerity” saw more than 250,000 searches on the dictionary’s free online tool. This was probably due to greater coverage of the international debt crisis. Therefore, it was announced by the company as Word of the Year for 2010. Runners-up also included “pragmatic,” “moratorium,” “socialism,” and “bigot”. For example, the latter possibly motivated from the public use by former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown! see: http://www.saviarora.com/gordon-brown-bigot-comment/

Austerity, is a 14th century noun defined as “the quality or state of being austere” and “enforced or extreme economy,”

Does this mean that people look behind the meaning of words? Or, could it be that the public wish to verify their use, checking-up on those who potentially should know better? I will always remember the words from the Reverend Jesse Jackson when I interviewed him a few years ago (see http://www.saviarora.com/rev-jesse-jackson-and-the-rainbow-push-coalition/). He suggested (paraphrasing)  that it is interesting some banks were quick to lend. However, now that there is an issue, they need to show both Corporate Responsibility and justice.

Now is the time for creative solutions to ensure that people, all who are hardworking can manage their existence and dreams.

Although nations in 2010 have focused on Austerity measures, have they:

• Identified their own areas of waste,
• Found potential investment in renewal strategies,
• Shown courage to support small businesses,
• Revisited private firms/contracts and associated procurement strategies
• Limited bankers bonuses (see: http://www.saviarora.com/bankers-bonuses-do-they-deserve-it/) and
• Started to seriously invest in youth based projects to give them hope rather than fueling their debt and despair?

I hope 2011 will be a year of creative renewal rather than a year of deepening crisis.

The BBC sports coverage team have a lot to answer for. Sometimes I feel that on the whole the BBC are a private club. I’m not doubting the abilty of the presenters to present edited highlights. Certainly, the crew that put together the ending sequences for the Wimbledon championships are skilled. My gripe is the lack of inclusiveness for many of the main events covered.

Poor Sports reporting
Take for example the 2010 Commonwealth games. Initially, to create sensationalism the staging was criticised. Maybe this was in an effort to ‘big up’ what the BBC may feel is an ‘also ran’ set of events.

In my view the BBC contradicted the nature and sense of the games. There is simply too much focus on the performance of UK home teams. I remember seeing one of the UK running teams finish 4th. Crazily the interviews were held with the latter and losing relay team and in the background the team that finished first were celebrating – you could see them in-shot in the background!?

At times during the coverage of the Commonwealth Games, there was an air of ‘how can the Indians be better than us’.
It was good that Michael Johnson put some of the presenters in their place. I remember it well.
It was after a winning run by an Indian runner. He suggested (paraphrasing) that this is what the games was all about.

However, it was sad to hear that this is what could be achieved at this time for the athelete and at this type of tournament. In my view reporing should include an element of inspiring others and celebrating in success.

Is this poor, biased or assumed reporting? Actually, all three could apply.

• Poor reporting means lazy researching and reporting. The knock-on impact is that it fails to inspire a nation or personalities from different background.
• Biased reporting means that analysis and feedback is only given to one side of a performance. We see this in patronising comments about a non-British team. It is easy to pick-up with the undertones of the commentator.
• Assumed reporting means that the editors feel that they know what is best for the public. Or, are they simply fueling their own interests.

With the Olympics approaching in 2012 will there be a change? At this moment I have no confidence in the editorial or presenting teams.

The need to change focus at the BBC

The BBC need to revisit their aims as a broadcaster. They need to remember the pledge of their charter, especially Section 4: item (e):

The Public Purposes
The Public Purposes of the BBC are as follows—

• (a)sustaining citizenship and civil society;
• (b)promoting education and learning;
• (c)stimulating creativity and cultural excellence;
• (d)representing the UK, its nations, regions and communities
• (e)bringing the UK to the world and the world to the UK;
• (f)in promoting its other purposes, helping to deliver to the public the benefit ofemerging communications technologies and services and, in addition, taking aleading role in the switchover to digital television.

