Lady Middleton can be found in Abolishing Slavery, The Fellowship

Last week more than 1.7 million people told the Government they did not want state surveillance from the sky slapping them with road charges, and one of the SAS ‘Originals’, Jack Byrne, died after a life of heroism and grand escapes. London theatre had an exceptional year. Advances in breast cancer treatment were reported, and we learned about several more rather ingenious inventions credited to Brits.

Dave Barnby shared his collection of newly available source material, which details how government leaders deceived Brits into voting to enter a common market that metastasized into the European Union. The UK Independence Party had a difficult week, which is a pity since it is the only non-racist party whose policy is to take Britain out of the EU.

I thought about love of country, and how particular love is and the good it has created. David wrote about the excellence of the public school system, a quality unfortunately not shared by state schools.

I quoted Peter Hitchens on gun laws and gun crime. Peter is a thoughtful writer, so his views on restrictive anti-gun laws and increasing rates of gun crime have to be read seriously. It might seem that stricter anti-gun laws would mean fewer guns therefore fewer crimes committed with guns. Unfortunately the overly simple equation breaks down, leaving law-abiding Brits helpless against criminals.

David wrote about the Red Arrows, a spirited corps he admires. The government’s attempts to shoot the Red Arrows down is exactly the kind of petty, unimaginative action we have come to expect from joy-squelching Chancellor Brown.

Daniel Hannan spoke out against the EU’s back-door attempts to enforce a constitution the French and the Dutch people have rejected and on which the Brits have never voted. Clearly the government expects they will vote no.

We celebrated the very different characters of John Henry Newman and Rupert Bear. We rejoiced in the justice won by pensioners against the malfeasance of the government, and we saw the good of soldiers who are risking their lives trying to make life safer and better for others.

We were glad to see that a new planetarium is opening at Greenwich and to learn about the return of cranes to Britain. And as usual we found Brits whose bravery and imagination inspires us – the Welsh home guard and women in 1797 and two more members of the Fellowship to abolish slavery, Lady Middleton and Thomas Clarkson.

The week's posts can be found in the Archives.