Commonwealth heads ‘could agree plans to discuss slavery reparations’
Commonwealth heads of government are set to agree to plans to discuss reparations for the slave trade as the Prime Minister has arrived in Samoa for a leaders’ summit.
Sir Keir Starmer touched down in the Pacific Island nation overnight ahead of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm).
Downing Street had previously said that reparations would not be on the agenda for the meeting.
The BBC reported on Thursday that officials of Commonwealth nations are looking at an agreement that could begin conversations on the issue through a communique.
“Facing forward”
As he travelled to the summit, Sir Keir insisted calls for reparations for slavery were not on his agenda.
“On the question of which way we’re facing I think we should be facing forward,” he told reporters.
“I’ve talked to a lot of our Commonwealth colleagues in the Commonwealth family and they’re facing real challenges on things like climate in the here and now.”
It is understood that reparations are not on the formal agenda for the summit, but there could be conversations on the wording for a communique through the event.
Earlier this week, Number 10 insisted that reparations are “not on the agenda” for the Samoan summit.
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: “The Prime Minister’s attending this week’s summit to discuss shared challenges and opportunities faced by the Commonwealth including driving growth across our economies.”
Speaking to reporters as he travelled to the summit, Sir Keir said that other nations in the association were more interested in raising cash to tackle the impact of climate change.
“That’s where I’m going to put my focus rather than what will end up being very, very long endless discussions about reparations on the past,” he added.
The Prime Minister said there was “no question” that slavery was “abhorrent”, adding: “But I think from my point of view and taking the approach I’ve just taken, I’d rather roll up my sleeves and work with them on the current future-facing challenges than spend a lot of time on the past. That’s my focus.”
Making history
Sir Keir has made history as the first UK Prime Minister to have visited a Pacific island nation, and will be in the company of King Charles, the head of the Commonwealth, during the gathering.
The Prime Minister is expected to make the case for strong economic bonds across the association, including by creating a new UK Trade Centre of Expertise, operating out of the Foreign Office.
Sir Keir has said that Britain cannot afford to be “protectionist” as it attempts to boost growth.
“We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix the foundations to turn round the lives of everyday people in the UK, but we can’t do that with a protectionist approach,” the Prime Minister said.
He added: “Under this Government’s pragmatic and sensible approach, we must harness the opportunities to work with genuine partners – like our Commonwealth family – across the world to build resilient economies that offer real opportunity for our people, whether that is accessing untapped markets, or collaborating on grassroots innovations.
“The combined GDP of the Commonwealth is expected to exceed 19.5 trillion US dollars in the next three years, we cannot let that economic heft go to waste.”
Support our Nation today
For the price of a cup of coffee a month you can help us create an independent, not-for-profit, national news service for the people of Wales, by the people of Wales.
The compensation to slave owners upon abolition (House of Commons Parliamentary Papers 1837-8) lists 365 pages of slave owners paid. The vast majority of these were in England and Scotland with only a handful in Wales. There were more slave owners in Ireland, now an independent country, than in Wales not being asked to compensate. Why is the Welsh taxpayer being asked to compensate the dirty deeds of England?
Because the money circulated throughout the country including Wales so Wales would have benefitted from the circulation of ‘slave’ money.
Evidence indicates that the largest value of the wealth was re-circulated elsewhere in the British empire. Classically demonstrated like the acquisition of the East India company making India a direct dominion and the continued expansion in Africa. Are these ‘other’ commonwealth counties to pay cash to the Caribbean?
The owners benefitted. People of wales were still living in hovels with terrible working conditions as say a slate mine where the big house was built because of plantations. The slaves and relative of slaves never saw a penny and they effectively became indentured workers. Slavery in all but name.
We only just finished paying that bill in 2015. The chances are many here have paid the slave ownser bill through the taxes you all pay.
Have a walk round Dolgellau and up the Aran…hovels yes, but not everybody, from the ‘Shopocracy’ up, a fair wind was blowing, when we were not at war…
Who to thank for our daily bread…?
It’s all online now: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/search
One man went to deny a multitude their justice …
‘a human rights’ law man at that…
Shared ownership in vessels employed as privateers…the wool trade, serene ducks have busy legs…
Read Slave Wales by Chris Evans, at least…
Add Eric Williams ‘Capitalism and Slavery’ 1944…
The tradition of taking owners surnames became superseded by expat influx…
Legs…my first visit to Nannau as a young child revealed two elephant’s feet log baskets either side of the big fireplace…
I see them now in my mind’s eye…
I could not believe it…!
The Hanes Cymru people have kept this history to a sentence at most and boy does it show…
Appalling idea. I am reading a history of East Africa in the mid 1850s. The main , brutal slavers were Arabs, the main slave trading port was Zanzibar then a part of the Oman Empire, now a part of Tanzania. The British were trying hard and finally managed to stop slavery at a cost of money and many in the Naval forces. I bet this achievement will not be mentioned nor will the Arab world be held responsible as it does not fit the woke ‘slavery reparations all British are bad concept.’
The Paddle Sloops of the West African Preventative Squadron make for a great read too but thanks for the RN mention but that was very late in the ‘game’…
Spot-on that the rest of the world fed off Africa, as the pecking order changed over history, still at it, but UK is on the menu at present…
If you like Victorian literature see S. W. Sadler…
Also, there are counties of Caribbean Islands which were Spanish and captured by the British, British and captured by the French, and French captured by the Spanish. All such empires practiced slavery at the time. Since then most Caribbean states have succeeded from the commonwealth since independence. This gambit is a ‘give us some cash or we leave’ by some political elites of the remainers. Nothing to do with slavery.
So, Starmer the ” Governor General” has metaphorically ridden by on his shiny land rover clutching his plumed hat & proclaimed to the natives what will be & what will not be. The shear arrogance of this man. The man who proclaimed to spend 28 billion pounds and then retracted on that on climate matters in the UK now wants others in other parts of the world to look ahead & focus on just that. He states he’s only looking forward to the future & enable ordinary people to share in the future prosperity. He wants the people who’s own… Read more »
Good, foprce the UK to the table it looks like. But the UK must go to the table.