The growth of reality TV also doesn’t help. The BBC should be spending our money on reporting personal development and motivational stories and not on countless programmes based on property. For example, everyweek daytime TV allocates hundreds of hours on home improvement, purchasing, movement and antiques! Why? They also seemed to be lost in a world of reality TV, like every other channel.

OK, lots of criticism but the BBC cannot be beaten on fantastic technical work, the innovation of the iPlayer and the multitude of radio channels (albeit that I wonder what the true figures are for listeners)

Unfortunately, most of us eat what we are fed, rather than shout for change.
The public broadcasting service needs to be revisited. The channel needs to be reporting for the people and not at the people!

In both 2009 and 2010 I was honored to be elected Chair of the Interfaith Youth Trust (IFYT). The Trust is registered with the Charity Commission. The working name is the Inter Faith Youth Trust.

The Trust (Alma Royalton-Kisch Trust) is the only UK charitable trust solely to fund inter faith projects for young people. Alma Royalton-Kisch kindly left us funds to establish and promote the education of children and young people about the religions of the world.

These funded projects bring together young people of different faiths to improve collaboration and understanding.

Since it first started, some of the funded projects have included:

• A Youth Project for workshops involving young people of Christian, Muslim, Sikh, Hindu and other faiths.
• Moroccan Women’s Project for exploring identities of Muslims and Christians.
• An arts festival in London for different faiths.
• A youth journal for publishing articles by young people about their faiths.
• A youth club to produce a mural showing “spirituality in the city”.
• A drama group for multi-faith after school activities.
• A residential for Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist and Christian young women.
• A cemetery clearing project for Christians and Jews.
• An Eid-Christmas workshop.
• A youth inter-faith action guide involving young people from the Baha’i, Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Jain, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh and Zoroastrian faiths.

2010 has been a significant year for IFYT as the trust have:

1. Changed focus to maximise our energies around Interfaith week.
2. Continued with developing our links with the Department for Communities- especially as the current financial climate brings us challenging times!
3. Worked together, bringing out our individual strengths
4. Reviewed the way we work and are grateful for the administrative support now available
5. Maintained our web presence
6. Continued to award funds for many organisations through the Interfaith week

It is great to see people trustees from different religions and humanists working together to help understand each other.

I remember when I was a child at infant school and how at that age there appeared to be no issues about who we were in our own diverseness. Unfortunately, as we get older the media influences us in terms of our views. I hope that working a youth level is a good place to start to retain common good.

In September 2010 we were happy to learn that we won 3rd place at this year’s Sikhnet Film Festival. The festival is in my view both innovative and inspiring. It is one of those initiatives that hopes to motivate people to get  their cameras out  and communicate who we are.

Back in 2008 I recorded a film that focused on the need for Sikhs to create their own media so that Bollywood would do not get away with distortion or dilution of the Sikh Identity and its principles. Although recently actors have ‘don a turban’ to take on roles and some of the storylines have improved – Rocket Singh was a nice film, they are still largely commercial and there is a dearth of documentaries, both audio and video based.

I suggested (btw so nice to be quoted recently!) that:

If Sikhs do not create their own media, then somebody else will do it for them.

At the end of another film I made entitled, ‘The Power of Media‘ I tried to take a positive perspective by suggesting that there is so much heritage and interconnection with the influence of Sikhs in areas such as technology, sport and service that unless we record these in a humble way we cannot get people to stop cases of mistaken identity and instead start  understanding the contribution that Sikhs have made globally.

The only way we can do this is by setting up funds for film foundations, competitions and using new and social media channels. Funding requires courage and commitment from those who have ‘our’ funds…

Earlier in the year I was astounded to learn how difficult it was for one film maker to get funding regarding a film exploring the Sikh contribution during last century’s world wars. It is not as if the money is not there, it is simply the need to trust that money spent will be beneficial in another way.

