Reparations

Saturday

James Heale

Should Britain pay reparations to Commonwealth countries?

16 min listen

This week, Keir Starmer has been in Samoa for a summit with delegations of the 56 nations which make up the Commonwealth. Between having to answer questions on Donald Trump and the budget, he has also been pressed on the issue of slavery reparations, with the leaders of some Caribbean countries insisting it is ‘only a matter of time’ until Britain bows to demands of handing over billions of pounds in compensation. Speaking today, Starmer addressed the issue. He said, ‘I understand the strength of feeling’ but insisted that he would be ‘looking forward, not back’. So what are the arguments for and against reparations? And why is this debate

Thursday

Robert Tombs

Has the C of E got its reparations bill all wrong?

Reparations have a troubled history, and rightly. The word itself, in its familiar sense, seems to have been a euphemism thought up by lawyers after the first world war. President Woodrow Wilson had promised a peace ‘without indemnities’. So no indemnities: ‘reparations’ instead. It sounded less objectionable. It was further agreed that liability should cover only demonstrable damage, not be punishment for the act of war itself – a remarkable and perhaps unprecedented concession by the victors to the vanquished (who had themselves recently imposed heavy indemnities on Russia, and before that on France). Yet reparations – relatively modest in total and largely unpaid – still became probably the most