Black History Month

Theresa Villiers Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

I thank the Backbench Business Committee and the hon. Member for Erith and Thamesmead (Abena Oppong-Asare) for securing a debate on this important matter. I was delighted to be a co-sponsor.

As many of us have said, Black History Month is a great opportunity to celebrate the contribution to our society made by black British people over many centuries. While records show people of African heritage living in these islands for nearly two millennia, very few have ever had their stories told. Many of us in this country today are unaware of the long and complex history of black people in Britain. That is why I tabled an Adjournment debate a few weeks ago to ask the Government to ensure that black history plays a prominent part in the history curriculum in our schools. I would like that to include the history of other ethnic minorities in this country too. I want every child, whatever their heritage or ethnicity, to be able to say, “British history is our history. Black history is British history.” I want them to know that people from BAME communities have played a hugely important role in our islands’ story, as has been pointed out articulately and passionately in many of the speeches that we have heard.

History in schools should always be taught in a balanced, objective and impartial way, but an understanding of history can help to inculcate a sense of unity. History teaching should be inclusive, not divisive. We should be honest about, for example, the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade and this country’s 250-year involvement in that appalling crime against humanity, but we should also recognise that our nation has a strong history of standing up for individual freedom, for the rule of law and for justice.

There is validity in the narrative that we are the nation that pioneered parliamentary democracy and championed values now respected across the world at a time when other countries were still labouring under tyranny. We need to learn from our past and recognise its conflicts, complexities and contradictions. Some aspects are noble and heroic, not least when this nation stood alone against the might of the Nazi war machine, but there are other aspects that are darker and crueller, including that long involvement in the horrors of the triangular trade.

The reality is that there was not an inevitable or unstoppable sweep of history towards modern values, equality and respect starting with Magna Carta.The real picture is much more complicated. Progress was slow, with many setbacks, and almost every step forward was hard won and strongly opposed by many at the time. If we study black history, there is no escaping the fact that for many centuries black British people were subject to racism, cruelty and injustice in this country, as were ethnic minorities in other parts of the world.

That legacy has an impact today, but we should take heart from the stories of black people in our history who succeeded in spite of the adversity that they faced. We have heard about many of them this afternoon, but I would like to mention just one—Mary Prince.Born a slave in Bermuda, her autobiographical narrative was published in London in 1831. It was hugely influential and successful, a landmark in the fight to end slavery in the British empire. It formed part of the first ever anti-slavery petition by a black woman to Parliament, illustrating Mary Prince’s determination: while she might have spent much of her life enslaved, her spirit was never broken, and she never stopped resisting the oppression to which she had been subjected. Her struggle has helped to create the better world in which we live today.