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29 Sep 15
13:10
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http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/29/jamaica-calls-britain-pay-billions-pounds-reparations-slavery
David Cameron is facing calls for Britain to pay billions of pounds in reparations for slavery ahead of his first official visit to Jamaica on Tuesday.
Downing Street said the prime minister does not believe reparations or apologies for slavery are the right approach, but the issue is set to overshadow his trade trip to the island, where he will address the Jamaican parliament.
Ahead of his trip, Sir Hilary Beckles, chair of the Caricom Reparations Commission, has led calls for Cameron to start talks on making amends for slavery and referenced the prime minister’s ancestral links to the trade in the 1700s through his cousin six times removed, General Sir James Duff.
In an open letter in the Jamaica Observer, the academic wrote: “You are a grandson of the Jamaican soil who has been privileged and enriched by your forebears’ sins of the enslavement of our ancestors ... You are, Sir, a prized product of this land and the bonanza benefits reaped by your family and inherited by you continue to bind us together like birds of a feather.
“We ask not for handouts or any such acts of indecent submission. We merely ask that you acknowledge responsibility for your share of this situation and move to contribute in a joint programme of rehabilitation and renewal. The continuing suffering of our people, Sir, is as much your nation’s duty to alleviate as it is ours to resolve in steadfast acts of self-responsibility.”
Professor Verene Shepherd, chair of the National Commission on Reparation, told the Jamaica Gleaner that nothing short of an unambiguous apology from Cameron would do, while a Jamaican MP, Mike Henry, called on fellow parliamentarians to turn their back on Cameron if reparations are not on the agenda, noting that the Jamaican parliament has approved a motion for the country to seek reparation from Britain.
“If it is not on the agenda, I will not attend any functions involving the visiting prime minister, and I will cry shame on those who do, considering that there was not a dissenting voice in the debate in parliament,” he told the newspaper.
Jamaica’s prime minister Portia Simpson Miller called for non-confrontational discussions at the UN in 2013, but Britain has never accepted the case for any compensation payments.
A Number 10 official said: “This is a longstanding concern of theirs and there is a longstanding UK position, true of successive governments in the UK, that we don’t think reparations are the right approach.
“The PM’s point will be he wants to focus on the future. We are talking about issues that are centuries old and taken under a different government when he was not even born. He wants to look at the future and how can the UK play a part now in stronger growing economies in the Caribbean.”
The official said Cameron’s purpose in visiting Jamaica and Grenada was to reinvigorate their relationship with the UK.
“He looks at that kind of relationship and who the Caribbean see as their major partners and sees them looking to China and Venezuela and thinks Britain should be in there. Britain has long historical ties with these countries,” she said.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/29/jamaica-calls-britain-pay-billions-pounds-reparations-slavery
David Cameron is facing calls for Britain to pay billions of pounds in reparations for slavery ahead of his first official visit to Jamaica on Tuesday.
Downing Street said the prime minister does not believe reparations or apologies for slavery are the right approach, but the issue is set to overshadow his trade trip to the island, where he will address the Jamaican parliament.
Ahead of his trip, Sir Hilary Beckles, chair of the Caricom Reparations Commission, has led calls for Cameron to start talks on making amends for slavery and referenced the prime minister’s ancestral links to the trade in the 1700s through his cousin six times removed, General Sir James Duff.
In an open letter in the Jamaica Observer, the academic wrote: “You are a grandson of the Jamaican soil who has been privileged and enriched by your forebears’ sins of the enslavement of our ancestors ... You are, Sir, a prized product of this land and the bonanza benefits reaped by your family and inherited by you continue to bind us together like birds of a feather.
“We ask not for handouts or any such acts of indecent submission. We merely ask that you acknowledge responsibility for your share of this situation and move to contribute in a joint programme of rehabilitation and renewal. The continuing suffering of our people, Sir, is as much your nation’s duty to alleviate as it is ours to resolve in steadfast acts of self-responsibility.”
Professor Verene Shepherd, chair of the National Commission on Reparation, told the Jamaica Gleaner that nothing short of an unambiguous apology from Cameron would do, while a Jamaican MP, Mike Henry, called on fellow parliamentarians to turn their back on Cameron if reparations are not on the agenda, noting that the Jamaican parliament has approved a motion for the country to seek reparation from Britain.
