A year on from the 1 September 2025 interview, the flag debate still has councils, party leaders and a flat in Downing Street in it
I Am Very Encouraging of Flags: What Starmer Said, and What Operation Raise the Colours Left Behind
A year on from the 1 September 2025 interview, the flag debate still has councils, party leaders and a flat in Downing Street in it
By Lowri Griffiths, patriotism and current affairs correspondent
The Interview
The Express and Star reported on 1 September 2025 that Sir Keir Starmer, then Prime Minister, told BBC Radio 5 Live: “I am supporter of flags,” and “I’m very encouraging of flags.” He added that “when they’re used purely for divisive purposes, actually it devalues the flag,” and that “I don’t think they should be devalued and belittled.” He also said: “I’m proud of our flag.”
The quotes are as printed in the article, including the grammar of the first one. Anyone who has done a live radio interview will know that sentences sometimes leave the building before they are finished.
The Background
According to the article, Union and St George’s Cross flags had been widely flown following the online Operation Raise the Colours campaign, which became contentious. Several councils removed flags from public infrastructure, and the article names Durham County Council, which is led by Reform, Tower Hamlets and Birmingham.
Mr Starmer was asked whether people putting up flags after protests at asylum hotels could be considered racist. The article says his answer did not directly address the question, and that he spoke instead about his own use of flags. That is a recognisable political manoeuvre, and I note it without drawing a conclusion.
The Flag in the Flat
A Downing Street spokesman said he was “limited in how much I can comment on the size of his flag,” according to the article. It adds that Downing Street declined to say how large the St George’s Cross flag in the Prime Minister’s flat is, and that he received it at the 2024 Euros final.
There is a rich comic seam in the idea of a spokesman declining to discuss flag size. I will leave it for readers who like that sort of thing. The relevant fact is that the Prime Minister owned a flag and a press office was asked about it.
Badenoch’s Line
The article also quotes Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, who called council removals of St George’s Cross flags “shameful” and said local rules were being enforced “selectively.” In a Daily Mail column in August she said English flags should be “welcomed” rather than “seen as an act of rebellion.”
The article says the dates of both comments are not fully specified, so I have reproduced them as reported and without a day attached.
What the Spokesman Said
The spokesman also said the Prime Minister could not support “graffiti” and that people “can judge what the appropriate ways are” of using flags. This is a line that is hard to disagree with and hard to apply. Most of us can tell a flag on a pole from a flag painted on a roundabout, and most of us would also like a council to explain how it decided.
The article notes that some people claim the rise in flags reflects xenophobia or racism, but it does not name who makes these claims. I have not tried to attribute them to anyone.
A Year Later
The same debate is still running. In Wakefield, as I report in another piece, a Reform-led council has voted for a list of four flags that may fly from its buildings. At the Proms in September, the argument was about EU flags. The Demos pride survey, also covered in this series, suggests that fewer people say they are proud to be British than at any point it has recorded.
A cynic would say that the more we argue about flags, the less we agree about what they stand for. A kinder reading is that people still care enough to argue, which is a kind of pride.
The Sensible Rule
Both Mr Starmer and Ms Badenoch, in the quotes above, said they like flags. The disagreement is about who gets to decide where they go and what they mean when they get there. Councils have rules, residents have views and the lamp posts have no say.
If there is a simple test, it is the one a neighbour would apply: does it look like a celebration or like a warning? Most people can tell.
Fly or Don’t
Anyone who wants to put a flag up on their own property is usually free to, within the planning rules, and anyone who wants advice about a pole on a public lamp post should ask the council. That is dull but accurate.
The better question is what the flag is for. A flag on a day of national celebration is cheerful. A flag in an argument is a stick.
Humour as a Mirror
Markets that worry are easy to laugh at, and the Cebu condominium story has drawn plenty of that: empty showrooms in Manila News, paperwork for British pensioners in the London Prat (at https://prat.uk/cebu-estate-agents-demand-character-references/) and long showings in Bohiney. See also prat.uk and bohiney.com.
Note: Philippine authorities are examining unproven allegations about Thomas Markle Sr., who lived in Cebu until earlier this year, as GMA News and the Guardian have reported. No charges have been filed. Child protection is a serious matter; the jokes here are about a property market and the paperwork.
For the lighter side of the news, there is always The Daily Squib.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/cebu-realtor-cant-sell-beachfront-listings/