please empty your brain below
An interesting piece with some little known facts but I must admit I was flagging towards the end!

MO | 26.03.21 - 7:06 a.m. | #

I’m glad you flagged that up to us!

Bob S | 26.03.21 - 7:14 a.m. | #

I can't believe that by 07:15 MO has beaten me, as I too intended to run that particular lame comment up the flagpole and salute!

Frank F | 26.03.21 - 7:18 a.m. | #

So utterly flagrant.

Geofftech | 26.03.21 - 7:22 a.m. | #

Vexillological- a wonderful word of the day! 👍🏻
I shall try to use that in conversation today and claim my bonus points. 😉😉

Jo W | 26.03.21 - 7:27 a.m. | #

The phrase ‘Banana Republic’ comes to mind.

RogerB | 26.03.21 - 7:29 a.m. | #

It seems that Fun With Flags has a budding new presenter ready to take the mantle from Dr Cooper!

Al | 26.03.21 - 7:40 a.m. | #

I enjoyed this! Wonder how long it’ll be before the national anthem is played in cinemas & people are expected to stand up - again!

When I lived in Denmark in the 70s, at that time a delightfully progressive & tolerant place, the danish flag was common in gardens & on birthday cakes etc - without the jingoism I associate it with here.

Toni | 26.03.21 - 7:43 a.m. | #

>Separate Union flag regulations apply in Northern Ireland because the UK isn't a proper union.

I now have a new mental picture of the mysterious DG, wearing a bowler hat, and look forward to tomorrows blog accompanied by an audio file of 'The Sash'. :-)

Mark Avis | 26.03.21 - 7:44 a.m. | #

I noticed that Tory ministers now have the flag in the background when being interviewed, obviously a deliberate decision, I think partly to emphasis that they are a national government in places like Scotland, and partly rub the the Labour party's nose in it..

Hopefully we don't end up like the US, where flying the national flag on your own property seems to be obligatory in some areas.

Still Anon | 26.03.21 - 7:48 a.m. | #

GSTQ

Dominic H | 26.03.21 - 8:01 a.m. | #

Aren't Tories VERY silly ........ and Sir Kier too, coz he's a patriot, innit.

Brian- | 26.03.21 - 8:10 a.m. | #

Maybe this whole ridiculous notion is to cover up the embarrassment of mandatory flaggery on February 19?

I doubt it though.

Ian | 26.03.21 - 8:16 a.m. | #

If someone flies a Union Flag in their garden I always assume that they are signalling to the world that they are a right-wing bigot who should be avoided at all costs. A gross and ridiculous generalisation but since I am avoiding these people at all costs I cannot test it.

Mel | 26.03.21 - 8:17 a.m. | #

The ratio of the sides should be the 'golden ratio', [(1 + square root of 5)/2], ie 1.62. To me this is an aesthetically attractive rectangle. 2:1 certainly isn't!

J, | 26.03.21 - 8:33 a.m. | #

The last sentence captures it: We've had the warm-up, this is the starting gun for a race to the right. Hope we can trust their record of u-turns.

commonliner | 26.03.21 - 8:33 a.m. | #

Pleased to see that standards are being maintained on this blog.

Waterhouse | 26.03.21 - 8:34 a.m. | #

The use of “ vexillological” is to be admired, but it is redundant.

Bryn Davies | 26.03.21 - 8:35 a.m. | #

'obsession with defunct administrative areas'? I thought you *liked* administrative heritage :-(

Sarah | Homepage | 26.03.21 - 8:35 a.m. | #

Good to see a picture of the Union Inn below the Royal Albert bridge at Saltash.

Petras409 | 26.03.21 - 8:43 a.m. | #

The Union flag is very popular in NI and look how successful that has been in creating a tranquil and unified country. (They also fly the Israel flag in parts of East Belfast.)

ganching | Homepage | 26.03.21 - 8:51 a.m. | #

I remember learning the flag facts as a boy scout many years ago. No mention was made at that time of the subsequent history of Ireland, or the withdrawal of most of that country from the UK during the twentieth century. Nor was that ever mentioned at school.

Malcolm of Kent | 26.03.21 - 8:59 a.m. | #

A *little* bit more flag wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. I see more England flags than Union flags in most given weeks, and it's hard to shake a certain association with those.

I grew up in Canada, and even though we're not on an American level of flag-obsession we are rather fond of ours and like to put it on loads of buildings and stuff. Though it helps that it's (unofficially) easily reduced to just a maple leaf on its own for smaller applications. So it was a bit of a change to come over here and see flags so rarely. One thing I can remember from childhood is that it really helps if your flag is easy to draw.

