Alongside the coronavirus, a defining issue of 2020 in the UK was the toppling of a statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol, after repeated attempts to have it removed through conventional methods failed.
Edward Colston statue pulled down by BLM protesters in Bristol. Colston was a 17th century slave trader who has numerous landmarks named after him in Bristol. #BlackLivesMattters #blmbristol #ukprotests pic.twitter.com/JEwk3qKJx2
— Jack Grey (@_jackgrey) June 7, 2020
The action was triggered by the Black Lives Matter protests, and led to many councils agreeing to reassess their public monuments and, indeed, street names.
Robert Jenrick, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, considered the issue of having monuments to racists, and decided – they need to be protected.
EXCLUSIVE in this weekend's Sunday Telegraph
Every statue will be given greater protection from "baying mobs" and road names could be saved from the "revisionist purge" of Labour councils, under law changes to be published on Mondayhttps://t.co/hMVElO2qHq
— Christopher Hope
(@christopherhope) January 16, 2021
The news went down as well as you’d expect.
1.
WHAT THE GOVERNMENT HASN’T PROTECTED:
Care homes
Schools
The NHS
Kids going hungry
The self-employed
People on low wages
The homeless
The fishing industry
The whole populationWHAT THEY WILL PROTECT:
Statueshttps://t.co/eAZgRxmWz2— David Schneider (@davidschneider) January 17, 2021
2.
If the government feels that it needs something to be getting on with, there's this thing called coronavirus it might want to pay attention to. https://t.co/WaZ2LhqqRI
— Ian Dunt (@IanDunt) January 17, 2021
3.
Get you a government who a year into a pandemic in which they’ve locked down too late 3 times, fucked up test and trace, put the elderly from hospitals into care homes without a test until April 20th and left 87,000 people dead goes “we must protect racist statues”
— James Felton (@JimMFelton) January 17, 2021
4.
If all the UK’s hungry children remain very still, perhaps the government will mistake them for statues and take steps to protect them. https://t.co/y8tCoOZmsh
— paul bassett davies (@thewritertype) January 16, 2021
5.
Robert Jenrick to bring in new planning laws to protect statues.
Bit of a change from his usual approach of overruling planners to give £billion developments by Tory donors the go ahead so they can save £50m in tax.
https://t.co/LPtzY5ccwY— Parody Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson_MP) January 17, 2021
6.
I am weary, WEARY I tell thee https://t.co/KWZJlFHLsN
— Greg Jenner (@greg_jenner) January 16, 2021
7.
It’s like being governed by a weirdly angry Facebook group https://t.co/SDQY1J8dgK
— Padraig Reidy (@mePadraigReidy) January 17, 2021
8.
So weird that they’re anti-scrapping statues now but were super eager to get rid of Theresa May at the time. https://t.co/rjtReQ26ut
— Tiernan Douieb (@TiernanDouieb) January 17, 2021
9.
Last week I approached Robert Jenrick’s department for comment on the fact at least 70,000 households in England have been made homeless during the pandemic.
They didn’t respond. https://t.co/1Wk0zPb8ob
— Chaminda Jayanetti (@cjayanetti) January 17, 2021
Considering the fishing industry is being crushed by Brexit – the very thing it thought would save it – James O’Brien‘s suggestion makes a lot of sense.
Maybe fishermen should pretend to be statues…
— James O'Brien (@mrjamesob) January 17, 2021
READ MORE
Winston Churchill’s statue’s been boarded up – 17 resolutely non-serious things people said about it
Source Telegraph Image Screengrab
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