Identity crisis

- Published: 04 September, 2009

A Stirlingshire butcher found himself at the centre of international media attention last month in the great debate of whether haggis is English or Scottish.

Robert Patrick, of Patricks of Camelon, become a global rent-a-quote in August, following a historian's claim that a haggis recipe she found reveals the dish is an English product rather than Scottish. Robert said: "On the Sunday night, while I was out walking my dogs, I got a call from Radio 5 Live to see if I wanted to go on a live show to discuss the claims being made in the Sunday papers about the origins of haggis being from England.

"At 8.55pm John Pienaar phoned me and, as a true Scot, I dismissed the claims as rubbish in a light-hearted way, as the last article before the hourly news generally is."

However, when Robert turned up to his shop on the Monday morning, at 6.30am, the next call arrived. "I got a call from somebody from the Press Association, who must have heard me on Radio 5. He asked me the same questions again. 'Great,' I thought. 'From my 15 minutes with him, I might get a small mention in a local paper in the north of Scotland or somewhere.' Boy was I wrong! At 9am the phone goes again. It was the local Christian broadcasting radio station, whom I've advertised with before."

Robert was then asked by the BBC if he could turn up at their studios in Glasgow to appear on television. He then was also interviewed on the BBC World Service, a nationwide radio network in the US, an ex-pat radio station in Spain and recently talked about haggis for XFM in Manchester.

But would Robert be up for all the media attention if it came round again? "Absolutely. I've done it once. It wouldn't bother me."