Enslaved Africans: National Memorial

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2016 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Oates]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to reconsider their decision to deny funding to the proposed memorial for enslaved Africans in Hyde Park.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, there is a tradition of funding new memorials through public subscription or private donation. This approach in no way diminishes the importance that the Government place on commemorating the victims of the transatlantic slave trade. We remain willing to work with Memorial 2007 to help it to maximise funding opportunities to ensure that the slave trade and slavery are remembered.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Oates (LD)]

I am grateful to the Minister for her Answer, but she is aware that there are many memorials up and down this country that receive funds directly from the Government. I very much hope that when we have further discussions—and I am grateful to her for the discussions that we have had already—we will get a real financial commitment from the Government to this long-overdue national memorial. Is the Minister aware that £20 million, the equivalent in today’s money of £16.5 billion, was spent by this Parliament on compensating slave owners, including many who were Members of this House? Will the Minister please impress upon her ministerial colleagues how utterly unacceptable it is that successive Governments have refused to provide a single penny to fund such an important national memorial, and will she please now ensure that this shameful failure is put right?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The noble Lord is right that there are many events in our history, including probably in Parliament, that we should be deeply ashamed of. It is important to find a way in which we can move forward and remember those events and pay tribute to the people who were victims of them. We now have the Modern Slavery Act, which ensures that some of the practices that are happening now do not happen again. We met yesterday and I agreed to work with him to try to identify funding to enable the memorial to happen.