Chz | 26.03.21 - 9:06 a.m. | #

A long time ago when I was a boy scout every pack meeting started/finished with the breaking/lowering of the Union Flag. It felt odd and anachronistic back then, especially to us children of immigrants. Unsure whether the modern scouting movement does similar now, but this government will perhaps decree it to be mandatory soon.

Frank F | 26.03.21 - 9:06 a.m. | #

I always felt the UK would have voted Remain in the dreaded vote if politicians / official buildings and projects part funded by the EU had been more willing to display the EU flag / logo.

ap | 26.03.21 - 9:23 a.m. | #

No need to change the flag if Scotland goes walkabout, we are used to the design we have now and so are the rest of the world.

mikeH | 26.03.21 - 9:26 a.m. | #

I have nothing useful to add except the word 'vexillonanism'. #vexillonanism.

HTFB | 26.03.21 - 9:38 a.m. | #

Your website is definitely prouder than mine cos I removed the small, discrete union flag that was in the footer of mine after the Brexit vote.

Andrew Bowden | Homepage | 26.03.21 - 10:02 a.m. | #

I guess I must not pass many government buildings very often as I had no idea they were supposed to fly the flag on certain days, and honestly can't say I've noticed it.

The only occasion when the flag grabs my attention is if someone significant has died and suddenly up they all pop at half mast.

With such a busy, full on design I can see it quickly becoming more an object of visual clutter than an object of national pride!

Cornish Cockney | 26.03.21 - 10:03 a.m. | #

Also, many of our government buildings are also historic buildings and bunging a flag on top will just look awful!
Could you imagine the Leaning tower of Pisa with a flag perched on the top?

It would also point out the lesser known government buildings thus making them potential targets for those with less than honourable intentions.

Cornish Cockney | 26.03.21 - 10:11 a.m. | #

While there's been a lot of nonsense from the "pro-flag" wavers, to me the "anti-flag" wavers are just as extreme. Other countries around the world don't seem to find displaying their country's flag to be offensive or jingoistic or a sign that you lean towards nationalistic politics.

Mikey C | 26.03.21 - 10:18 a.m. | #

Greetings from the home of the world's largest Union Flag! Actually the design cannot be "upside down" unless it is a two-sided flag and hoisted up a pole. This is because the two sides of a double-sided flag are always different, and the key thing is that the broad white stripe is always on the side nearest the pole. It is impossible to know whether a one-sided design is upside-down unless there is some indication which side the invisible pole would be placed. It seems to be assumed the pole would be on the left, but how can anyone really know this?

cau1khead | 26.03.21 - 10:18 a.m. | #

At first I thought this was a DG windup. Do the DCMS really have nothing more important to do at the moment? I hope they've got a good bulk-buy deal on flags; they're not cheap, and in bad weather you'd be lucky to get more than a few weeks out of one before it looks tatty. The St George's flag is rather cheaper as it's less complicated to make.

Andrew S | 26.03.21 - 10:53 a.m. | #

Unfortunately many of your flag emojis failed to render in my unpatriotic Chrome browser, leaving your post littered with GBs.

Government attention should be focused at once to ensuring this is resolved, even going so far as to 'correct' words such as logbook, tugboat and bugbear with mid-word patriotic reminders.

TomH | 26.03.21 - 10:58 a.m. | #

To me, it will always be known as the Union Jack!

rogmi | 26.03.21 - 11:10 a.m. | #

If Scotland (despite current SNP bickering) gets its independence, St. Andrew's cross will have to go.

Maybe it's time for Wales to be represented on the Union Flag, although St. George's cross with the Welsh dragon has dubious symbolism - an emblem for St. David might be more appropriate.

JW | 26.03.21 - 11:12 a.m. | #

When I first saw today's post I had to quickly check that it wasn't April 1st already. It just goes to show that DG is very good at showing commitment to a joke.

X-Plaistow | 26.03.21 - 11:33 a.m. | #

No flag-rant errors spotted here.

Stuart R | 26.03.21 - 11:37 a.m. | #

"This week's updated guidance also revokes planning permission for flying the EU flag"

If it is "guidance" can it actually "revoke permission" ?

Sounds like a great opportunity for some of our European loving London boroughs to pick a fight with central government. Because a culture war is also useful for distracting us from other things!

ADS | Homepage | 26.03.21 - 11:43 a.m. | #

Make the most of it. It's likely to become obsolete from 2024.

Removal of the St Andrew's Cross, perfectly illustrating what the current political vandals and fake patriots have to done to a once proud country.

