The Army Council was committee of high ranking officers and civilian organizers headed by a Cabinet Minister who controlled the army, and had its own flag which was authorized in 1905.

The Port of London Authority (PLA) is a self-funding public trust established in 1908 by the Port of London Act. It is responsible for governing the Port of London, protecting the public right of navigation, and for conserving the Thames River and all its public docks between London and the sea.

The Royal Flying Corps, composed of a Naval Wing and a Military Wing, was constituted by Royal Warrant in 1912. However the Admiralty ignored this arrangement, and organized its own air service. The Naval Wing officially became the Royal Naval Air Service in 1914, which left the Military Wing to take the name Royal Flying Corps. In 1917 it was recommended that the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service should combine to form a new air service, independent of either the Army or the Navy. This was effected on 1 April 1918 when the Royal Air Force was established. In 1937, the Fleet Air Arm was removed from the Royal Air Force and placed once again under the control of the Admiralty. The Fleet Air Arm being part of the Royal Navy used the traditional naval White Ensign.

The Royal Air Force Ensign is the official flag of the Royal Air Force. The Ensign has a field of air force blue with the Union Flag in the canton and the Royal Air Force roundel in the middle of the fly.

The Royal Mail is the national postal service of the United Kingdom. Historically, the General Post Office was a government department which included the Royal Mail delivery business, represented in government by the Postmaster General, a Cabinet-level post. It became a limited corporation in 1969, eventually under the name of Consignia Plc, Consignia Holdings Plc, and finally Royal Mail Holdings Plc, which it is called today.

This little known member of the family of British-style ensigns was adopted in 1931 for use at United Kingdom airports and by aircraft registered in the United Kingdom.

The British Army is the land armed forces branch of the British Armed Forces. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdoms of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. In contrast to the Royal Navy, Royal Marines and Royal Air Force, the British Army does not include Royal in its title. The British Army flag is mainly used in recruiting and military events and exhibitions.

The Special Air Service or SAS is a regiment of the British Army that has its origins back in 1941 and the Second World War. Today it is part of the United Kingdom Special Forces (UKSF), formed in 1987, along with the Special Boat Service (SBS), Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR), Special Forces Support Group (SFSG), 18th (UKSF) Signal Regiment, and the Joint Special Forces Aviation Wing. They form the Special forces, or special operations forces, which military units highly trained to perform unconventional, high-risk missions. The United Kingdom Special Forces have served as a model for the special forces of many other countries.

The Special Boat Service (SBS) is the special forces unit of the British Royal Navy, similar to the U.S. Navy Seals. The SBS is not an independent unit, but part of the Royal Marines. In the past to be eligible for SBS selection, a candidate usually would have served for at least two years in the Royal Marines or the Royal Navy, and then passed a rigorous selection course. However, today the SBS is open to non-marine members of other regiments and services from throughout the UK military. Together with the Special Air Service, Special Reconnaissance Regiment and the Special Forces Support Group, they form the United Kingdom Special Forces and come under joint control of the Director of Special Forces. The SBS can trace their origins to the Second World War when they were formed as the Special Boat Section in the 1940s.

The National Fire Service (NFS) was the single fire service created in Great Britain in 1941 during World War II in order to deal more effectively with the fires started by air raids. At peak strength the NFS had 370,000 personnel, including 80,000 women who were mostly employed on administrative duties. The NFS was divided into about forty Fire Forces. These were subdivided into Divisions. Each Division had two Columns and each Column had five Companies. It existed until 1948, when the fire services reverted back to local authority control.

The Army Sailing Association (ASA) was formed in 1947 to manage sailing as a sport within the Army and to represent its interests at Service and national level. It caters to all sailing disciplines, including offshore and inshore yacht racing, dinghy and keel-boat racing, windsurfing and kitesurfing.

