London The British government proposes a controversial new law to protect historic monuments in England after statues of slave traders were overturned or removed by local authorities during Black Lives Matter argument last summer.
Currently in England local governments have to approve any major changes to buildings, but the same rules do not apply to statues. The new legislation would expand the requirements for buildings to cover statues and provide an option for the national government to veto the decisions of local councils.
“An attempt was made to impose a single, often negative story, which not so much reminds us of our national story, but to erase a part of it. This was done by the flash mob, or by the command of a ‘cultural committee’ of militants in the town hall and values awakened, ‘community secretary Robert Jenrick wrote in an article in the British newspaper Sunday Telegraph.
The proposed legislation must be approved by parliament to become law.
“What has stood for generations should be considered carefully, not removed on a whim or at the behest of a bumpy crowd,” Jenrick continued.
In June, a statue of slave trader Edward Colston, who died 300 years ago, was thrown into a river by the Black Lives Matter protesters in the English city of Bristol and a heritage debate and inclusion. After consulting with various parties, local officials decided that the Colston statue would be placed in a museum next to protest signs.
“It is up to us to make sure we record this moment for future generations to understand the journey that Bristol has undergone,” Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees told the BBC at the time.
Shortly afterwards, Sidiq Khan, Mayor of London, created a new Commission for Diversity in the Public Empire to review public landmarks, art and street names around the capital, so that it reflects the diversity of the city and further discusses the heritage is celebrated. ‘
“There are some slaves who need to come down, and the commission will advise on that,” Khan told BBC News. Under the proposed legislation, the national government will be able to veto decisions of local authorities on the advice of the commission.
Members of the arts community, historians and racial equality activists were quick to criticize the government’s plan, accusing them of trying to divert from more pressing issues, including the widely criticized response to the UK’s worst pandemic. capita left it. COVID-19 mortality rate of any nation.
“(It is) smoke and mirrors,” Dr Halima Begum, director of the race’s think tank, Runnymede Trust, told the Guardian newspaper. “With one view to the next election, Jenrick used this article to wage an artificial culture war, to revive the Tory base and to deduce from the government’s terrible failures around Covid.”
“I wish we could get away from language of censorship and extinction and understand that it is about broadening, deepening and creating honest and inclusive narratives,” tweeted the director of the advocacy group, the Museums Association, Sharon Heal.