In recent weeks I too have been frustrated over the extent of a small investment in some software that I have developed for media channels. I’m questioning myself over charging for its development. Surely Satellite transponder owners and people like SkyTV are not compromised or subject to a period of long contemplation over their service payments or investment.

I’m beginning to wonder if my technology insight is too early? I suggested to the media channels in question that they should take the opportunity to engage with youth using new media and mobile Apps as after all that is mode that they (the youth) are native to.
Sadly, I still wait but am hopeful that someone will wake-up and smell the roses. Interestingly, collectively and internationally we can build wonderful buildings but we also need to establish good libraries of content.

In summary, unless we keep ‘pushing’ for change, it is not going to happen. We need  to demand relevant content rather than be simply fed it.

Here is the film that we put together. Thanks again, Sikhnet:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I wrote these notes as I watched tonights episode of BBC1′s Remembrance: The Sikh Story.

Firstly, as per normal it’s ridiculous that programmes of such calibre and importance are shown at such a late hour. I’m also not sure how much it was advertised. It’s a credit to some of the people who I know who sent text messages to get people to watch it.

At the beginning of the programme there was a categoric mistake. NB The 5 K’s of the Sikhs are not all military based! Maybe time was an issue but there is no excuse to not delve deeper into the spiritual and scientific importance of Sikh symbols.

It was good to see where Sikhs had fought, for example, France, Burma and Italy… Actually, the book and film, ‘The English Patient’ also documents the contribution of Sikhs.
I suggest that the French need to see this documentary so that they can realise that Sikhs helped to free them. Maybe it could help them stop their stance on discriminatory action on religion.

It was good to see such fascinating pictures and the audio was truly amazing.

Midway through the programme revealed the shooting of innocent lives in Amirtsar in 1919. That was an event ironically conducted by General Dyer. Incidentally, the Programme forgot to mention that Sikhs were also the largest community who gave their lives for the freedom of India as part of the Quit India campaign.

As previously suggested with such rich content the BBC really needed to show this at peak viewing hours so that today’s generation can understand the rich heritage that we all share. Just as the Programme mentioned, maybe its political to keep the contribution hidden to aid a alternative view of patriotism for the general population.

On the whole, the programme was well put together. There is also a hidden message for SIkhs. We need to take advice given at the end by one of the interviewees, I.e As we sadly see the passing away of Sikh Soldiers, we urgently need to document their brave efforts for everyone to see and remember their sacrifices.

I’ve been brewing this article in my head for the last 3 months in an effort to really understand where ethnic based media is heading. Is there a place for such media, who is controlling the editorial and does it really reach out to our youth? These are some of the areas I will explore, specifically for the three UK based Sikh Channels from a personal view-point but also based on having interfaced with them.

Like many other communities in the UK we should feel fortunate that we have media outlets. On Friday 1st October we witnessed the launch of the third Sikh based TV channel called SikhTV. All three now reside on the Sky broadcasting platform and internationally available from independent streams courtesy of the Internet.  I question why Sky categorises each of these channels as International and not religious.

In one sense it is a great achievement that there are now so many ‘ethnic media’ outlets, a repercussion of deregulation and if I was cynical,  it has resulted in fueling the development of new media moguls! I feel before we can understand the value of such media we need a quick revisit regarding its development.

Asian programming on BBC-television began at 9am on Sunday 10 October 1965 on BBC-1 with “In Logon Se Miliye” meaning “Can I Help You?”. In January 1966 this was replaced with “Apna Hi Ghar Samajhiye” meaning “Make Yourself At Home”, which also ran on Sunday Mornings on BBC Radio 4. By 1968 this programme was replaced on television with “Nai Zindagi Naya Jeevan” meaning “New Life, New Home”. The latter was the first major programming for Hindi and Urdu-speaking viewers and represented the beginnings of regular broadcasting in the UK for non-native English speakers. Until that point, all BBC programmes had assumed an English-speaking (and largely caucasian) audience. Also included were cultural and current affairs interviews, and performances of music. It was presented by (amongst others) Mahendra Kaul and Saleem Shahed. Finally, this was replaced around 1982 with “Gharbar” running midweek on BBC-2.