HMS Trincomalee was built in Bombay as a 38 gun frigate in 1817, and is now the oldest ship afloat in the United Kingdom, probably the second oldest in the world. (The USS Constitution is the oldest.) The Trincomalee was to have been scraped in 1897, but was bought to replace the training ship Foudroyant, which had just been wrecked. After conversion she was re-named the Foudroyant in 1902 and served as a training ship until 1986. The hulls of obsolete wooden warships at permanent moorings in harbors and rivers around Britain were used as training ships. Between 1950 and 1986 she flew the Blue Ensign of TS Foudroyant. Restoration to her present condition was carried out by the Foudroyant Trust, which became the HMS Trincomalee Trust in 1992.

The dragon symbol itself dates back to Roman times when it was the standard of the Roman cohort stationed in Wales (Part of the Tenth Legion). It was a prominent symbol across England and Wales in the years after the departure of the Romans, and during the era of the invasions of the Angles and Saxons.

In the United Kingdom any vessel flying an auxiliary service ensign has a civilian crew that is not subject to the Naval Discipline Act. A naval auxiliary is not commissioned and any armament carried is for defensive purposes only and must not be used offensively. The ensign of the Royal Naval Auxiliary Service is now obsolete, but it was originally established in 1952 as the "Royal Naval Minewatching Service." The Royal Naval Auxiliary Service was disbanded in 1994.

The Joint Services is basically a special command organization under the Minster of Defence representing all three United Kingdom Armed Services, including the Royal Navy, Army, and Royal Air Force. In 1956, a special flag for the Chiefs of Staff Committee was approved. Admiral of the Fleet, the Earl Mountbatten of Burma, became the first Chairman. Three years later his title, and that of the flag was changed to the Chief of the Defence Staff. A horizontal tricolor of dark blue, for the Royal Navy, over red for the Army, over light blue for the Royal Air Force, with the Joint Services badge centered, was chosen for the staff flag. The order of the stripes represented the seniority of the individual services. The white circular background of the badge was encircled by laurel leaves in gold.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) is the United Kingdom's government department responsible for implementation of government defense policy and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces. The Ministry of Defence principal objectives are to defend the United Kingdom and its interests. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, the MOD has turned its attention to identifying weapons of mass destruction, stopping international terrorism and other threats to the UK's interests. The Ministry of Defence also manages the armed forces, does contingency planning and defense procurement.

The Army Board consists of high ranking officers and civilian advisers headed by the Chief of the General Staff and the Executive Committee. The Executive Committee of the Army Board's mission is to assist the Chief of the General Staff in discharging his executive responsibilities for the delivery of coherent military capability, the current and future fighting effectiveness and efficiency of the Army, and the morale of the Service. It also helps oversee performance management, risk, budgetary, resource and financial assurance issues.

Keep Britain Tidy is a private British organization founded by Lady Elisbeth Brunner and the National Federation of Women's Institutes in 1954, whose goal was simply to "Keep Britain Tidy". They quickly got to work tackling litter and encouraging pride in their country. In 1959, they became an independent organization and using the iconic "Tidyman" logo that began appearing across England. World-famous entertainers such as Abba, Morecambe and Wise, The Bee Gees, Marc Bolan and David Cassidy, to name a few, have joined their efforts to clean up the environment.

Today, the KBT is one of the world’s largest environmental education programs reaching about five million United Kingdom students. Their Waste Watch program, for example, helps communities, local authorities, and land managers conserve resources across the whole United Kingdom, especially on environmental issues.

Seashore Award Flag Variant
(with date of award in gold)

Each year these KBT flags are awarded to new parks and beaches that have maintained clean and safe standards for their facilities. The year that the flags are awarded has the date of the award added in either white (or gold) lettering.

Over 1,300 parks and beaches in England and Scotland and Northern Ireland are now proudly flying either their Green, Blue or Seashore Awards Flag, indicating how sucessful the program has become. A similar international organization, named the "Foundation for Environmental Education," started their own Blue Flag campaign in 1986, using the the KBT program as a model.

