Kemi Badenoch says Britain should not apologise for the slave trade

Kemi Badenoch, leader of Britain’s Conservative Party, rejected calls for an official apology for the UK’s role in the transatlantic slave trade, saying it would distract from current issues and could lead to demands for compensation. Prime Minister Andy Burnham is considering an apology ahead of the Commonwealth summit in Antigua and Barbuda, but has ruled out financial reparations and offered to discuss more favourable debt restructuring for poorer countries. Badenoch called for the whole history to be acknowledged, including the role of African kingdoms, rulers and merchants, and noted that previous debt-relief campaigns wrote off more than $100 billion while some countries later accumulated larger debts. Chancellor John Healey also said it would be unfair to impose the financial cost of reparations on British people who had no role in the slave trade.