‘Both Farage and Polanski are wrong about Britain – it is not what divides us that defines us’

Doomscroll your social media feed. Watch the news. Listen to our voters and constituents. The same emotions come pouring out – frustration, fear and fury. Those who cannot afford a decent life are angry and scared. While others who are financially comfortable feel alright. Our nation feels deeply divided because we are deeply divided.

We are deeply divided at a time we face existential crises. A burning planet; war in Europe; and an affordability crisis that two thirds think “will never end”.  As a nation, we can only meet this moment if we are united under a common vision of Britishness. If we remain divided, then everything we hold dear will wither and perish.

Yet division is all that Farage and Polanski offer. Both deliberately exclude some Brits. Both seek to blame our problems on some ‘other’ group – trying to play us off against one another. For Farage, it’s foreigners and migrants. For Polanski, corporations. Just attack them, they say, and all our problems will be solved. The affordability crisis will disappear. Carbon will stop being emitted. Putin will go away.

But all their visions add up to, in the end, is weakness and division. Once they are done attacking all the migrants and nationalising all the corporations, what then? Will our lives be more affordable? Will that stop Putin? Will the planet stop burning?

The answer is no.

Only a united nation can overcome these crises. Only a united nation will have the strength to meet this moment.

Uniting our nation requires a political vision of Britishness that can bring us together. A Britain where our different communities come together to form one British whole – forged from our historic values, and lived in our everyday culture.

Our united Britain is made up of different, strong communities that come together to forge one unified whole. Every part of our country may look, sound, and feel different but they’re all still British.

I travel 20 minutes north from my constituency and I’m met with “Ey up me duck”. I travel 20 minutes south, and the ‘a’s become ‘ah’s and the ‘uh’s become ‘u’s. We have a curry and a pint of (in my case, mass-produced) lager; some of us wear kilts while some wear suits; some need more SPF than others. 

The strength of our nation is that our different communities can and do interact with one another. Our churches and temples, our workplaces, our sports teams, our pubs. Not every person exists in every community, but these communities do mix, and every community is included in the British whole. I can go the gurdwara on a Sunday morning and watch Man United (my natural team, being from Luton) lose in the pub that afternoon. I can belong to both a Sikh and a lads community.

Our unity as a nation is threatened when communities do not interact and when people feel as if they are not part of any community. When pubs close, communities disappear and more people start voting for the radical right. Loneliness and social isolation breed support for political extremes. A strong nation is built from strong communities. People need to be able to afford to socialise and shared community spaces have to be with one another, like pubs or clubs.

Shared national experiences also help to bring different British communities together. The World Cup, Eurovision, Jubilees – all provide a common touchstone with our fellow Brits. We bond as a nation at these times.

Our communities can interact because of our common culture. Our Britishness is not spent in earnest moments, discussing the deeper meaning of how an island resisted an invasion for a thousand years. It’s the moments down the pub, helping someone with a pram, queuing politely, Strictly. A self-mocking Mr Blobby patriotism that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

Crucially, communities can come together because they have a shared foundation of common British values – of unity, decency, and determination. These values crystallised during the Second World War. We worked together (unity) to defeat Nazi Germany in the face of impossible odds (determination), with an army defined not by colour or birth, but by the flag it marched under (decency).

Farage and Polanski don’t get this. They don’t get what’s best about Britain. And that’s why they are seeking to divide us.

But by knowing who we are, we can meet people’s anger and fear, and turn them to our vision of a united Britain. A burning planet, war in Europe, an affordability crisis. We meet all three by standing together, not standing apart. We stand together by knowing what Britain, at its best, really is. United. 

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