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Although I don't have anything against people from other countries, the higher the influx into England the more the British identity disappears.

With the issue of immigration, it's very difficult because, although I don't have anything against people from other countries, the higher the influx into England, the more the British identity disappears.

English has always had a special fondness for other European languages, a neighborly soft spot - perhaps because Britain has been invaded by speakers of those languages from the onset of its recorded history.

You only have to look at London, where almost half of all primary school children speak English as a second language, to see the challenges we now face as a country. This isn't fair to anyone: how can people build relationships with their neighbours if they can't even speak the same language?

England and America are two countries separated by the same language.

It's unimaginable to meet a Pole or a German who does not know about the history of their country. But lots of English people don't know the difference between Britain and England.

I think Brits probably feel that Americans are more like us than vice-versa, if that makes sense. Because we get everything American over here in Britain, but yet there are things which are staunchly English that you guys don't have.

As I absorbed life here and understood it better, I just completely fell in love with England.

Through my youth, there was imposed on us a culture relentlessly English. English books were all you could buy; English television filled our screens, and in consequence, England seemed to matter in a way that our world didn't.

With the United States in slow long-term decline, how will that affect the position of English? And where will all that leave monolingual Britain? Our political leaders like to boast about how global Britain is, but when it comes to languages, it is near the bottom of the global league, together with another island state, Japan.