UK slavery reparations not on the table, says Ed Miliband

LIVERPOOL, England — British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband rejected Monday the idea of the U.K. paying reparations to Commonwealth nations for its role in the transatlantic slave trade.

Speaking to the POLITICO Pub at Labour Party conference, Miliband said he’s against financial payments as a solution to the poverty within those countries.

“I don’t think reparations are the answer, and I’ve had those discussions already with some of our Commonwealth colleagues,” the foreign secretary said.

While condemning the slave trade as “terrible,” Miliband said his focus is on addressing the current problems facing people around the globe.

He said that included countries “on the front line of the climate crisis, of the debt burden, of trying to reduce poverty in those countries.”

The foreign secretary is due to attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Antigua and Barbuda this November. During the previous CHOGM summit in 2024, Britain’s former colonies agreed “the time has come” for a reparatory conversation about the slave trade — though then-Prime Minister Keir Starmer insisted it would not be on the agenda.

Starmer’s administration decided to cut international aid funding from 0.5% to 0.3% last year to fund higher defense spending.