British PM rules out slavery reparations

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham says he is ‘open’ to the possibility of the UK formally apologising for its role in the transatlantic slave trade, but has ruled out financial reparations, reports BBC News. He said he wanted a ‘dialogue with those affected’ and was open to ‘calls for an apology’, but said reparations were ‘not the right answer. The statement was welcomed by the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Afrikan Reparations, with its chairwoman Bell Ribeiro-Adday saying the issue was not just about money. It comes ahead of next week's Commonwealth leaders summit in the Caribbean. As King Charles III tours the region, there have been renewed calls for an apology. On Saturday, Burnham described the transatlantic slave trade as a ‘brutal and barbaric violation’ and said Britain must ‘face up to the past’. The British Government has never formally apologised for slavery or offered to pay reparations. Burnham has stuck with the policy of his predecessors, and has stopped short of offering any consideration of reparation payments. ‘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,’ Burnham wrote in The Guardian.

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