![\"Dick](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/XGFIG2VFNZETVIYWW6TSYIZK4Q.jpg\")
Dick Cole, leader of the Cornish nationalist party Mebyon Kernow <\/p>\nWe\u2019re sitting in a Starbucks off a roundabout near the inland Cornwall village of Fraddon. It\u2019s an ungodly early hour. Outside, the rain is biblical. Inside, the talk is political, as local councillor Dick Cole explains that he is absolutely not an Englishman.<\/p>\n
Cole is a Cornish nationalist. Suddenly he points across the cafe, past the frappuccinos and the flapjacks at something out the window in the middle distance.<\/p>\n
\u201cSee that clay pit over there?\u201d he says in his distinctive Cornish drawl. Not really. I see nothing through the showers of the sudden squall battering the land.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe pit is a half mile that way. My great- grandfather worked the clay pit that was underneath it. Farther down the road, at the old brickworks \u2013 my great-great-grandfather was the superintendent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cole\u2019s self-identity is firmly rooted in the soil of this picturesque southwestern peninsula that, like Britain\u2019s temperature-testing toe, creeps out into the chilly waters of the Celtic Sea and English Channel.<\/p>\n
Dick Cole, leader of the Cornish nationalist party Mebyon Kernow <\/p>\n
\u201cI am Cornish and I am British \u2013 in fact we are the ancient Brits. I am a Celt. But I am not English,\u201d says Cole, for 28 years the leader of local nationalist party Mebyon Kernow (the Sons of Cornwall, although these days they prefer to style it as the Party of Cornwall).<\/p>\n
The UK government officially recognised the Cornish as a national minority 10 years ago. They have distinct culture, identity, flag (a white cross on black background) and language \u2013 although the latter is struggling a little bit. Yet the English establishment still treats Cornish nationalism as a national joke.<\/p>\n
There was once a shadowy nationalist group, the Cornish Republican Army \u2013 condemned by Mebyon Kernow and unrelated to it \u2013 that went around vandalising symbols of England. In a nod to the local accent, the Sun newspaper dismissed it as the Ooh-Arr-Ay.<\/p>\n
Cornwall Council has been granted observer status at British Irish Council intergovernmental meetings, but only for discussions on language. \u201cAfter that we have to get out of the room,\u201d says Cole.<\/p>\n
This month, Cornwall Council, of which Cole is a member, backed an official petition to the Westminster government calling for Cornwall to be officially designated a fifth nation of the UK, joining England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n
The Cornish want their own parliament. The petition had 24,000 signatures when it closed last Thursday, enough to require Westminster to consider an official response. As we speak, Cole and his colleagues have yet to receive it: \u201cThere will probably just be some silly statement that will p**s us off greatly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many Brits think of Cornwall, which is adjacent to Devon, as little more than a summer holiday destination. A plague of second-home ownership has driven up prices and caused friction with some locals who are priced out of the market.<\/p>\n
Cornwall\u2019s \u00a32 billion (\u20ac2.3 billion) tourism industry is concentrated in pretty villages and towns around the coast such as St Ives, Port Isaac and Falmouth. Away from the coasts, however, Cornwall is a different land \u2013 more industrial and working class.<\/p>\n
![\"Bargain](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/NZA5BXRASZGNNOXTOO5G6FRHKI.jpg\")
Bargain booze outlets blight the east side of Newquay ![\"Surfers](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/4V2OZSHEQFG7LGMH7LGIR634XE.jpg\")
Surfers in the sea at Newquay <\/p>\n![\"Redruth](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/3CKEPKAPQNHQHEWUYGFMEUKARM.jpg\")
Redruth is a depressed old mining town <\/p>\n