president and gentlemen ladies of the
house i standing here with eight minutes
in my hands and this venerable
another magnificent institution i was
going to assure you that i belong to the
henry the eighth school of public
speaking that as henry the eighth said
to his wives i shall not keep you long
but now finding myself but now finding
myself the seventh speaker out of eight
in what must already seem a rather long
evening to you I rather feel like Henry
the eighth's last wife I'm more or less
know what's expected of me but I'm not
sure how to do it any differently
he'll perhaps what I should do is really
try and pay attention to the arguments
that were advanced by the opposition
today we had for example two richard
ottaway suggesting make challenging the
very idea that it could be argued that
the economic situation of the colonies
was actually worsened by the experience
of british colonialism well I stand to
offer you the Indian example Sir Richard
India share of the world economy when
Britain arrived on its shores was twenty
three percent by the time the British
left it was down to below four percent
why simply because India had been
governed for the benefit of Britain in
Britain's rise for two hundred years was
financed by its depredations in India in
fact Britain's Industrial Revolution was
actually premise upon the
deindustrialization of India the
handloom Weaver's for example famed
across the world whose products were
exported around the world Britain came
right in there were actually these
Weaver's making fine muslin lighters
woven air it was said and Britain came
right in smashed their thumbs broke
their looms in post tariffs and duties
on their cloth and products and started
of course taking the raw materials from
India and shipping back manufactured
cloth flooding the world's markets with
what became the products of the Dow
and satanic Mills of Victorian England
that meant that the weavers in India
became beggars and India went from being
a world-famous
exporter of finished cloth into an
importer went from having 27% of world
trade to to less than 2% meanwhile
colonialists like robert clive bought
their rotten boroughs in england on the
proceeds of their loot in india while
taking the Hindi word loot into their
dictionaries as well as their habits ah
and the British had the gall to call him
Clive of India as if he belonged to the
country when all he really did was to
ensure that much of the country belonged
to him by the end of the 19th century
the fact is that India was already
Britain's biggest cash cow the world's
biggest purchaser of British goods and
exports and the source of highly paid
employment for British civil servants we
literally paid for our own oppression
and as has been pointed out the wealthy
Victorian British families that made
their money out of out of the slave
economy one-fifth of theof the elites of
of the wealthy class in Britain in the
19th century owed their money to
transporting three million Africans
across the waters and in fact in 1833
when slavery was abolished what happened
was that a compensation of 20 million
pounds was paid not as reparations to
those who had lost their lives or who
had suffered or been oppressed by
slavery but to those who had lost their
property I was struck by the fact that
the old
Wi-Fi password at this Union
commemorates the name of mr. Gladstone
the great liberal hero what I'm sorry
his family was one of those who
benefited from the discomfort
staying with India between 15 and 29
million Indians died of starvation in
British induced famines the most famous
example of course was the Great Bengal
famine during the Second World War when
four million people died because Winston
Churchill deliberately as a matter of
written militant policy proceeded to
divert essential supplies from civilians
in Bengal to steady tummies and
Europeans as reserves stockpiles he said
that the starvation of anyway underfoot
underfed Bengalis mattered much less
than that of sturdy Greeks this is
Churchill's actual quote and when
conscious stricken British officials
wrote to him pointing out that people
were dying because of this decision he
peevishly wrote in the margins of the
file
why hasn't Gandhi died yet so all
notions are the British were trying to
do their colonial Enterprise out of
enlightened despotism to try and bring
the benefits of colonialism and
civilization to the mid night it even
I'm sorry
Churchill's conduct in 43 simply one
example of many that gave a lie to this
myth as others have said on the
proposition violence and racism were the
reality of the colonial experience and
no wonder there the Sun never set on the
British Empire because even God couldn't
trust the English in the dark
let me take world world 1 as a very
concrete example since the first speaker
mr. Li suggested these things couldn't
be quantified
well let me quantify world war 1 for you
again I'm sorry from an Indian
perspective others have spoken of other
countries one-sixth of all the British
forces that fought on the walk were
Indian 54,000 Indians actually lost
their lives in that war 65,000 were
wounded another 4,000 remained missing
or in prison
Indian taxpayers had to cough up a
hundred million pounds in that times
money India supplied 70 million rounds
of ammunition 600 thousand rifles and
machine guns 42 million garments were
stitched and sent out of India and 1.3
million Indian personnel served in this
war I know all this because of course
the the commemoration of the centenary
has just taken place but not just that
India had to supply a hundred and
seventy three seventy three thousand
animals three hundred and seventy
million tons of supplies and in the end
the total value of everything that was
taken out of India India and India by
the was suffering from recession at that
time and poverty and hunger was in
today's money
eight billion pounds in one
quantification it's available second
world war it was even worse two and a
half million Indians in uniform I won't
belabor the point but of Britain's total
war debt of three billion pounds in 1945
money 1.25 billion was owed to India and
never actually paid somebody mentioned
Scotland where a fact is that
colonialism actually cemented your union
with Scotland
you know the Scots had actually tried to
send colonies out before 1707 they'd all
fail them sorry to say but then of
course came Union and India was
available and there you had a
disproportionate employment of Scots
I'm sorry mr. Mackenzie has to speak
after me engaged in this colonial
