Bristol council passes motion to make reparation for slavery. Tories oppose it
Over it goes: the toppling of the Colston statue, back in June.
Here’s yet another reason for This Writer to be proud of the city of my birth.
After making controversial history during the Black Lives Matter protests last year, when citizens of Bristol tore down a statue of the slaver Edward Colston and threw it in the docks, the city council has gone a step further.
It has passed a motion to make “reparations” – not just financial but also cultural – for the slave trade in which the city participated and its enduring impact.
As former Lord Mayor Cleo Lake stated, “The contribution of African civilisation, culture and people versus how we have been treated is one of the world’s great paradoxes.”
Bristol is also calling for the UK’s Tory government to set up an all-party parliamentary inquiry to examine how such reparations might be delivered.
This might be a challenging request as although the motion was passed with 47 votes in support, 12 Tory councillors voted against it.
Believe it or not, they said the motion to make amends for an abhorrent past “risks exacerbating some divisions by presenting a binary view of the world when the reality is much more complicated”.
That sounds like doubletalk to This Writer! That is, disapproving speech that is intended to confuse an issue.
I think these Tories simply don’t want to face the reality of Bristol’s – and the UK’s – slave-trading background, with all the harm it has done, or the racism that still pervades this nation as a result.
In opposing the motion, they also opposed community wealth creation strategies to produce more sustainable and equitable growth whilst alleviating systemic poverty, which acknowledges that a just economy is the only way to achieve racial justice.
Typical Tories, you might say.
Source: ‘History is made’ as Bristol passes slavery reparations motion
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