Sorrow and Regret Offered, but Reparations Refused
In a signed article before next week’s Commonwealth summit in Antigua, the prime minister called the transatlantic slave trade “a brutal and barbaric violation”, expressed “sorrow and regret”, and said he is open to calls for a formal state apology. He refused financial reparations: “I do not believe that is the right answer.”
The structure of the offer is the story. He gives a personal expression of regret, puts a formal state apology on the table without granting it, and declines reparations on a liability argument: that “British people today” cannot 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”. In their place he offers a debt-restructuring drive for the poorest Commonwealth countries, to be led by a former prime minister and expected to involve the IMF — which matters, because debt-servicing costs in the poorest countries are at their highest in more than twenty-five years and more than 40% of them spend more on interest than on health. Caribbean leaders have answered precisely rather than warmly. Barbados thanked him for “breaking new ground” while saying “our views differ” on reparations. A former prime minister of St Vincent was blunter: “If they are not going to entertain reparations, what is the conversation about? Nothing.” The summit runs from tomorrow to Wednesday; reparations are not on its agenda.