LONDON: Some British Labour lawmakers on Sunday accused Prime Minister Keir Starmer of having a “colonial mindset” and trying to silence nations pushing for discussions on reparations for transatlantic slavery at this month’s Commonwealth summit in Samoa.
Britain has so far rejected calls for reparations but some campaigners hoped Starmer’s new Labour government would be more open to it.
However, ahead of the Commonwealth heads of government summit in Samoa, where Caribbean and African nations wished to discuss the topic, Starmer said the issue was not on the agenda and that he would like to “look forward” rather than have “very long, endless discussions about reparations on the past.”
“(It) is very insulting (to) tell people of African descent to forget and move forward,” said Labour lawmaker Bell Ribeiro-Addy at a cross-party reparations conference in London.
At the end the Samoa summit, leaders of the 56-nation club headed by Britain’s King Charles agreed to include in their final communique that the time had come for a discussion on reparations.
“I’m very proud those nations refused to be silenced,” Ribeiro-Addy said.
Another Labour lawmaker, Clive Lewis, said it was surprising Starmer thought he could take a “colonial mindset” to the summit and “dictate what could and could not be discussed.”
At a news conference in Samoa on Saturday, Starmer said slavery was “abhorrent” and that the discussions agreed to in the communique would not be “about money.”
A Downing Street spokesperson had no further comment on the remarks by Labour lawmakers on Sunday.
Proponents of reparations say slavery’s legacy has caused persistent racial inequalities while opponents say countries shouldn’t be held responsible for historical wrongs.
The lawmakers said that reparations could include a formal apology, debt cancelation, the return of artefacts or changing the school curriculum, not just financial payments.
Diane Abbott, Britain’s first Black woman lawmaker, said Labour previously had plans to establish a national reparations commission but Starmer “seems to have forgotten that.”
“Reparations isn’t about the past, it is about the here and now,” she said.