A favourite book of my childhood was Our Island Story, H E Marshall’s magisterial (and chronological) account of this country’s history. Twenty years ago, this newspaper and the think tank Civitas collaborated on a venture to supply thousands of these books to primary schools across the land. Readers contributed more than £25,000 and free copies were sent out in the hope of inspiring renewed interest in our history and pride in the nation’s achievements.

Where are those books now? My fear is that they are mouldering on library shelves, untouched, unread and unloved by teachers predisposed to think nothing but ill about this great land and its past. What else can we conclude from the depressing findings of this year’s Social Attitudes Survey indicating that pride in Britain’s history has fallen sharply over the past decade.

The decline is startling: a 22-point fall in the proportion of people saying they are proud of Britain’s history, from 86 per cent to 64 per cent. There was also a 13-point drop in those who said they would rather be a citizen of Britain than any other country, from 62 per cent to 49 per cent.

There were marked declines in the proportion of people expressing pride in Britain’s democracy, its economic achievements, and its political influence in the world. People were less likely to agree that Britain was better than most other countries or that people should support their country even if it was in the wrong.

Some commentators attributed this to an embrace of greater “inclusivity” and a consequent lessening of jingoistic tendencies. But this is wilfully to conflate patriotism with nationalism, a trick used by those who have a pathological dislike of their own country.

Samuel Johnson may have called it the last refuge of a scoundrel, but patriotism is a positive concept. In his Notes on Nationalism (1945), George Orwell said: “Nationalism is not to be confused with patriotism. Both words are normally used in so vague a way that any definition is liable to be challenged, but one must draw a distinction between them, since two different and even opposing ideas are involved. By ‘patriotism’ I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force on other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally.”

Orwell spoke wisely, as he often did. Elsewhere he observed that “England is perhaps the only great country whose intellectuals are ashamed of their own nationality … in Left-wing circles it is always felt that there is something slightly disgraceful in being an Englishman and that it is a duty to snigger at every English institution, from horse racing to suet puddings”.

This is, indeed, a peculiarly English phenomenon. The nation that makes up Great Britain with England and Wales has no compunction about celebrating its history or waving its flag at every opportunity. You don’t see the Scots denying their past because they played a central role in building the Empire that we are now expected to decry.

The Left-wing circles to which Orwell referred were on the fringe when he wrote in the 1940s but have dominated our public life for decades, even under Tory administrations. They now constitute our government and are about to rewrite the school curriculum to make it “broader, modern and inclusive”, which should fill us all with dread.

If there is one reason why national pride has declined, it is not because the wartime generation has died out, as was suggested yesterday, but because the Left has hammered away at our history for years, leaving it a bloodied wreck. Alex Scholes, a senior researcher on the survey based on 5,600 interviews conducted last year said the fall in pride may in part reflect the high-profile public debate about empire, slavery and race in recent years. You don’t say.

We are no longer invited to praise the actions of the Royal Navy in ending the slave trade – in which all nations participated – but to single out Britain for particular opprobrium for having been involved in it in the first place. We no longer marvel at the role of Britain in an Industrial Revolution that would eventually bring previously unimaginable prosperity to the world, but are castigated for being the perpetrators of global warming.

We are no longer allowed to point out that the liberties enjoyed by countries around the world originated on these shores as long ago as Magna Carta (did she die in vain?), but are instead accused of being habitual abusers of human rights. If our colonial legacy was so bad, why are countries that were part of the British Empire now in a Commonwealth headed by the King? Why, furthermore, are so many migrants beating a path to our door, avoiding many others on the way?

As Orwell said, patriotism is “devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life”. Germans call it Heimat, even if they have a past to forget, but we have no equivalent word. Almost uniquely, we also have no national day. Denmark is the only other country without one, though they do have a Constitution Day, which serves the purpose. While the French are en fete on Bastille Day, the Americans celebrate their independence on July 4, and Australia observes the landing of the first fleet in 1788 in January, we have nothing.

It used to be said that such a celebration was un-British (really un-English since the Scots have a holiday on St Andrew’s Day) and should be frowned upon. We knew we were top dog so why flaunt it? Many still hold this view.

Yet this survey shows the danger of arrogance when there is nothing to fall back on apart from the occasional Jubilee and the odd special event like the Olympics or a wartime commemoration. We have no means of routinely reaffirming our pride in our country in an unapologetic and celebratory way that can be shared by all, whatever their background.

Marshall wrote an introductory letter to her young readers declaring: “Remember that I am not trying to teach you, but only to tell a story.” Is it still being told in a positive way? This survey suggests not. Of course it has its flaws and excesses as all histories do. But it is one in which we can all be proud, if we would only stand up to those who seek to trash it.