“If it is not on the agenda, I will not attend any functions involving the visiting prime minister, and I will cry shame on those who do, considering that there was not a dissenting voice in the debate in parliament,” he told the newspaper.
Jamaica’s prime minister Portia Simpson Miller called for non-confrontational discussions at the UN in 2013, but Britain has never accepted the case for any compensation payments.
A Number 10 official said: “This is a longstanding concern of theirs and there is a longstanding UK position, true of successive governments in the UK, that we don’t think reparations are the right approach.
“The PM’s point will be he wants to focus on the future. We are talking about issues that are centuries old and taken under a different government when he was not even born. He wants to look at the future and how can the UK play a part now in stronger growing economies in the Caribbean.”
The official said Cameron’s purpose in visiting Jamaica and Grenada was to reinvigorate their relationship with the UK.
“He looks at that kind of relationship and who the Caribbean see as their major partners and sees them looking to China and Venezuela and thinks Britain should be in there. Britain has long historical ties with these countries,” she said.
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Replies: 62
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Perhaps Britain should pay for all unhappy Jamaicans seeking their roots to be sent to live in deepest Africa where their ancestors originated.
Maybe they'd jump at the chance. |
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Many people from Jamaica live here in Britain; this could in effect mean they are paying for the suffering of their ancestors out of their own pocket.
Also I would be strongly opposed to my tax payments going to pay for this, we the working class made nothing out of colonialism or slavery, just look at the way we were living/existing at the time. The best way to solve this would to target those families who made money from slavery. I bet there would be a few politicians, social commentators, human rights lawyers and most of the social elite would have red faces, so name them and shame them |
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There is a website where you can search your family name to find out how your family was involved.
I believe palmerston had the greatest ownership of slaves of all. |
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When I think of Jamaica (which isn't very often) I think of lazy good for nothings idling in the sun, drinking alcohol, smoking cannabis and occasionally knifing/shooting each other. Reparations ?? I wouldn't be against sending a ship stocked with rum barrels if that'd keep the natives happy.
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Are they suggesting cameron is descended from creoles?
pmsl, they were largely seen as the worst of both worlds |
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Why not send a fleet of gunboats to Jamaica.
Then round up all the moaners and take them back to Africa? I wouldn't give them an apology or a single penny. Cheeky buggers. |
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^Oh I see STUDYFORM beat me to that one.
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can't we settle up with them once we've been paid out by the Romans?
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I'd like reparations from Jamaica for all the heartburn suffered over the years eating their cake..
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Jamaica has been responsible for so much international crime and misery for decades, but (surprise, surprise) it's all Britain's fault.
What sort of supposed proud, free, independent country wants to keep thrusting the begging bowl before the former colonial master? |
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They really do a disservice to the black cause do they not.
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On LBC now
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we must owe the far east countires trillions then since they are the slaves of the modern world .
Do Jamaicans buy from the current sweat shop countries or is that against their principles ? |
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can't we settle up with them once we've been paid out by the Romans?
and France for the Normans. Why compensate Jamaica ? What about the African countries which lost their people ? |
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I wonder what Corbyn thoughts on this is? Maybe he could pump Abbott for her opinion.
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They live in paradise. People pay big money to go on holiday there. Apart from a few idiots who go to shoot animals not many people want to go on holiday to the townships of South Africa. They've got a nerve asking for a free dinner.
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we should get the italians to pay , they enslaved lots of brits
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Just chancing their arm,more chance of Corbyn being PM.
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How can you compensate them if they're all dead?
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Phew Alias, you're too sharp for me tonight.
