Teach children about legacy of Empire and slavery, urges Corbyn
CHILDREN SHOULD be taught more about the legacy of the British Empire, colonialism and the slave trade, Jeremy Corbyn is due to tell a meeting in Bristol.
The Labour leader is calling for schools to give pupils a greater awareness of the role played by black Britons in shaping the country’s history. Mr Corbyn will set out plans for an Emancipation Educational Trust aimed at educating future generations about slavery and the struggle to end the trade.
The Labour leader will set out his proposals in Bristol, a city that grew rich from the slave trade and the scene of more recent battles for racial equality.
Mr Corbyn will meet Paul Stephenson, a civil rights activist who played a role in the Bristol bus boycott in 1963 aimed at overturning a ban on ethnic minorities working on buses.
The Labour leader will say the stories of people like Mr Stephenson should be as well known as that of Rosa Parks – the US civil rights activist who refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama.
October is Black History Month, but Mr Corbyn said: “Black history is British history, and it should not be confined to a single month each year.
“It is vital that future generations understand the role that black Britons have played in our country’s history and the struggle for racial equality.”