The Blue ensign of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary features an upright anchor. Since the Royal Navy's logistical support is provided, not by commissioned naval vessels, but by the civilian-manned ships of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary Service (tankers, underway replenishment ships, and the like), they can not fly the White Ensign of the Royal Navy. For this reason they have been provided a special Blue Ensign with a gold anchor on the fly. The names of these ships are preceded by "RFA" instead of "HMS." The vertical anchor was introduced in 1969 as a separate ensign for the Royal Fleet Auxiliaries.

The Environmental Agency is an executive non-departmental public body responsible to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and an Assembly Sponsored Public Body responsible to the National Assembly for Wales.

Her Majesty's Coastguard (HMC) is the government service concerned with coordinating all civilian maritime Search and Rescue, including the mobilization and organization of adequate resources to respond to persons either in distress at sea, or on the shoreline of the United Kingdom. It is part of a larger Maritime and Coastguard Agency. It was first formed in 1829, but the ensign illustrated dates from 1999.

Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC) was formed in 2005, following the merger of Inland Revenue and Her Majesty's Customs and Excise. After 2008, it was then merged with the United Kingdom Border Agency (UKBA). The vessels which used to fly the HMRC ensign now fly the UKBA ensign (shown below). If this ensign is used at all now, it used only on land.

The Ministry of Defence Police (MDP) is part of the United Kingdom's Ministry of Defence. It is part of the Ministry of Defence Police and Guarding Agency which was formed by merging the MDP and Ministry of Defence Guard Service (MGS) in 2004. The MDP is primarily responsible for providing police, investigative and guarding services to government property throughout the United Kingdom including high security sites, both military and civilian. The MDP has approximately 3,500 police officers based at 110 police units at 86 locations across the United Kingdom.

The Advisory Committee on National Historic Ships was established in 2006 as a part of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to advise the Secretary of State and other public bodies on ship preservation and funding priorities. They are charged with helping funding bodies who are attempting the preservation of historic ships, maintaining a watch list of vessels with potential historic significance, and providing direct assistance to vessel owners find funding grants, and keeping a directory of those with skills and services necessary to help in the preservation of historic vessels.

The United Kingdom Border Agency (UKBA) was formed in 2008. The agency protects the United Kingdom's borders, and is one of the largest law enforcement agencies in the UK. They number about 25,000, including more than 9,000 warranted Customs and Immigration Officers, who are stationed at all borders and across 135 countries worldwide. Customs officers have wide-ranging powers of entry, search and detention. Immigration officers have the power of arrest and detention conferred on them by the Immigration Act 1971, both at ports and inland.

The UKBA Ensign as flown from all their vessels, including all Customs Cutters, which serve a similar duty to those of United States Coast Guard Cutters. Their ensign is the standard blue ensign defaced with the UKBA shield on the fly.

The Maritime Volunteer Service is a nationwide uniformed civilian service based at around 35 locations on Britain´s coast. The service exists to keep alive British Maritime skills and train others in seamanship, navigation, marine engineering, radio operation and operational support. Their goal is "...to maintain a corps of trained volunteers capable of supporting maritime authorities ashore and afloat at maritime events or emergencies."

The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the United Kingdom responsible for the command of the Royal Navy. Originally it's leadership was the Lord High Admiral and his Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, who sat on the Board of Admiralty. In 1964, the functions of the Admiralty were transferred to a committee of the tri-service Defense Council of the United Kingdom and became part of the Ministry of Defence.

Lord High Admiral

The Navy Board is today the body responsible for the day-to-day running of the British Royal Navy. Its composition is identical to that of the Admiralty Board of the Defence Council of the United Kingdom, except that it does not include any of Her Majesty's Ministers.

The United Kingdom Supreme Court is the final court of appeal for all United Kingdom civil cases, and criminal cases from England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It is the final court of appeal, and plays an important role in the development of United Kingdom law. As an appeal court, the UK Supreme Court cannot consider a case unless it has been first tried in a lower court.