I note also that in Washington DC, a weekly Sikh programme was broadcast on Sunday’s. I couldn’t find formal references but from some personal contacts my understanding is that is was run by Dr Sethi’s family and has run for almost 20 years.

In the 1990s in the UK we saw the development of other programmes, for example Network East and selective specials, say during religious festivals. Sometimes programmes such as Michael Wood’s History of India and 1984 – A Sikh Story are issued but sadly they often skim past important events, including in the case of Michael Wood’s programme, simply lazy research!

In terms of UK radio media, from the beginnings of the Pirate station Sina Radio in the 1990s through to post deregulation to the multitude of DAB, FM and AM channels, we now have more choice than ever. Let us also not forget that some of the early pioneers have become very rich media moguls that also own international outlets. Market segmentation for all these channels is probably best described as either entertainment and or both religious. For example, Desi Radio in the early hours to 10am and then in the early evening to 7.30pm plays religious content, the rest of the time listeners are greeted with Punjabi folk music…

Taking Stock
Maybe it is time to take stock of where we are and where we’re heading, from a TV perspective. Today, there are many Muslim based channels, again defined by SkyTV as International? There is one Hindu channel and as previously mentioned, three Sikh Channels. Let us examine the developing demographic for each of the latter three:

Sikh Channel (SC).
The channel was first on the scene, pardon the pun and although initially developed from a commercial organisation or entities, i.e: a claim based solictor and BritAsia TV. SC is now a Community Interest Company/Charity, clearly great for transparency. It is also good that they have managed to secure a large set of direct debits to help with stability. i.e: Many channels in the past, such as Channel Punjab failed. Even TV Asia, originally owned by a leading Bollywood actor ran a loss but was later resurrecting as the successful Zee empire.

It is good to see the development of programmes that focus on an outreach via Gurdwaras. It is also impressive that this channel also follows the development of Sikh issues and attempts to rally opinion.

In the early days I was involved in 4 of their programmes as both a presenter and guest, the latter during a one-to-one session. The programmes were called, ‘Let’s talk about it’ – discussion programme and German Sikhs Answers. During the recording of the discussion programme I remember turning up to the studio with 2 suits, 2 ties and a set of items that I prepared, for example: a list of questions, possible pathways for arising points, a script, a studio layout, briefing notes for the guests and a timed schedule. There was a very small green room in a corridor between the control room and recording studio. Sure, the layout was well put together but we experienced the assembly of a studio audience from random visitors and I also noticed that many of the staff were interins.

Maybe things have got better but my understanding is there is reliance on pre-recorded content from abroad and for UK based content a team is sent out to capture key events and gurdwara recordings.

What kind of audience are watching the Sikh Channel and where are they. Is it people at home during the day, random visitors, other communities or media observers at the BBC?  NB The channel is Birmingham based. Therefore, can we assume that many of the viewers are from Central England. Selective Gurdwara broadcasts locations  include Derby and London.

To summarise, there is some development with outreach programmes, but not as much as the early days. Editorial control appears exercised through the information roll-bar at the bottom of the screen. It is always up-to-date appearing authoritative and informational. Does the channel show leadership in terms of commentators, spokespersons and a round-up of perspectives? At this point the answer is no. They do however, have a newsround-up.

Does it have the potential to reach a youth audience? In my view, yes but only if programmes are developed with passion for addressing today’s agenda for example community-based issues, the recession and social integration issues.

