Miliband says slavery apology will not bring added cost for UK taxpayers

Ed Miliband says he has asked for a historical digest of Britain's part in the transatlantic slave trade, and that reading it has been harrowing. The foreign secretary described what it contains while speaking on the BBC's Newscast podcast: more than three million people shipped over a couple of centuries, with the complicity of the British state. Hundreds of thousands of them died on the way. Those who survived the crossing faced appalling conditions on the ships and, he said, further suffering after landing in the Caribbean and the Americas.

The interview came as the government moves toward a formal apology. Miliband's main message was about money: considering an apology, he insisted, will not bring higher costs for the British taxpayer. The prime minister has said the UK will not pay reparations to affected countries. He has declined to say whether his new approach could involve additional taxpayer money, which leaves a gap between the foreign secretary's assurance and the prime minister's silence on that point.

Miliband framed the shift as a break with earlier governments, which he said had a habit of sweeping the issue under the carpet. His example was Sir Tony Blair, who said in 2007 that the UK's involvement in the slave trade was a matter of deep sorrow and regret. Miliband called that a "sorry not sorry" moment. In his telling, Blair expressed sorrow, then said sorry, and then Number 10 walked it back. He said that episode is still cited abroad, and that it came up in a recent conversation between Andy Burnham and Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley.

There is also a more recent grievance. Miliband said that on his second day as foreign secretary he was told one of his tasks was the fallout from the 2024 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Samoa, which "didn't go well." In diplomatic language, he said, it ended in a verbal punch-up over this very issue. He added that the question has hung over the Commonwealth for about twenty years but has grown and grown. Given that, he said, the government thought it right to confront it rather than pretend it did not exist.

Burnham now says the government is open to formally apologising. Ministers are beginning what they call a "structured dialogue" with affected countries. The expectation is that an apology could come around the time the prime minister hosts the G20 Summit of world leaders in Manchester in November 2027.

Miliband anticipated the charge that this looks weak. He said it is the opposite: it is fragile, weak countries that cannot face up to their past. He said he is proud of Britain, and that being proud of your country includes being willing to face up to things you didn't do yourself.

The process now under way is likely to end in a formal apology. The government hopes it will also free the Commonwealth to turn its attention to other matters. What to watch is whether the dialogue produces that apology on the expected timetable, whether it calms the tensions that surfaced in Samoa, and whether the prime minister ever answers plainly the question of whether any taxpayer money will be involved.