David Vance SubstackRead More
I see that Commonwealth heads of government are preparing to defy the United Kingdom and agree plans to examine reparatory justice for the transatlantic slave trade.
Reparatory justice for slavery can come in many forms, including financial reparations, debt relief, an official apology, educational programmes, building museums, economic support, and public health assistance.
Starmer isn’t happy about this as he wanted to discuss Climate Change instead.
OK, let’s start from the top.
The UK owes ZERO to these Commonwealth Countries in terms of so-called Reparations. In fact, if anything they owe us as it was the UK that ended the transatlantic slave trade to the chagrin of many African chieftains who benefited enormously from selling their own people. The Royal Navy ended this repugnant trade in human souls and it cost them many lives in the process. It also cost the UK enormous amounts of money to end Slavery. In 1833, Britain used £20 million, 40% of its national budget, to buy freedom for all slaves in the Empire. The amount of money borrowed for the Slavery Abolition Act was so large that it wasn’t paid off until 2015. Which means that living British citizens helped pay to end the slave trade.
So we don’t so much as a penny to these shameless grifters now coming back for more apologies and more of our cash.
But how does that sit with David Sammy, the Foreign Secretary who is on record saying that his family history as descendants of enslaved people will inform his work in government, as he seeks to deepen the UK’s relations with the global south and the Commonwealth. He’s been very critical and talks about the ‘twisted lies’ of imperialism, the slaves stolen from homes in shackles and Lammy actually supported the toppling of the Edward Colston statue in Bristol!
The Commonwealth grifters are reputed to be seeking £200bn in “Reparations” and there are many on the Labour Government benches that will have sympathy with this financial target. The fact it would transfer such as huge chunk of British taxes to these Commonwealth would mean little to these economic halfwits.
In the final analysis, the UK has more than repaid any debt, financial or moral, to these Nations and we can but hope that Starmer stands firm, but I doubt it. The very fact that he wants to talk about “Climate Change’ may simply be a ruse to transfer more of our resources to the grifters in the Commonwealth who have already benefited from British largesse.
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