Sangat TV
This channel was launched on 1st September and is supported by a UK Charity called the Sangat Trust. We read from their website press release that:

Sangat Television, a new Sikh lifestyle channel…The focus of the new lifestyle channel is based on promoting the values of the Sikh Guru’s and Guru Granth Sahib Ji. Ranbir Singh Attwal, Trustee commented, “media must be used positively to project values through educational programmes that Sikh children and young people enjoy. Our channel aims to also reach out to the wider people of Britain so they understand our Dharam better”.

This all sounds great and I have to say that the quality of some of the films they have commissioned is good.

Although it maybe early days, it appears that they are playing pre-recorded content from India. Maybe there are plans to recruit UK based film-makers and if the education target demographic is youth aged from 3-30, will we see new talent from this pool emerging?

With a large number of trustees we have to hope that discipline and focus will be maintained to ensure a consistent development of programming. Back in July I met with one of the Trustees. I showed my cv and desire to assist. The offer is still there as I hope that some of my humble media skills can help.

Again, we have to ask the question: ‘Where is this channel heading and who’s watching’ ? Will it be commercial free? Will it allow commercials to help supplement investment?

If the assumption is that it is going to be a source of high quality educational content, then I would suggest some element of interfaith dialogue. In my view and experience, getting people together and facilitating dialogue about the differences and commonality between each faith, makes each believer stronger in their values and work towards a common purpose.

It would also be great to profile the great charity work that many people in the Sikh community perform.
Therefore, their mission of communicating ‘to the wider people of Britain so they understand our Dharam better’ could be maintained.

SikhTV
It is very early days for this channel. On first viewing I notice that like the other 2 channels it is showing pre-recorded content from India.

My experience with them to date has been interesting as I have suggested some programming content and the need for greater community engagement, especially for today’s non-represented youth.

What about the BBC – Don’t we already pay for national media and coverage of all people?

The BBC are appreciated all over the world. I too have to say that they are probably leaders in best practice but sometimes I feel that they act like they are a replacement of their colonial past.  Typecasting continues with accented voiceovers and many of the documentaries produced by the BBC skim very important history. Just look at their coverage of the Commonwealth Games – there is little mention of the progress of other countries!  In addition, both the BBC and ITV National newscasts are still heavily edited, ranked and released.

With our own media we have tried to move away from the patronising programme output from the BBC but sadly ethnic TV channels have not taken the opportunity to commission quality programmes that can communicate truth and the contribution of the Sikhs to the world.

I hope that it is just early days for all Sikh Channels. I want them to survive but also be viewed by the general public with seriousness.
Today we urgently need part (with commercial organisations) or seperate funding initiatives become established to support. These funds can support the development of films, programmes and episodes in the areas of for example:

1. Films about our youth and their challenges
2. Historical perspectives about Sikhs during the world wars
3. How Sikhs were the largest community that sacrificing their lives during the Quit India movement
4. The heritage of some of our Gurdwaras
5. One-to-one sessions with role models
6. Educational films on health and nutrition
7. Charity initiative ‘fly-on-the-wall’ documentaries

8….

I created the following phrase, ‘If we do not create our media, somebody else will do it for us’.
This means that we need to fuel associated production costs.
Just look at the quality of output from Sikhnet.com and look at how they engage with youth, for example, the Sikhnet Film Festival. They are to be admired.

Creating quality and engaging content requires dedicated teams, experience, no political agendas and money. Only then can we create and broadcast quality that can influence the mainstream.

The alternative, is that engagement with the people who need content the most will be lost.
Do we really want to gamble and lose that risk?

Wow! Its been a while since I blogged and so much has happened.
Is it because I haven’t had enough time or simply an attack of writers block?
Its probably a combination of the latter.

