Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade

I am grateful for the opportunity to participate in the debate and to welcome, on behalf of my party, the opportunity to remember an historic decision taken by this House, which removed a blemish on our history. We have listened to descriptions of the treatment of fellow human beings—the numbers in the trade who died, were abused, lost their dignity and freedom, were hurt or damaged, and those who live today with the consequences. We cannot run away from the fact that it was a blemish on our history, but it is important that we remember it, because it is part of this country’s history. On the other hand, I want to make it quite clear that I agree with the hon. Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Ellwood) that there is no cause for apology. I note that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, when visiting America recently, apologised on behalf of the people of Northern Ireland for the part that it played in the slave trade. There is an irony, of course. Although Belfast was well placed as a port on the right side of the United Kingdom to have benefited from the slave trade, because of the strong evangelical Christian influence in Northern Ireland at the turn of the 18th century, it did not do so. Indeed, there was a very strong lobby against slavery in that part of Ireland—northern Ireland—at that time. There are certainly plenty of other things that, if he had wanted to, the Secretary of State could have apologised for, but I will not go into those tonight, Mr. Deputy Speaker, as you would probably call me to order for digressing. The historic decision that was taken illustrates the role that can be played—and was played—by someone who was strongly motivated and able to use the advantages of the climate of the time in which he lived and the support that he gained. Much has been said in the House today about William Wilberforce, but as has been pointed out, he was not alone. At the age of 10, he was influenced by his meeting with John Newton, the slave trader turned parson. Then he met Thomas Clarkson. I cannot provide the same detail about Thomas Clarkson’s life as the hon. Member for North-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Moss), but one thing that we do know is that at a time when much that happened in the slave trade was buried beneath the surface—we did not have the media of today—he risked life and limb to find out about the methods and facts of the trade, which he brought to Wilberforce’s attention. Wilberforce studied those reports to establish the effect of the trade first on the slaves themselves, and secondly on Africa and the colonies to which they were taken. He then made up his mind to oppose it in the House of Commons by means of parliamentary procedure. Wilberforce was helped by a strong evangelical Christian climate. There were the Quakers—who have already been mentioned—the Methodists and, in the Church of England, the Clapham sect, all of whom created a climate that encouraged people to abhor the slave trade and the way in which it denigrated and damaged fellow human beings. Wilberforce was also helped by the courage of Africans who used the opportunities available to them. We have heard today about Sam Sharpe, the Baptist preacher in Jamaica who persuaded slaves there that it was not right to lie down under slavery, and about Equiano, who wrote an autobiography that had a great influence in the United Kingdom. Wilberforce was not alone, and those who were with him used all the methods that have been described today: lobbying, slogans, trade bans and, indeed, propaganda. Clarkson recognised more than anyone else that a human interest story, a story of individuals and the way in which they had been affected, could capture people’s hearts. Twenty-odd years before he succeeded in his aim, Wilberforce stood in the House of Commons and said: "““So enormous, so dreadful, so irremediable did the trade’s wickedness appear that my own mind was completely made up for abolition. Let the consequences be what they would, I from this time determined that I would never rest until I had effected its abolition.””" That determination and strength of character enabled Wilberforce to take on the establishment. As we have heard, Lord Mayors of Liverpool benefited from and lobbied for the slave trade. Members of Parliament were bought by the colonists, who spoke of economic ruin if the trade was not allowed to continue. It is significant that Wilberforce succeeded in persuading the House to act against the economic and political interests of our country in order to do away with a great evil. A mere Back Bencher, described by the hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack) as an independent, was able to have that degree of influence because of the determination with which he had set his face against the slave trade. I wonder whether today—given that the House of Commons has handed much of its power to other bodies in Europe and elsewhere, and given that even the power that does rest here has been absorbed into the Executive—it would be possible for a campaigning Back Bencher to turn around the country’s economic policy in the face of established interests. I doubt it very much. As other Members have pointed out, slavery is still with us. As long as there are people who are strong and people who are weak, there will be opportunity for slavery. Human beings and human nature being what they are, those weaknesses will be exploited. When we go on holiday and see the great pyramids in Egypt, we are seeing monuments to slavery; indeed, we can see monuments to slavery in our own civilisation, built by people who were enslaved and used as economic tools at various times in world history. Today, of course, there are still strong people who exploit and take advantage of those who are weak. Numerous examples have been mentioned, but I shall give just two. The first is pertinent to Northern Ireland. When the Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs looked into the subject of organised crime, it considered the role that paramilitaries play in exploiting people who are trafficked into the United Kingdom and who are either used for cheap labour or sexually exploited. Of course, the problem is not unique to Northern Ireland—organised criminals are doing the same in other parts of the United Kingdom—but if we are to convince people in Northern Ireland that there will be an end to paramilitarism, and that the ill-gotten gains of paramilitarism will not remain with people who exploit human weakness, we must robustly take those people on, whether they have political influence or not. It may mean making hard decisions in the so-called peace process, but it is important that the message goes out that people who engage in such activity will face the full brunt of the law and will lose their ill-gotten gains. On that point, I hope that the change in the organisation of the Assets Recovery Agency will not diminish the ability of the authorities in Northern Ireland to take away from those who gain from the sex trade and from using trafficked individuals. I hope that it does not concentrate its activities on the bigger players in the organised crime market and leave those at a lower level, who nevertheless gain from such trade. We seek assurances from the Government that that will not be the case. Of course, sentences must be severe, too. My second example is a form of slavery from which we in this country benefit to a certain extent. It is indentured labour, which is sometimes found in this country. For example, in the Morecambe bay incident, in which people brought into the country by gangmasters were exploited for very low wages, we saw that people can become victims of what is virtually a slave trade. We also benefit from cheap consumer goods, and some good investigative reporting has been done on that subject; sometimes, people work in conditions that are little short of slavery. I listened to what the hon. Member for Glasgow, North (Ann McKechin) said about free trade, but if there are no conditions attached to trade, it can help to further exploitation, because it gives freer access to western markets, and provides an even greater incentive to those who want to exploit labour in third-world countries—it encourages them to do so. There is one other form of slavery that I want to mention, but I do not want to detract in any way from the suffering of people who have been subject to slavery through the ages. Slavery means the weak, the vulnerable and the desperate being exploited, and I believe that the Government have created a climate in which many people in this country will find themselves enslaved, not by having their freedom taken away from them, but by the addictions to which they are prone. Opportunities are being put in their way. Powerful arguments have been made by Government Members for 24-hour drinking and a casino-type society. We are providing opportunities, because of the powerful economic arguments that have been advanced, for people to become enslaved to their addictions.