Some people are convinced that the United Kingdom has been integrated into Europe over the last forty years.

There is an argument however that many of the signs and symbols of UK independence have never been given up.

There was a controversy recently over the colour of the UK passport after leaving the EU. This surely is a detail when judged against the content of the passport. On the front is written ‘The United Kingdom of Britain and Northern Ireland’. How could this offend a patriot? Inside the design and content is entirely determined by the government of the UK. If you are abroad and need a new passport photograph for instance, you will not find it easy to obtain a photograph with a Passport Office prescribed white background. Photograph machines in Spain for instance, have grey backgrounds which is the preference of the Spanish Government. The UK Passport Office state very clearly that if you submit photographs with grey backgrounds they will be returned and no passport issued until they are changed.

When you renew your UK passport, it will not have the number of your previous passport, but a new one. Imagine how confusing this is to other European countries who do not do this. Is Europol going to be able to track these changing passport numbers?

Such squabbling over details is common across the entire European Union. Most of the time it isn’t serious but when it comes to European Armies trying to share ammunition for their weapons unsuccessfully, you realise it can have real implications.

But let’s go back to European documentation. After a passport, your driving licence might be considered the next most personal State-issued document. Europe has never issued a European driving licence. If you move around Europe, after a year in one country, you need a driving licence issued by that country. During that time you might have committed various offences ranging from parking to drink driving. How is the penalty point system administered? Are police in the UK really going to spend time with drivers of foreign lorries trying to put points on their licence through the UK courts, when the driver is leaving the country in a few days?

Does such a disjointed system make it easier or more difficult for a criminal or terrorist to move around Europe?

It would be less serious if the car registration system was unified across Europe. But no, just as passports and driving licences have been made ‘European’ by putting the European symbol on them, the same has happened to car registration plates. Each European car has a more or less, meaningless blue badge with a circle of stars. So what? More seriously it means that as you cross borders in Europe, speed cameras may not be set up to read numbers on ‘foreign plates’ often because of different backgrounds.

People may not realise it, but number plate recognition systems are in place on most major roads, borders and travel hubs. Surely they should be allowed to work without hindrance from multiple letter styles and backgrounds? Not that it matters because as far as I am aware there is no European car registration database.

Many European countries gave up their national currencies for the Euro. In rich countries like Germany, their goods and services suddenly became highly exportable overnight. Not so in the UK, which decided to keep the pound and kept UK goods and services relatively more expensive than Europe. For it’s citizens, they are forced to pay every time they buy a product in Euro’s or go abroad for a holiday. Pensioners living in Europe have their precious pounds squeezed through an exchange rate every month, and in the last year or so, have lost 15% of their income.

These are a few of the more high profile indicators of what living in the European Union means to the average UK citizen. I would not pretend to understand whether a similar hollow process has taken place in the European Courts and Parliament. Has there really been any serious integration between nations? At a superficial level at least, each has retained their signs of nationality and ignored the benefits of integrating economies, law enforcement, migration and customs control or defence.

The deckchairs have been well and truly moved around on the Steamship Europe since it’s inception. Little has happened to change the ship’s course or speed, as it enters ice berg infested waters.