OK, here’s a quick catch-up
July heralded the 21st Bike Ride from Birmingham to London, this year raising funds for Wellchild. It was great to see the ‘sea of yellow’ again. NB I created this phrase to represent the teams of riders all in Hi-res yellow vests, getting together to cycle 130miles for a children’s charity. See more at: http://www.charitybikeride.com

August was fun with a trip to sunny Cyprus and meeting a couple of people in our hotel who simply smiled everyday. The two receptionist would greet us for breakfast and dinner and always smile so geniunely.  They got me thinking about why we don’t smile enough in our daily lives and if we do, is it viewed as suspicious? My conclusion is that there is lots to smile about, the fact that we breath, experience people and marvel at creation. However, our survialist stance makes it hard to find time to contemplate. The latter word has to be the strongest argument for taking time out.

By the end of August we managed to put together an entry for this year’s Sikhnet Film Festival – in my view one of the best festivals to encourage knowledge through creativity. The film produced explores the issue of need to contemplate through a poem written by both Jasdeep Hari Bhajan Singh Khalsa and Onkardeep Singh Khalsa, from their book Spirtual Poetry, A Disciples Journey, published by LuLu.com.
I’m also currently working on their audio book with proceeds of the sale going to a charity in Africa.

September just rushed run by.
On a sporting front it was nice to meet the cyclist’s from July’s charity ride again as I helped to drive a reunion picnic. We met at the Annual Skyride in London. NB Last year there was a staggering 64,000 riders allowed to freewheel the streets of London. This year the numbers soared to an incredible 85,000 !!!

In business I was exposed to a disappointment from an individual who worked for me and failed to understand the importance of ‘duty of care’ when made redundant. He failed to view the the big impact on the people he left behind and the risk that he may have taken advantage of the good nature of others. I felt exploited and all that remains is a bad taste in my mouth especially as I feel that you should try and trust in others and help them if their calls for help appear geninue. This is not to imply that you expect trust in return but common decency would drive you conclude that people should recepriocate. For example, on a video assignment, a project that with editing time estimated by the individual to take three more weeks, after he left it was completed within 5 days!

October has now dawned and over the first weekend we saw the incredible opening of the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games – a chance for India to shine. It glorified and communicated aspects of India yet missed an opportunity to communicate a greater heritage and deeper history. The way they showed the yoga experience was illuminating. Good Luck to all the organisers and participants.

I hope the next blog entry won’t be in 3 months time, i.e: That I will have time and energy to post more views and news!
BTW At the end of September, the Sikhwithin i-phone App was released and on 1st October the Smooth Groovers i-phone App:
was released – enjoy!

Today the UK is expecting one of the harshest Budget’s for 30 years. As per normal the UK press manage to capture leaks, hints and tips or are they leaks (!) of what we are to expect.

The current UK coalition government may claim that the deficit is a result of the past regime.
The past regime quite rightly suggest that it is a global issue.

Lets just take a look at the latter. From the outset it appears that freedom of banks to gamble has now lead to the public paying the price.

I look at the economy from a different perspective. Although capitalism can fuel opportunities it has a dark side, one of greed and as Wall Street the movie put it, ‘Greed is good’ and ‘Lunch is for wimps’!

The model to squeeze the worker to support the power of the multinational is based on personal survival.
i.e: The beast wants more and if you feed it, you too can eat some of the pie and live.

We seemed to have missed something. Economics based on helping each other.
We are bred to be immune to the suffering of others. We all know people are dying of malnutrition.
We and I am guilty if this this, will buy the latest gadget but simply express shock when we realise how little the component assembler is being paid or treated. We hope that the manufacturer will influence the factory but on many occasions they don’t or can’t get close enough to the internal abuse. By then it can be too late. In the same way people will rush to buy cheap cloths and will forget that child labour made in a backdrop of underground/Mafia, ungoverned operations and non-policed middle men. Corporate responsibility is played a simple lip service to as it is left to unaudited processes.

The following list shows some of the reasons for poverty. Why can’t our politicians and economists develop strategies that involve global sharing initiative initiatives to tackle each and more of them?

• State discrimination corruption and abuse of public power.
• Lack of social integration. Competition instead of cooperation.
• Crime.
• Substance abuse
• Procrastination
• Climate or environmental factors and abuse of the dumping of recycling waste.
  
