When thousands of protesters took to the streets of London and other major cities in the UK to show solidarity with the American people’s anger at George Floyd’s death, many wondered why the African American cause had resonated with the British people.
But the answer became evident in the symbolic toppling of Edward Colston’s statue in Bristol. Colston, who was a merchant and slave trader at the outset of the British Empire, became the target of protester’s outrage since it was seen as a symbol of one of the main root causes of systematic racism in the US: British Colonialism. Guardian mentions this point by highlighting Britain’s role in industrializing black enslavement in the Caribbean, developing “systems of apartheid” in African colonies during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and later on benefiting from colonies’ land, resources and labour to fight both world wars.
Although this part of the British history is often ignored by the conservative governments of May and Johnson, continuing racial discrimination in the UK pinpoints the relevance of Floyd’s death to the present-day British society.
British government officials have a record of failure in tackling racism in various cabinet ministries. The Windrush Scandal and the poor government response to the issue through the so-called Windrush scheme is only one such example. This scandal that broke during Theresa May’s tenure led to the resignation of the then-home secretary Amber Rudd. Also, hundreds of Caribbean immigrants who were for decades treated unfairly (some lost access to government services and welfare benefits and some were robbed of their right to live and work in the UK) are still waiting for compensation payments by the government.
The prejudice against the British Black community was also an issue of concern during the New Labour governments. A study by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies refers to the 1997 Macpherson Report and asserts that after this report, the existence of institutional racism in UK policing practice became widely accepted. The recent cases of black people who have died during the stop-and-search process or in custody and the police officers who have not been justly prosecuted or held accountable for their racist behavior indicate that even though the scope of systematic racism isn’t as vast as that of the US, the United Kingdom is “not innocent” when considering records of police brutality and criminal injustice.
Other traces of implicit racial biases can be found in disparities represented in statistics pertaining to different aspects of social life in the UK.
Indeed, studies suggest that the ethnic minorities of Britain – aka the BAME or the black, Asian and minority ethnic groups – are more likely to be discriminated when it comes to stability in employment or Covid-19 contraction.
With mounting level of violence during the Black Lives Matter protests and public anger at covert racism in Britain, the British Prime Minster Boris Johnson has been compelled to announce his government’s decision to launch an inquiry into racial inequality in the UK. Race Disparity Audit, the latest government inquiry in this regard, reveals how racial discrimination is invisibly interwoven within the fabric of the British society. According to the results of this inquiry (2017-2018):
- Asian and Black households and those in the other ethnic group were more likely to be poor and were the most likely to be in persistent poverty.
- Around 1 in 10 adults from a Black, Pakistani, Bangladeshi or Mixed background were unemployed compared with 1 in 25 White British people.
- NHS staff from a non-White background were more likely to report having personally experienced discrimination at work from either a manager or colleague than White staff.
- Around 0.29 percent of Black Caribbean pupils are permanently excluded, compared with 0.10 percent of White British pupils.
- In 2015/16, the London Metropolitan police force area had the highest rate of stop and search overall, at 19 for every 1,000 people resident, but among Black people this was 42 per 1,000 of the resident Black population.
- Black defendants at the Crown Court, particularly Black males, were the most likely to be remanded in custody, whereas White and Asian defendants were less likely to be remanded in custody.
- The average length of prison sentences has increased for every ethnic group since 2009 and, in every year, white people received the shortest sentences.
The most recent figures on the risk of death from COVID-19 among ethnic groups confirm the continuation of this endemic racism in Britain. Based on the evidence review carried out by UK’s National Institute for Health Research (on 20 May 2020), there is greater probability for patients from the BAME communities to be taken to critical care compared to patients from the white community. Moreover, the mortality rate in COVID-19 critical care is higher for BAME patients (about 50%) than white patients (44%).
The above-mentioned reviews and figures demonstrate the fact that racial discrimination in UK is not an issue which is only prevalent among black and white communities and it more broadly concerns people from BAME groups. Furthermore, toppling or defacing statues of prominent figures in UK may be dismissed by British officials as acts of ‘thuggery’ or vandalism, but they are, in fact, indications of the pervasiveness of an issue in Britain which can be traced back to the country’s imperial past, and so, with growing calls from right groups for the revival of Britain’s ‘glorious past’ after Brexit, it seems to be paramount to address the issue before grievances grow any further.
