Black History Month

Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2021 Westminster Hall

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Black History Month 2021.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Sir Graham. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing this vital debate and I extend my thanks to the hon. Members who supported my application and have joined to participate today. To some, this might be just another debate, but for black and minority ethnic communities, holding this debate in Parliament shows that we recognise and celebrate that history and their achievements right across the UK and the world. I sincerely hope that general debates to celebrate Black History Month will become a regular fixture on the parliamentary calendar.

This year’s theme for Black History Month is “Proud to Be”. That is so important because so many are made to feel uncomfortable about their ethnic heritage, cultural history and language—seen, or felt to be seen, by others as the other, inferior or a minority. However, black people have so much to be proud of culturally in the ways we have contributed to British history, and we ought to be proud to be both black and British. In her Adjournment debate last week, my hon. Friend the Member for Erith and Thamesmead (Abena Oppong-Asare) highlighted several black British individuals who make us feel proud. I am sure that colleagues will no doubt mention several more individuals who have made significant contributions to our nation’s history and who we ought to be proud of. From Yvonne Conolly, the UK’s first black headteacher, to C. L. R. James, the renowned author, from William Cuffay, the leading figure of the Chartist movement, to my right hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), the first black woman to be elected to this Parliament, we see figures who reflect the diversity of our country and who we can all be proud of.

The UK has its own rich civil rights history, which my generation and those before me were unfortunately never formally taught and have had to take it upon ourselves to learn. Not recognising yourself in your history can have a serious impact on your identity. How are we expected to feel “Proud to Be” if we are shown by omission that the contributions of black people are not worth being taught in our schools? Colleagues may be aware of the petition that circulated last year, which called for the UK to teach Britain’s colonial past as part of the curriculum. It achieved over 260,000 signatures and, along with similar petitions, means that the teaching of black history in schools has received the most support of any parliamentary petition in our history.

That appetite has not waned at all, because more than 660 schools in England have signed up for a diverse and anti-racist curriculum developed by teachers and council staff in the London Borough of Hackney. The Black Contribution aims to teach young people about not just the history of black people, but fundamentally the history that we all share because—as I hope everyone has heard many times throughout this month—black history is British history.

Now is the perfect time to pay tribute to the Labour Government in Wales, which have instituted black history as part of their curriculum. Seeing them lead the way and seeing how much support that has had, I cannot understand why the Government still refuse to commit to putting black history in the curriculum, when there is such widespread support. Perhaps when responding to the debate, the Minister can inform us the reason why the Government refuse to take action on this.

Instead, unfortunately, what we have seen is discussions descending into a so-called war on woke and culture wars, and other, very bizarre claims about the phrase “white privilege”, how it has affected us and the idea that it is being widely taught in schools. First, anyone who actually speaks to teachers will find that that is not a feature in any of the lessons. We do not hear about children running home from school talking about it or, indeed, about teachers asking Timmy, “What’s 1 + 1?”, Timmy saying, “2”, and the teachers saying, “Aha! Timmy, you knew the answer because of white privilege.” We do not hear such nonsense. That is not what is happening in our schools. Secondly, teaching children about race inequality, as some teachers will do during Black History Month, is not what is holding back working-class children in our education system. It was not teaching about racism that closed down hundreds of youth services or cut funding per pupil in this country; that was this Government. It is those policies that hold back working-class children from all our communities.

I completely understand why this Government may not want to talk about race, and especially not about their record on race, but ignoring these issues will not lead to the post-racial society that some people believe we are living in. We have to address them. We have to address past issues of slavery and colonialism and their lasting impact, which is the racism we face today, and we have to do it by education and other means. I would be proud to be part of a Parliament that finally apologised for the atrocities of slavery and colonialism. Yesterday I was pleased to officially launch the all-party parliamentary group on African reparations and am looking forward to policy on this. Cambridge University recently returned, and quite proudly so, two of the looted Benin bronzes, but there are over 3,000 in this country and 900 alone in the British Museum. Reparations begin with things such as that: giving back these things that do not belong to us.

We know that over the past few years there has been no shortage of discussions about racial disparities. We have had debates about the impact of covid on black and ethnic minority communities, about the need to teach black history as part of the curriculum, about racial disparities in maternal health outcomes, and about the ethnicity employment gap and the ethnicity pay gap, and of course the Black Lives Matter protests, a tragic reminder that racism can be a matter of life and death. Time and time again, we have raised the ongoing racial disparities in the UK, and time and time again we have called on the Government to act, but the response has been felt to be full of platitudes and empty gestures, with a report that told us, quite famously, that systemic racism does not exist and that in some ways actually attempted to create some racial divides.

Although it seems like we have talked about it quite a lot, given that the last CRED—Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities—report was only released earlier this year, it would be remiss of me not to mention it. As far as I am concerned, it turns back the clock on ending racial inequality. There are other reports and inquiries that have outlined how racism continues across society, and report after report outlining the social causes and political failings that underpin it.

[Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on her amazing speech. She alludes to the fact that there have been multiple reports on racial inequality in this country. Does she agree that if the Government just took some time and looked at beginning to implement some of those recommendations, we might, just maybe, begin to make some headway on racial inequality?

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. If we had gone down that road, perhaps we would not be having the discussions that we are having today.

We need to think about what that report said, when it decided that there was no institutional or systemic racism, and how that discounts years of lived experience and the things that people from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds have experienced in this country. What I could not understand at the time was whether the Government believed they would get any buy-in for a report that was so widely discredited across our communities or to what extent, given how discredited it has been, it was actually for our communities, even though it was very much about them.

The idea that institutional racism does not exist means that there is no action for the state to take, because it is not an institutional problem. As far as I am concerned, the Government appear to be absolving themselves of responsibility to take action on institutions that fail to deliver racial equality. We did not need that report; we needed action on reports gone by. We certainly did not need a new story about slavery and colonialism, when the one that we have at the moment is not even being widely taught.

My hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) pointed to the recommendations of reports gone by that have not been implemented, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) reminded me that the Government continue to stall on implementing fully his Lammy review. In the meantime, BAME youth custody now sits at 51%, which is an increase of 10% on when he was asked to do the review just five years ago.

The Windrush lessons learned review by Wendy Williams was also commissioned by the Government. Even the author of the report has said how woeful it is that, again, the Government continue not to act on the recommendations. Furthermore, the scandal continues, because many people caught up in it have not yet received compensation or their proper status of leave to remain in this country.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. When we talk about unimplemented reports and inquiries, we could go all the way back to the early ’80s and the Scarman inquiry. If everything that Scarman spoke about had been addressed, we would not be in the situation we are in today.

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is what we want to bring to an end. We have to stop this cycle whereby something bad happens, we have a report or inquiry, and the Government—successive Governments—just push it under the carpet and wait until the next disaster in which racial inequality is raised. Part of why we are not making headway is that the bodies that are meant to protect us and to apply checks and balances on the Government simply do not have the ability to do so.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights report, “Black people, racism and human rights”, said that overall there was a very damning picture of structural racism right across society, such as in health, immigration, policing, the justice system and electoral participation. It also mentioned, in a key way, the failures of the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission is tasked with policing equality and, potentially, enforcing such targets. However, it is not fit for purpose in its current form. How could it be? It is supposed to be an independent arm’s length body, but its major appointments are still made by the Government. That must make it difficult to take action when Government policies lead to inequality or human rights breaches. That has been highlighted in many court cases over the past few years. The EHRC also appears to have rarely used and limited investigation and enforcement powers, and it has an ever-dwindling budget. In practice, it has become a body with no teeth.

In my work on the Women and Equalities Committee, we have found that when people—the Government included—refuse to comply with what they are meant to do under equalities legislation, the Equality and Human Rights Commission appears to be able to do very little. Key to that, given that our main purpose here every day is to pass legislation, is that the Government do not produce equality impact assessments of various pieces of legislation. When they do, at times they refuse to publish them. How on earth are we meant to hold the Government to account and ensure that they are complying with our equalities law? Why does our equalities law always have to be an add-on?

Frankly, black communities need fewer champions and more enforcement of what are supposed to be the rights that protect us. Report after report has reinforced not only the issues, but the recommendations that we need to bring about systemic change. If we were clear about our equalities legislation and the guidance, we would be moving forward.

When we discuss racial inequality and call on the Government to introduce policy to change things, we are not asking for anything beyond equality; we are simply asking the Government to recognise how we are treated as a community in this country and to take meaningful action to change it. Likewise, when we ask the Government for black histories to be taught as part of the curriculum, we are not asking for that to be done over other aspects of British history; we are asking them to recognise that black history is British history—it is a part of that history—but that it is not taught widely, as it should be. They should take those key steps to ensure that that is done.

If racism is ignorance, and education is the absence of ignorance, there is an obvious answer to dealing with racial inequality; it is simple and it costs the Government nothing to start just there—with education.

[Sir Graham Brady (in the Chair)]

I suggest an informal time limit of eight minutes to try and ensure that everybody who wants to speak can do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

I want to start by thanking all Members who have participated for their well-delivered contributions. I would like to say that the support of the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) for these issues does not go unnoticed. My hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) took us through the history of great black women and reiterated the shameful lack of quality impact assessments on Government legislation. My hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum) pointed out quite rightly the shameful lack of representation of black teachers in our schools and wider academia.

The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts), whose constituency I know I have pronounced wrong, gave an analogy about discussions about race and our history being fragrant and thorny. I really liked that. As the only Welsh Member here, she probably takes full pride in the launching of the teaching of Black History Month in schools in Wales.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) reminded us of the civil rights struggles here in the UK. She took a lot of time to talk about the other black Members of Parliament without mentioning herself. She is a trailblazer. She talked about the others whose shoulders we stand on, but we know fully that we stand on hers. My hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Taiwo Owatemi), our shadow Minister for Equalities, quite rightly reaffirmed her commitment to tackling these issues. The hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara)—

[Sir Graham Brady (in the Chair)]

Order.