The Forestry Commission of Great Britian origins are in the First World War, and the difficulties Britain had meeting wartime demands on timber. Woodland resources had been declining since the middle ages, but reached an all time low in the wake of the Industrial Revolution. With the outbreak of war the country was no longer able to rely on timber imports, and in 1916 the Acland Committee was organized to look at the best ways of developing woodland resources. The committee recommended a state organization be formed to coordinate government and private forestry efforts.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) is the United Kingdom department responsible for policy and regulations on environmental protection, food production and standards, agriculture, fisheries and rural communities in the United Kingdom. Although DEFRA only works directly in England, they also work closely with similar administrations in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and they generally lead on environmental negotiations in the EU and internationally.

Originally known as the Ministry of Transport (MoT) the Department for Transport (DfT) is the government department responsible for the English transport network and a limited number of transport matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The department is run by the Secretary of State for Transport.

The Department of Trade and Industry, formally the Board of Trade, was a United Kingdom government department with a wide range of responsibilities, including: Company Law, Trade, Business Growth, Innovation, Employment Law, Regional Economic Development, Energy, Science, and Consumer Law. In 2005, the DTI was split into three parts: the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR), and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS). There is, however, still a Board of Trade, although now just a part of the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.

The Scottish Executive of Rural Affairs Department is now responsible for most of the issues concerning the health, education, justice, rural affairs, and transport of the Scottish people. The Scottish Government was known as the "Scottish Executive" when it was established in 1999 following the first elections of the Scottish Parliament.

The title Lord-Lieutenant is given to the British monarch's personal representatives around the United Kingdom. Usually some retired local notable, a senior army officer, peer or business person is given this honorary post.

The Office of High Sheriff is an independent non-political Royal appointment for a single year. The origins of the Office date back to Saxon times, when the "Shire Reeve" was responsible for the maintenance of law and order within the shire, or county, and for the collection and return of taxes due to the Crown. Today, there are 55 High Sheriffs serving the counties of England and Wales each year.

Queen Elizabeth's Personal Flag which she flies when visiting Commonwealth countries of which she is not Head of State.

Two examples of Royal Standards of current British Commonwealth nations are shown to the left. These flags are flown for Queen Elizabeth when she visits these British Commonwealth nations, of which she is still considered the Head of State.

The Commonwealth of Nations is actually a voluntary association of 53 independent sovereign states, most of which are former British colonies. Although no single government in the Commonwealth exercises power over the others, some still consider the British King or Queen of England their traditional Head of State.

Commonwealth of Nations Flag 1976		Commonwealth of Nations Flag 2013

In 2013, the Commonwealth of Nations flag was simplified and modernized at the request of the Commonwealth Secretariat. The number of "spearheads" was reduced from 64 to 34, the globe was slightly altered to make it standout better, the blue field color was lightened a bit, and the emblem was slightly tilted towards the hoist. According to the Secretariat "The radiating spears do not represent the number of countries in the Commonwealth, but symbolizes the many facets of Commonwealth cooperation around the world."

This amusing flag design was used by the Scottish Jacobite Party, a minor political party which advocates Scottish independence. The flag was used on at least one occasion, together with traditional flags of Scotland and the SJP Party. The flag gained more notoriety in 2012 when Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond and Deputy PM Nick Clegg clashed publicly over the Scottish independence issue. The flag is, of course, the British Union Flag stripped of its distinctive Scottish blue background. It should be pointed out that this flag design is very unlikely because even if Scotland did become independent and a republic, like in many parts of the former British Empire, Great Britain's royal family would probably still be considered the "monarchs" of Scotland, as they have since 1606, and the Union flag would therefore most likely remain unchanged.

The Organization of the Friends of the British Overseas Territories (OFBOT) is a charitable organization which promotes and supports an increased awareness of the British Overseas Territories both in the United Kingdom and across the world.