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Only racists and fascists like posy seem to think there's something wrong with compensating the descendants of people ripped from their homes, transported across an ocean and sold, then worked to death.
who are their descendants ? you think just black people in Jamaica? millions of white people are descended from black slaves , it was 8+ generations ago . 30,000 + black people in Britain 200 years ago must have millions of descendants today , and not many of them are are black what about people descended from slaves and slave owners ? The whole world benefits from the slavery of 1500-1865 . Without slaves the resources of the Americas would have been too expensive to extract and so there would have been no profit and no capital to fund the industrial revolution. Most of us would be working in fields and a horse and cart would be the height of technology |
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Alias hoping for a payout, NAP
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We should charge these nations for passing on the benefit of the English language that has allowed so many of their people to trade and work elsewhere to send remittances back home. Let's call it a draw,eh ?
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We should charge these nations for passing on the benefit of the English language that has allowed so many of their people to trade and work elsewhere to send remittances back home. Let's call it a draw,eh ?
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there just like the rest of the world wanting Britain to pay for something or the other.
Middle east wants us and Europe to pay for all their refugees. Africa wants us to pay for their food (well there's always an advert on tv asking to give money) Europe wants us to give billions a year into the pot then give us back next to nothing. I guess Jamaica thought they might as well give it a go too. How can you compensate? those affected have been dead at least 100+ years. Current descendants have never had any contact with their "slave" ancestors. Notice they haven't asked African countries whose inhabitants sold the slaves to the slave traders in the first place. Tell them to fe ck off. |
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Obama wants to compensate the American blacks for slavery.
Half of him is due compensation,the other half owes it. |
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Alias
I pity you fool. Someone ugly can do something about it via plastic surgery if that is what they want. A bird with no hooters can have implants. If the desire took me I could get a penile reduction. You sir, are and will remain irredeemably stupid. |
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How do you compensate a man who has lost nothing?
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Ah the penny has just dropped. Alias is hoping the Jamaicans get some wedge then he can start his class action on behalf of the Scots for all the good hidings the English gave them.
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Reports of Barbary raids and kidnappings of those in Italy, Spain, France, Portugal, England, Netherlands, Ireland, Scotland, and as far north as Iceland exist from between the 16th to the 19th centuries. It is estimated that between 1 million and 1.25 million Europeans were captured by pirates and sold as slaves in Tunis, Algiers and Tripoli during this time period.
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Those pirates (descendants) are now Tories pumphol.
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Exactly C-C
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Curious that Jamaica should be so vocal and sensitive about an issue that ended hundreds of years ago, but seemingly relaxed about Homosexuality still being a crime there.
. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Jamaica |
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German civilians must be owed billions in reparations for the various war crimes committed against them by all the allies during and after WW2
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Re WW2 - haven't you heard of the Marshall Plan?
Hasn't Cameron just announced a £300 million development package to fund infrastructure projects in the Caribbean? |
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Cecil Gutzmore at the University of the West Indies has written that religious fundamentalists believe that the Bible variously declares homosexuality to be an "abomination", a "vile affection", "unseemly", "not natural", or a "form of ungodliness".
Those who commit this great sin are thus unequivocally construed ... as legitimate subjects to be punished by terminal violence, a fate not only dealt out directly by God Himself but, presumably, also by those regarding themselves as His faithful servants and the possible agents of His will. These persons feel a kind of righteous justification for ... acting violently on God's behalf against perceived homosexuals and homosexuality. ... In Jamaica metaphorical stones enthusiastically and destructively cast take the form of homophobic song lyrics, passionate sermons, and parliamentary and party conference speeches that voice a refusal to liberalize anti-homosexuality laws.[39] The above extracted from the article on Lgbt rights in Jamaica posted by Alun 2005 These same religious people might like to reflect that in the very same Bible their God approves of slavery. there are many references in Deuteronomy and Leviticus, an example being in Leviticus 25. I'm sure many people who profited from slavery at the time used these verses to justify their deeds. |
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http://biblehub.com/leviticus/25-44.htm
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Dave has come up with a good one:
The UK is to spend £25m on building a prison in Jamaica so that foreign criminals in the UK can be sent home to serve sentences in the Caribbean. More than 600 Jamaican nationals are in UK jails but cannot be deported because of Jamaica's poor prison conditions.  . http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34398014?ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbc_breaking&ns_source=twitter&ns_linkname=news_central 600 odd Jamaican lags costing UK taxpayers approx £40K per inmate per year, a Jamaica prison idea could pay for itself in a year or so. ££ |
