It's official: there's nothing wrong with celebrating St George's Day. How do we know? Communities secretary Hazel Blears sent us a letter yesterday saying so and encouraging everybody to celebrate the occasion. She went further, saying that for too long we have seen the flag hijacked by those who spread race hate or people shying away from celebrating English culture and history because of a fear of offending somebody. We should not let these people spoil this celebration, she said, which is an opportunity to show the true spirit of this country, one of inclusiveness, tolerance and friendship.

Hear! Hear! A lot of us probably feel a bit awkward about St George's Day because of its past associations with extremists.

Slowly but surely, however, this occasion is being brought back into the mainstream as a day we can all enjoy celebrating. The support shown by the Government and Leicester City Council for these celebrations is helping that process.

However, we would suggest to Ms Blears that this can be taken further. The Government should mark out St George's Day as a really significant event in our calendar by making it an official public holiday. The Scottish and Irish already mark their respective saint's days in this way so it only seems fair that the English should get the same treatment.

As is often pointed out we are short-changed on public holidays in this country. There are only eight of them a year in England, while the EU average is more than 10. Here then is a perfect opportunity to redress the balance and at the same time make St George's Day a great occasion.

We know that some business leaders say that extra bank holidays cost too much. However, the rest of Europe seems to manage them without going bust. Surely, it is not too much to ask to give us one day's holiday to celebrate our country.