• Historical factors, e.g: with origins from imperialism and colonialism.
• Population growth
  
• War, genocide and bullying
• Lack of education and skill development
• Excessive materialism

If we based an economy on developing other nations then collectively we will benefit. If we can see that they (for example, a developing nation) need the building of infrastructure, then together we can trade and harmonise the world. Economics driven on equality not on class, caste or race distinction. One way to expose and help on a community level is to twin schools, enterprises, medical support and food provision.

The obsession with squeezing people in richer countries could impact development projects as they could claim they have less of their own money to share with others. Instead, we should set-up global development funds for those living in richer countries to invest in.

We need economists with imagination not politicians claiming and repeating the policies of the past will work. We all know they don’t and we let them (the politicians) continue on a decade-on-decade of the cycle of boom and bust – yet for some people its doom and dust for all of their lives…

It is a bit like your social network, but based upon trust (or lack of) in peoples recommendations so you can discover cool stuff from thousands of people, not just friends or immediate trusted connections. Rummbling is really easy online or from your mobile phone.  Its the best to Rummble when you’re actually at a place you love or loath, then you can add a photo & if you want, share it straight away on Twitter, Facebook, Bebo or more…

It’ has been a while since I blogged. The reason? I guess its because I’ve been in deep thought about a number of issues.
Firstly, the economic climate is full of uncertainty and if like me you run a business, it yields a series subtle stress…! Secondly, as the summer kicks in, you get to experience change… derived from the climate, mood and the environment. Combine all this with flag-waving mania (just look at the state of some of the cars roaming around with countless England flags clipped onto their windows) induced by the World Cup soccer championships and my birthday – often a time to reminisce about your life and consider how things have changed.

When I grew up the national flag and St George’s flag were both synonymous with racism. They had both been hijacked by the racist party – the national front (note the lower case!).  Are things any different now?

On Saturday 12th June 2010 I was invited to join a group of friends to watch England’s first world-cup match against the USA. The event was televised on 4 screens, including a large projection wall display. We all decided to congregate at the Indian Gymkhana, first established in 1916. Click here for a full history of its inception.

Back to the match. The majority of those watching the match were of Indian decent – Representatives from all of Indian’s wide and varied community were present. Even my next door neighbour with his entire family attended.

Interestingly, there was one thing they all had in common. 80% wore an England football shirt and the atmosphere was electrified by the chants of ‘Come on England’!

I managed to catch some of the excitement, especially just after the first and only goal that was scored: See below:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I found this new loyalty to the English flag amazing on many levels.

• Was this a demonstration that Norman Tebbit’s rules had been broken?
• Did Enoch Powell’s  rivers of blood speech now mean nothing as people felt comfortable with accepting England as their true home?

My mind tells me that we have a further journey to travel – for the general community to accept people from different backgrounds, many who have fathers and mothers that struggled since the 1950s to be accepted as equals and who laid the foundations for today’s youth and generally more comfortable life style.

Why do I still feel some cynicism regarding the flag ? Firstly, there is no acceptance from the media at large to acknowledge that the UK is varied in its cultural make-up. TV, radio and the majority of featured celebrities is orientated towards a sub-culture and the pretence that the average viewer or listener is from a ‘white’ background. What also does not help are shows like Britain’s Got Talent displaying a weekly / seasonal undertone of inequality and class distinction. The BBC are quick to chop the BBC Asian Network (Why call it Asian!) yet commitment to Radio 3 continues. Remember too that ‘ethnic’ programming is still late into the night!

Maybe, I was shocked due to my personal experiences of being bullied on race grounds at school. Maybe, I consider that today’s loyalty to the flag displayed by others is based on convenience. NB We do have a lot to the Thank the UK for.
Or, maybe I should be more optimistic that ‘times are a changing’ ?