The Queen has praised the Windrush "pioneers" for their "profound contribution" to British life as a statue to them was unveiled on Windrush Day at Waterloo Station. The Government funded £1 statue, designed by Basil Watson, depicts a man, woman and child standing on top of suitcases and pays tribute to the thousands of people who arrived in the UK from Caribbean countries between 1948 and 1971.

However, there has been negative reaction to the statue. Activist Prof Gus John, in an open letter to Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove, declining an invitation to the unveiling described it as "a monument to unforgivable political illiteracy and an entrenched colonial mindset. The entire Windrush narrative distorts the history of Caribbean engagement with Britain and of Britain's relentless efforts to keep us out".

Windrush survivor and campaigner Glenda Caesar said: “I knew nothing about the unveiling and wasn’t asked to attend. I can understand that it represents the people who came in via that station in 1948 but this does nothing to help the people, like myself, who suffered under this scandal and are labelled as the Windrush generation."

Jacqueline McKenzie, partner and head of immigration at Leigh Day, a firm representing more than 300 people affected by the Windrush scandal, decided not to participate in the Waterloo statue unveiling “whilst justice is being denied to thousands of victims.”

Read more here and here.

As well as screenings in Manchester, Birmingham and Bristol, with more to be confirmed, MJR's documentary ‘After the Flood: the church, slavery and reconciliation' will be shown at the Church of England's General Synod in York on July 11. It will also be shown at the 2022 Lambeth Conference later in the summer.

The General Synod is the national assembly of the Church of England. It meets every two years. The Lambeth Conference is a gathering of bishops from across the worldwide Anglican Communion convened every ten years by The Archbishop of Canterbury for prayer and reflection, fellowship and dialogue on church and world affairs.

Research by the Church Commissioners into a Church of England investment fund has revealed that for over a century it invested large sums of money in a company responsible for transporting slaves. 'Queen Anne's Bounty' was formed in 1704 to help support poor clergy. In 1739 its accounts showed £204,000 (estimated to be worth £443m today) had been invested in the South Sea Company which had an exclusive contract to transport slaves from Africa to Spanish colonies in South America for more than 30 years from the 1710s. Church investments in the South Sea Company continued well into the 19th century and the fund today is worth £10.1bn.

Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby has said he was "deeply sorry for the links". "This abominable trade took men, women and children created in God's image and stripped them of their dignity and freedom. The fact that some within the Church actively supported and profited from it is a source of shame. It is only by facing this painful reality that we can take steps towards genuine healing and reconciliation - the path that Jesus Christ calls us to walk."

Read more here and here. Read the Church Commissioners report here.

MJR's documentary ‘After the Flood: the church, slavery and reconciliation' reveals more of this history of complicity with colonial slavery on the part of the Church of England and other churches, and also talks about the reconciliation Justin Welby speaks of. Find out more here.

At their annual meeting Quakers have agreed they will make practical reparations for the trans-Atlantic slave trade, colonialism and economic exploitation. They took this decision after hearing powerful evidence about Lancaster Quakers in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, who profited from the enslavement of people. They also heard about the personal experience of racism of some of their own members. Quakers summarised their thinking in a statement they call an epistle which will be shared with all Quaker bodies nationally and locally, so they can consider how to respond with practical and meaningful action. It states: "Britain Yearly Meeting resolves to build on our decision last year to be an anti-racist church, working with partners, including churches and faith groups, to look at ways to make meaningful reparations for our failings."  Read more. Read the full epistle here.

A Home Office commissioned paper that officials have repeatedly tried to suppress since it came out in 2021 concludes that the origins of the Windrush scandal lay in 30 years of racist immigration legislation designed to reduce the UK’s non-white population. The 52-page paper, which has been leaked to The Guardian states that “during the period 1950-1981, every single piece of immigration or citizenship legislation was designed at least in part to reduce the number of people with black or brown skin who were permitted to live and work in the UK”. 

​The report, named 'The Historical Roots of the Windrush Scandal', was commissioned by the Home Office as part of a commitment to educating civil servants about the causes of the Windrush scandal, which saw thousands of people wrongly classified as illegal immigrants by the department. Stating that “the British Empire depended on racist ideology in order to function” the report asserts that in the 1950s, British officials shared a “basic assumption that ‘coloured immigrants’, as they were referred to, were not good for British society.”

