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Multi-cultural Britain

My Lords, I remind your Lordships that, after the passage of the Bill abolishing the slave trade in 1807, something remarkable occurred. From the moment that the Bill received Royal Assent in March of that year, successive Governments made a determined effort to secure the international abolition of the slave trade. What was the point of abolishing the British trade in slaves if our place was to be taken by the French, the Spaniards or the Portuguese? In 1807, this country embarked on what the lateMr Robin Cook would in 1997 describe as an ethical foreign policy—one against the slave trade. That lasted for about 60 years and was remarkably successful. The policy had four elements. First, there was simple diplomacy aimed to persuade other powers, France included, at the Congress of Vienna, that the slave trade was evil. Secondly, there was diplomacy backed by money, a policy devoted to countries in Europe such as Portugal and Spain which, it was rightly thought, would like some financial support in the form of loans in return for abolition. Thirdly, the same commitment of diplomacy and cash was directed at African monarchs, merchants and noblemen who had greeted the abolition of the slave trade in Britain with incredulity. We need to recall that the vast majority of slaves carried by European captains to the New World were sold by, or exchanged with, African merchants, kings or noblemen. That is one reason why the whole idea of compensation is especially difficult. A fourth tactic was adopted by British Governments. That was the remarkable naval patrol by ships of the Navy off the African and, to a lesser extent, the Brazilian and Caribbean coasts to try physically to prevent the Atlantic slave trade continuing. For example, a British West Africa squadron of two vessels made a trial journey for that purpose to West Africa in 1808. The last such voyage was in 1870, after which the battle-scarred West Africa squadron was merged with the Capes squadron. Between those years, of some2 million slaves who had been who had been carried across, 160,000 were freed from slave ships by the Navy. Not far short of 1,400 slave ships were seized by the Navy—about a sixth of the 7,750 slave ships which probably set off in that era. In the last stages of the patrol era, British naval vessels were joined by some French and American vessels. Those two nations played a small part inthat police operation, although a far lesser part than we did. British Secret Service money was amply used to assist naval captains. For example, for a time, the harbour master of Río de Janeiro was working forus, so the Navy was well informed of arrivalsand departures of slave ships from that port in the 1840s. About 2,000 British seamen died as a result of skirmishes at sea, from yellow fever or from malaria contracted on land or in the rivers of the slave coasts, which had by then begun to be known as the white man’s grave. That was a long, wearisome commitment, with an importance far greater than the number of slaves released would suggest. It tried the nerves as well as the patience of officers and seamen alike for year after year. It also was trying for Members of this House and of another place. That commitment by the Royal Navy enabled us to look back from the early 21st century with real pride at the years immediately after abolition. It caused Palmerston to consider in old age that his achievement in bringing an end to the slave trade to Brazil was his greatest work. If we are fair, it also allows us to recall the famous liberal historian, Lecky, who wrote in his A History of England in the Eighteenth Century, of the, "““unweary and unostentatious … crusade of England against slavery””—" after Wilberforce had begun his work, of course—which, "““may probably be regarded as among the three or four perfectly virtuous pages comprised in the history of nations””."