Burnham 'Open' to Formal Apology for Slave Trade, Rules Out Reparations Ahead of Commonwealth Summit

Writing in The Guardian ahead of next week's Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Antigua, Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said he is open to a formal apology from the British state for its part in the transatlantic slave trade. In the same piece he closed the door on financial reparations.

Burnham described the trade as a "brutal and barbaric violation" in which people were treated as property and worked to their deaths. He offered his personal sorrow and regret for the suffering of millions, and said he wanted to recognise the way that history still shapes the world today. He framed the conversations ahead as the right thing to do and also the patriotic one, arguing that the Britain he believes in is confident, decent and brave, and that a country which led the world in abolishing slavery can show leadership again.

The mechanism he proposed is what he called a structured dialogue with those affected by the slave trade. Listening to calls for a formal apology on behalf of the British state, he wrote, will form an important part of that process, and he said he is open to them. That stops short of promising an apology. It commits him to hearing the case for one.

The intervention comes after Caribbean nations renewed their calls for both an apology and reparations while the King toured the region.

On reparations, Burnham followed the line held by his predecessors. He wrote that he does not believe financial reparations are the right answer, and that British people today cannot be held liable for historical wrongs, however heinous, that took place in a different age under different laws and in which they played no personal part.

In place of payments, he said he would seek a drive on debt servicing, aimed at helping countries repay over longer periods and at better rates. Chancellor John Healey, Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband and former prime minister Gordon Brown will travel with him to the summit to help with that work. The UK, he said, will also support countries in moving to renewable energy, work to get smaller countries heard on the world stage, and back efforts to educate women and girls and to tackle poverty and inequality.

The response from campaigners was swift and unimpressed. Denis O'Brien, founder of The Repair Campaign, which describes itself as a transatlantic movement for reparatory justice for the Caribbean, said the government must stop obfuscating and give a full and formal apology now, calling that a significant and symbolic first step toward reparatory justice. He called the Prime Minister's statement disappointing and said it will not quell the demand for an apology from the 15 Caricom countries before the Antigua meeting.

What to watch is whether Burnham arrives in Antigua with apology language in hand, or whether the dialogue he is offering stays just that, with the gap between his openness and Caricom's demand still unresolved.