While circulated internally, a year on the report remains unpublished and a Freedom of Information request by The Guardian was turned down by the Home Office; a refusal described as "shameful" by Simon Woolley, the former CEO of Operation Black Vote and chair of the No 10 race disparity unit. “The government is hellbent in its denial of the systemic nature of racial inequality and in this climate historical facts have become uncomfortable truths that need to be hidden.” Read the full Guardian article here.

​Image by Steve Eason.

This was one of the comments on social media after the premiere screening of our documentary ‘After the Flood: the church, slavery and reconciliation' on Wednesday May 25 at Bloomsbury Central Baptist Church, in London's West End. Over 200 came to watch, and burst into spontaneous applause as the credits rolled. It was followed by a lively question and answer session with a panel chaired by film interviewee Wale Hudson-Roberts, and including narrator Prof Robert Beckford, Eleasah Roberts, Lisa Adjei, Peter Cruchley and MJR trustee Paul Keeble.

Thanks to all who came and special thanks to Bloomsbury Central Baptist for hosting.

So, how do we get this documentary "seen by every church in the land"? One way is by lots of people asking to see it in their church or city. If you would like to know more, visit this page on our website or send us an email.

Black Equity Organisation (BEO), the UK’s first national civil rights organisation established to advance justice and equity for Black people has been launched by some of the country’s most influential Black figures, including shadow foreign secretary David Lammy, academic David Olusoga, chief executive Karen Blackett, business leader Dame Vivian Hunt and artistic director Kwame Kwei-Armah.

Launched to coincide with the second anniversary of the murder of George Floyd, BEO is founded on the premise that systemic racism not only exists but plagues millions of people across Britain. The legacy of historic policies and attitudes means that 50% of Black children live in poverty, Black mothers are four times more likely to die in childbirth and at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, Black people were four times more likely to die from Covid than white people.

The organisation has been compared to the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) in the United Scales, founded in 1909 by key Black progressives.

Read more in The Independent. Or in The Guardian here. The launch of BEO has been supported by six law firms - more.

Premier Christianity magazine has given the new MJR documentary ‘After the Flood: the church, slavery and reconciliation' a 5-star review, describing it as a "beautifully made, informative and moving documentary, well worth an hour of your time." Despite the nature of some of the content, the film is not "angry", but "thoughtful, well-made, engaging content."

It notes that since the murder of George Floyd, there have been "numerous films made and books written about slavery and racism, but few that focus on the active and disgraceful role of UK churches". 

"​Superb on-location shots from the West Indies and the UK are interspersed with insights from theologians and academics who, despite their great learning, communicate well in plain, everyday English! It is incredibly well made and watchable" Read the whole review here.

Last week Dr Robert Beckford and MJR trustee Paul Keeble spoke to Chick Yuill on Premier Radio about the work of MJR and the new feature documentary, ‘After the Flood: the church, slavery and reconciliation'. The film, which will be premiered in London on 25th May 2022, tells how the 18th century Church became embroiled in the slave trade and encourages us to face the truth and deal with the ongoing legacy of slavery.

“Most Christians don’t know about the history of slavery because it represents one of the biggest cover ups in the history of the church in Britain. What we hope the film will do is enable people to understand this history, and to meaningfully, in an educated way, become part of the solution.” Dr Robert Beckford.
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Listen to the interview here. Tickets for the Premiere are available here.

New figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that unemployment rates among Black, Asian and minority ethnic workers are now more than double those of their white counterparts: 7.7% versus 3.5% The gap has widened considerably since the start of the pandemic. These disparities show that the post-pandemic employment rate for ethnic minority workers is recovering at a slower rate than that of white workers.

It has also been revealed by The Independent that Black households face being disproportionately impacted by the cost of living crisis with the majority having less than £1,500 in savings and being more likely to go hungry. And it has recently emerged that Black, Asian and minority ethnic women are twice as likely to be on zero-hours contracts as white men.

Frances O’Grady, the general secretary of the Trades Union Congress (TUC), said: "The pandemic held up a mirror to discrimination in our labour market". and is calling on the government to “challenge” structural racism that is resulting in job inequality. “BME workers bore the brunt of the economic impact of the pandemic – in every industry where jobs were lost to the impact of Covid, BME workers were more likely to have been made unemployed.”

Read more here. Download the ONS report here.