Of Empire and lies

About 20 years ago, I got a book by Private Eye writer, Paul Foot, about the foreign policy disasters made by the UK Government in the 20th century.

As a country, we did some horrific things, usually backing the dictator and despots who subjugated the people so we could get oil or some other raw material.

This is history that is not taught. Sometimes we come across it through a film or book, but otherwise we believe what a wonderful forward thining country the UK, Britain or England is, and always has been.

I have a book called Nathanial's Nutmeg, about the Spice Wars fought with the Netherlands over a tiny island in the far east which was the only place in the world mace and nutmeg were found. Both sides were abominable to each other, neither side come out of it well. But at the end, Netherlands got the Island of Ran, the UK got trading rights with all of North America, and took cuttings of the plant that produced nutmeg and mace, planted them in India where they thrived.

The Empire, the British Empire, was not a good thing, mostly for those who were not white, rich and educated. Everyone else either worked until they died or were traded. The Empire was partially based on slavery, and was so for centuries.

The great and the good had statues erected in their names, institutions set up that still bear their name, and based on profits from the trading of human beings. We in the UK learned more about this over the course of a weekend that we did in a decade at school. That there are more statues dedicated to slavers out in the country came as a shock to many, mainly white people, and so comes the national discussion about our shared past.

Many would prefer to carry on believing in the Great British Empire that the sun never set upon, rather than the fact of taxing the poorest people whilst be stole their natural resources, and when the population rebelled, we massacred them.

The Government is more angry about the destruction of property than it is that this was a spontaneous act of a crown, local, who had tried for over a decade to either get the statue removed of the plaque changed to actually mention the 84,000 slaves he saw transported when head of the Royal African Company. The Home Secretary is determined that someone is charged for the crime, but actual prosecution might not be in the public's interest. It isn't up to the Home Secretary to decide what is legal and isn't, or when a person is prosecuted, that is for the Police and Crown Prosecution Service.

But it is funny to Priti and co triggered because a 19th century statue of a 17th century slaver was thrown in the river where his own ships docked. Who can't find that kind of poetic?

History is not being erased, but being corrected, and revealing our place in the world. How we came to be here.

And so to Brexit and Covid, which had you listened to the BBC news bulletins yesterday, you would have thought both were no problems. As the only COVID story was primary schools not reopening before September, and nothing about Brexit at all.

But COVID is still there, and the Government is still hiding figures of testing down, I have seen no evidence on how high the take up of the track and trace app has been, or how many people have been tested since its introduction, the Government just stated in italic text that the "data unavailable". Even the number of tests hasn't climbed much about 120,000, it's as though they've given up as its too hard and hope we, the people, won't notice.

PUBS ARE REOPENING!

FOOTBALL IS BACK!

Anything to distract from the omnishambles their handling of the COVID crisis is. Yesterday the ONS updated its figures and estimates on how many people have died, and in the last ten weeks, 66,000 additional deaths have occurred above the usual 5 year average.

One last thought: It is odd that Brexiteers rail against the EU where the UK would help set rules and regulations as one of the 28 nations, but this labelled the UK as a rule taker, and a key pillar of leaving the EU. But are quite happy to accept rules set by the WTO, that the UK is one of 160 members, and whose institutions are weaker and less protective than the EU ones. And again, is more than happy to lay down in front of the bulldozer of the US and accept chlorinated chicken, hormone injected beef and we will see further U turns on involvement in the NHS by US companies.

As the trade deal with the US will be secret, almost certainly it will have provisions to compensate US companies if future UK Governments change policy, allowing them to sue the UK for projected possible earnings, making it financially very difficult to break out of them and correct wrongs. They railed against the possibility of being hampered by previous Parliamentary decisions, but are happy to do the same to future generations.

In the not too distant future, we will look back on this horrific year of pandemic and crisis and some kind of oasis of calm and glory, with the reality of a deal with the US and trampling of our basic rights.