Suella Braverman says former colonies should repay Britain for the "investments" provided by the empire.
Former British Home Secretary Suella Braverman has called on Britain's former colonies to pay reparations to London for the "investment, effort and contribution" she claims the empire made in building the countries.
In a post on X, Braverman – a right-wing politician who left the Conservative Party earlier this year to join the far-right Reform UK party – entered the reparations debate by declaring: „The British Empire did so much for the world.”
„Of course slavery was abhorrent, but expecting the British people of the 21st century to pay for actions that took place in the 18th century has no legal basis,” Braverman said.
This claim is false. According to British government figures, UK taxpayers were, until recently, paying off a £20 million loan taken out in 1835 to compensate slaveholders after abolition. The amount was around 5 percent of Britain’s GDP at the time. In today’s money, that would be the equivalent of more than $3 billion.
The British government admitted in 2018 that the loan was only finally repaid in 2015, meaning that British taxpayers had been paying for generations of debt that was taken out to compensate slaveholders, not slaves.
Braverman continued: „If the government is serious about this, then the former colonies should repay the British for the significant investment, effort and contribution that this country made, which laid the foundations of many of the democracies that flourish today.”
With these words, Bell responded to Labour MP Ribeiro-Addy, who shared the The Guardian an article stating that Jamaica should „take the matter of reparation directly to King Charles III” by submitting a formal petition later in the year.
According to Ribeiro-Addy, „it is becoming increasingly difficult for British institutions to maintain their preferred tactic of simply ignoring calls for reparations.”.
There is no evidence that Britain „invested” in its colonies for the benefit of the colonized. Colonial economies were built to extract resources, labor, and wealth for London, not to develop colonized societies on their own terms.
Research by economist Utsa Patnaik, published by Columbia University Press and based on almost two centuries of data, found that Britain looted about $45 trillion from India alone during colonial rule.
At its height, the British Empire occupied roughly a quarter of the world's land surface.
Braverman, who is of Indian descent and whose parents immigrated from former British colonies, immediately drew fierce online backlash. „‘Of course slavery was abhorrent, but’ is a wild way to start a sentence,” wrote one user. Another put it this way: „The British Empire did not invest, but stole the wealth and resources of its colonies to benefit the British Empire, not the colonies.”
Analysis: The narrative of „reverse reparations” and the subversion of history
Suella Braverman’s latest claim – that former colonies belong to Britain – is not just a political provocation, but an extreme manifestation of a revisionist reinterpretation of the colonial past. The rhetoric is strategically important in contemporary British domestic politics, especially on the far-right, where restoring national pride often involves denying historical responsibility.
1. Denial of historical reality
Braverman's argument about "investment" runs counter to economic facts. The colonial system was based on extraction: transporting raw materials at low prices and then selling finished products at high prices, artificially hindering the development of local industry. Utsa Patnaik's research on the $45 trillion Indian loss demonstrates that empire was not "built" but "looted.".
2. Victim-perpetrator swapping
The most dangerous element of the politician’s argument is his attempt at moral equivalence: defining the slaveholder compensation paid by British taxpayers (which represented a long-term commitment of public funds) as an „investment” while portraying the colonized as „debtors.” This approach recognizes slavery as „shameful,” but immediately nullifies this recognition with the conjunction „but,” thereby degrading the historical crime to a kind of technical transaction.
3. Political Context: A Tool of the „Culture War”
For Braverman, this statement is an excellent tool for promoting Reform UK. Among British voters struggling with the difficulties of the welfare state, the narrative of the „deprived British taxpayer” evokes strong emotional reactions. The relativization of the colonial past is a kind of „mental self-defense” for a part of British society who cannot reconcile democratic values with imperial cruelty.
Conclusion
Braverman’s position is based not on historical facts but on an identity politics based on „imperial nostalgia.” As Caribbean states like Jamaica increasingly demand formal reparations, the response of London’s elites is increasingly divided: either confronting structural inequalities or, following Braverman’s example, resorting to denial and counterattack. The latter, however, tends to deepen the gap between Britain and its former colonies in the long run, while discrediting the British government in the global human rights discourse.
Source: MME
