UK PM Burnham ‘open’ to formal apology for Britain’s slave trade, but rejects financial reparations
UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said he is “open” to calls for the British state to formally apologise for its role in the transatlantic slave trade. However, he has rejected demands from Caribbean countries for Britain to pay financial reparations.
In an opinion piece for the Guardian, published ahead of a summit of Commonwealth countries starting on Sunday, Burnham offered a “structured dialogue with those affected” by the slave trade. “Having these difficult conversations to safeguard the Commonwealth for the future is the right thing to do. It is also the patriotic thing to do,” he wrote.
On reparations, however, his position was clear: he argued they would be the wrong solution. “I do not think that British people today can be held liable for historical wrongs, however heinous, that happened in a different age under different laws and in which they played no personal part,” the prime minister argued.
Caribbean leaders have pressed the case for reparations. Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley announced in June a manifesto by Caribbean leaders setting out the “moral, ethical and legal case” for reparations from former colonial powers.
Burnham will attend the biennial Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Antigua and Barbuda, which runs through Wednesday. It will be his first foreign trip with King Charles.
The summit will be a crucial test for the prime minister, who will try to avoid a fight over slavery reparations that marred his predecessor Keir Starmer’s visit at the last summit in 2024.