IsarSteve | Homepage | 26.03.21 - 12:01 p.m. | #

The only reason for this fixation on the Union flag by the government is that it diverts attention from more important issues, particularly their appalling handling of the Covid crisis

Tones | 26.03.21 - 12:08 p.m. | #

The "correct way up" for a union flag design is a convention. This convention uses the flagstaff when referring to physical flags, but for other representations (on paper or other one-sided media) the left hand side as you look at it is the reference. So a drawing of a union flag does have a right and wrong way up.

Malcolm of Kent | 26.03.21 - 12:09 p.m. | #

Hello, yes, I'd like to unsubscribe from Flag Facts please.

J | 26.03.21 - 12:44 p.m. | #

I often think of the Australian flag as "the Union flag at night".

Offshore | 26.03.21 - 12:53 p.m. | #

Interestingly, I can only count four Union Flags. I'm sure there are probably more as I see a lot of GBs.

Maybe my computer isn't very patriotic.

RG (GB) | 26.03.21 - 12:56 p.m. | #

If not for the comments, I wouldn't have known I was missing flags! They don't render in Chrome or Edge, but do in Firefox and Safari.

Chz | 26.03.21 - 1:16 p.m. | #

Anyone else willing to admit to getting out their biggest dictionary and looking up all the words beginning
FLAG... to try to make some 'clever' comment?

popartist | 26.03.21 - 2:04 p.m. | #

I am dismayed that the maximum dimension for flags in non government buildings are given in metric rather than Imperial units.

Keith | 26.03.21 - 2:23 p.m. | #

It does appear that when a government has no policies a flag policy is the default substitute

Simon | Homepage | 26.03.21 - 4:28 p.m. | #

Flagrantly filched from another blog
"The gov.uk website, which includes latest flag guidance, (...has...) no Union Flags in some 3,950,000 pages."

mikeS | 26.03.21 - 5:37 p.m. | #

Aesthetically speaking, I prefer the 2:1 version because it causes all the red diagonals to be quadrilaterals (two trapezia and two parallelograms), any shorter ratios cause the parallelograms to be blunted at one end.

Culturally speaking, my preferences regarding flags would probably start a war in the comments.

Gregg | 26.03.21 - 6:51 p.m. | #

In general I would say that is it the Flag of England that gets abused in it's use by hooligans and the hard right. The Union Flag tends to be less of interest to them. So why the problem with the Union Flag? Is it just British reserve that showing it seems to be an embarrassing thing to do and worse than that might make it look as though you are getting above oneself and seeking attention.

Here in France it is compulsory for all public buildings and all schools to fly the French Flag. Often other relevant flags are flown too. Our nearest town, Limoux, flies three at it's main roundabout, The Flag of the European Union, Le Tricolore and the Flag of Occitanie, as that is the region in which it resides.

The people here, for the main part, expect to see those flags and are proud of them, including those on the left of politics, in the UK, it appears the left see it as a reminder that they need to apologise for something and makes them ashamed

David Sheriton | 26.03.21 - 8:01 p.m. | #

Yawn.
What a predictable cacophony of bleating.
Who decided that it's shameful to fly the flag of the country in which you live? An example of a wasteful navel-gazing epidemic which has afflicted some for a lot longer than the current malaise.

JP | 27.03.21 - 3:55 a.m. | #

I would be happier to see the Union Flag displayed more if it wasn’t such a dreadful looking thing. It looks like it was designed by a committee (which it possibly was).

And what about Wales?

I was rather ambivalent about this subject until politicians started wrapping themselves up in the Union Flag - shame on them!

Rob T | 27.03.21 - 8:54 a.m. | #

I like it when commenteers get in a flap

NickW | 27.03.21 - 10:02 a.m. | #

And how many multi-million, untendered, flag procuring contracts will now go to mates and friends of mates with no links to flag-procuring companies, I wonder?

Cornish Cockney | 27.03.21 - 1:33 p.m. | #

So what happens when Scotland votes to become independent, and the Union flag become obsolete? Anyone thought about that?

dg writes: If you read the comments, yes, three people have. I also mentioned it in the post.

Grichal | 27.03.21 - 8:17 p.m. | #

Browsers not displaying the flag should be showing UK rather than GB. (And Chrome on my phone shows the flags, but on my PC it doesn't).

Betterbee | 28.03.21 - 9:20 a.m. | #

My browser (Firefox) shows GB for about 24 hours before changing to flags. (It might have been the effect of an update to Firefox which arrived some time yesterday.)

Mike Roberts | 28.03.21 - 10:30 a.m. | #











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