enterprise as soldiers as merchants as
agencies employees and the earnings from
India is what brought prosperity to
Scotland even pulled
Paul Scotland out of poverty now that
India is no longer there
no wonder the bonds are loosening now
we've heard other arguments on this side
there's been a mention of the railways
well let me tell you first of all as my
colleague the Jamaican High
Commissioners pointed out railways and
roads were really built to serve British
interests and not those of the local
people but I might add that many
countries have built railways and roads
without having had to be colonized in
order to do so they they were designed
to carry raw materials from the
hinterland into the ports to be shipped
to Britain and the fact is that the
Indian or Jamaican or other colonial
public their needs were incidental
transportation there was no attempt made
to match supply to demand for mass
transport none whatsoever
instead in fact the Indian Railways were
built with massive incentives offered by
Britain to British investors guaranteed
out of Indian taxes paid by Indians with
the result that you actually had one
mile of Indian Railway costing twice
what it costs to build the same mile in
Canada or Australia because there was so
much money being paid in extravagant
returns Britain made all the profits
control the technology supplied all the
equipment and absolutely all these
benefits came as private enterprise
British private enterprise at public
risk
Indian public risk that was the railways
as an accomplishment
we're hearing about aid I think it was
it was it was again sir richard ottaway
mentioned british aid to india let me
just point out the British aid to India
is about 0.4% of India's GDP the
government of India actually spends more
on fertilizer subsidies which might be
an appropriate metaphor for that
argument if I may point out as well
if I may point out as well that that as
my fellow speakers from the proposition
that pointed out there have been
incidents of racial violence of loot of
massacres of bloodshed of transportation
in India's case even of one of our last
Mughal emperor yes maybe today's Britons
are not responsible for some of these
depredations but the same speakers
appointed with pride to their foreign
aid you're not responsible for the
people starving in Somalia but we give
them aid surely the principle of
reparations for what is for the wrongs
that have been done cannot be denied
it's been pointed out for example the
dehumanization of Africans and the
Caribbean the massive psychological
damage that has been done the
undermining of social traditions of
property rights of the authority
structures of these societies all in the
interests of a British colonialism and
the fact remains that many of today's
problems in these countries including
the persistence in some cases the
creation of racial and ethnic and
religious tensions were the direct
result of the colonial experience so
there is a moral debt that needs to be
paid someone challenged reparations
elsewhere well I'm sorry Germany doesn't
just give reparations to Israel it also
gave reparations to Poland perhaps some
of the speakers here are too young to
remember the dramatic picture of
Chancellor Willy Brandt on his knees in
the Warsaw Ghetto
in 1970 and there are other examples
there is italy's reparations to libya
there's Japan's to Korea even Britain
has paid reparations to the New Zealand
Mallory's so it's not as if this is
something unprecedented run harder
that's going to somehow open some sort
of nasty Pandora's box
no wonder professor Lewis reminded us
that he's from Texas there's a wonderful
expression in Texas that summarizes the
arguments of the opposition all hat and
no cattle now
if I can just quickly and look through
the other notes I was scribbling while
they were speaking there was reference
to democracy and rule of law let me say
with the greatest possible respect you
can it's a bit rich to oppress enslave
kill torture maim people for 200 years
and then celebrate the fact that their
democratic at the end of it
we were denied democracy so we had to
snatch it seized it from you with the
greatest of reluctance it was considered
in India's case after 150 years of
British rule and that too with limited
franchise yes indeed all right I don't
think that needs needs contradiction not
for me at any rate but if I may just if
I may just point out I think the
arguments made by a couple of the
speakers the first speaker mr. Lee in
particular conceded all the evil
atrocities of colonialism but
essentially suggested that reparations
won't really help they won't help the
right people they be used as a
propaganda tool
they'll embolden people like Mr Mugabe
it's always nice how in the old days you
know I'm sorry to say that the the
people of the Caribbean used to frighten
their children into behaving and
sleeping by saying Sir Francis Drake
would come after them that was a legacy
of that effect now that now it's Mugabe
will be Lesley this is the new sort of
Sir Francis Drake of our times the fact
is the fact is very simply sir
that we are not talking about
reparations as a tool to empower anybody
they're a tool for you to atone for the
wrongs that have been done and I I am
quite prepared to accept the proposition
that you can't evaluate put a put a
monetary sum on the kinds of Horrors
people have suffered certainly no amount
of money can expiate the loss of a loved
one as somebody pointed out there you're
not going to be able to figure out an
exact amount but the principle is what
matters the fact is that to speak
blithely of sacrifices on both sides as
an elegy was used here a burglar comes
into your house ransacked the place
stubs his toe and you say what he there
was a sacrifice on both sides that I'm
sorry to say is not unacceptable is not
an acceptable argument the truth is that
we are not arguing specifically that
vast sums of money need to be paid the
proposition before this house is the
principle of owing reparations not the
fine points of how much is owed to home
which should be paid the question is is
there a debt does written all
reparations as far as I'm concerned the
ability to acknowledge a wrong that has
been done to simply say sorry will go a
far far far longer way than some
percentage of GDP in in inform in the
form of of aid what is required it seems
to me is accepting the principle that
reparations are owed personally I'd be
quite happy if it was one pound a year
for the next 200 years after the last
200 years of Britain and India thank you
very much
you