If plans touted by then-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn in 2017 came to fruition, we would be enjoying another bank holiday tomorrow (Wednesday, April 23). Ahead of his first general election as Leader of the Opposition, Corbyn wanted to add four extra bank holidays to mark each UK nation’s patron saint day.
This would mean St George’s Day (April 23), St David’s Day (March 1), St Patrick’s Day (March 17) and St Andrew’s Day (November 30) would be added to our eight days off work.
But seven years on from this, in April 2024, Prime Minister Keir Starmer ruled this out. Speaking to the BBC months before being elected, he said it was not possible due.
He told reporters: “A bank holiday [on St George’s Day] would be very nice but I think that, with the economy where it is at the moment, we have to celebrate in-and-around the work that we’re doing, because we need to absolutely take our country forward.
“What I want to do, if we’re privileged enough to come into government, is to have a government of service to the country and have a decade of national renewal – and that would fulfil St George’s Day’s promise.”
Campaigners who want St George’s Day to become a bank holiday argue that England has fewer bank holidays than other major industrialised countries. The average across the European Union is 11, while there are also differentials across the UK.
St Andrew’s Day is celebrated as a bank holiday in Scotland, while Northern Ireland has both St Patrick’s Day and the Battle of the Boyne.
Why do we have bank holidays?
Bank holidays are a modern and more secular version of holy days (which in itself is where the word ‘holiday’ originates). Some, like Christmas Day and Easter Sunday, are both.
Up until 1834, some 33(!) holy days were celebrated in the UK. But, the impact of Protestantism on British culture and the general move to the cities meant such days weren’t observed like in times gone by.
Thankfully, Sir John Lubbock pushed the Bank Holidays Act through parliament in 1871, which brought back the idea of shared national days off work. England has the fewest public holidays in the world, behind Mexico. India leads the rankings with 21 official days.
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