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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow (now) and Matthew Weaver (earlier)

Priti Patel condemns minority at Black Lives Matter protests as 'thugs and criminals' – as it happened

Summary

  • Priti Patel, the home secretary, has said she backs the idea of a new law to make it easier to prosecute people who damage war memorials. She was speaking in the Commons during a statement on the Black Lives Matters protests and responding to the Conservative MP Jonathan Gullis who said residents in his Stoke-on-Trent North constituency were “outraged” at the Cenotaph graffiti and attempts to burn the Union flag. He asked Patel if she would back a desecration of war memorials bill. Patel replied:

I completely support the sentiment and the point [Gullis] has just made.

Earlier she said the “hooliganism” of a minority of people attending the protests at the weekend was “utterly indefensible”. (See 5.16pm.)

  • Patel said that she would not “take lectures” from the opposition about racism because she had been a victim of it herself. (See 5.42pm.) She made the comment in response to claims that her hardline opening statement implied that she did not fully understand the anger felt by people about structural racism in Britain. Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, adopted a more empathetic tone in his own statement about the protests. Like Patel and other government colleagues, he condemned the violence. But he was better at expressing what sounded like genuine commitment to the ongoing cause of building “a better society”. (See 4.45pm.)

That is all from me for today.

There is more politics coverage on our UK coronavirus live blog, which has been covering Matt Hancock at the UK government’s daily press conference.

And for the latest on the Black Lives Matters protests in America, here is our US live blog.

This is from the Labour MP Nadia Whittome on Priti Patel’s response to Florence Eshalomi earlier. (See 5.42pm.)

Dawn Butler, the former shadow women and equalities minister, has gone to the police after being threatened with a torrent of violent and racist abuse for defending the Black Lives Matter protests, my colleague Kate Proctor reports.

Updated

Patel says she will 'not take lectures' from others about racism because she has been victim herself

Although Priti Patel’s comments in her opening statement about understanding the “deep-seated desire for change” felt by the BLM protesters were overshadowed by her uncompromising rhetoric about the “thugs and criminals” who were a minority at the demonstrations (see 5.16pm), a few minutes later she got the chance to powerfully state her opposition to racism.

It came when she was responding to the Labour MP Florence Eshalomi, who suggested that Patel did not understand the anger felt by people, particularly the young, and their desire for action to tackle structural racism. Eshalomi said her son turned three yesterday. She said she did not want to have to wait until he was a teenager before there were changes in this country. Action was needed now, she said.

Patel said she had been clear about the level of injustice felt across the country. She went on:

I’m really really saddened that [Eshalomi] has effectively said that this government doesn’t understand racial inequality.

Well, on that basis, it must have been a very different home secretary who as a child was frequently called a Paki in the playground, a very different home secretary who was racially abused in the streets or even advised to drop her surname and use her husband’s in order to advance her career.

A different home secretary recently characterised ... in the Guardian newspaper as a fat cow with a ring through its nose, something that was not only racist but offensive, both culturally and religiously. [Patel was referring to a Steve Bell cartoon.]

So when it comes to racism, sexism, tolerance or social justice, I will not take lectures from the other side of the house.

I have already said repeatedly there is no place for racism in our country or in society. And sadly too many people are too willing, too casually, to dismiss the contributions of those who don’t necessarily confirm to pre-conceived views or ideas about how ethnic minorities should behave or think. This ... in my view is racist in itself.

In some respects Patel’s argument echoed that made by another BAME minister, the equalities minister Kemi Badenoch, in a Twitter thread at the weekend. Here is one of her posts.

Updated

Here are more quotes from Priti Patel’s opening statement. After a measured start, it soon ended up sounding like conventional Home Office hardlinerism.

She told MPs:

As the ugly tally of officer assaults show, some protesters regrettably turned to violence and abusive behaviour at the weekend. This hooliganism is utterly indefensible. There is no justification for it.

There is no excuse for pelting flares at brave officers, throwing bikes at police horses, attempting to disrespect the Cenotaph or vandalising the statue of Winston Churchill, one of the greatest protectors of our freedoms who has ever lived.

It’s not for mobs to tear down statues and cause criminal damage in our streets, and it is not acceptable for thugs to racially abuse black police officers for doing their jobs.

The criminals responsible for these unlawful and reckless acts are betraying the very cause they purport to serve.

These protests are about injustice but by attacking our courageous police, they are acting in a wholly unjust way ...

To the quiet law-abiding majority who are appalled by this violence and have continued to live their lives within the rules, I hear you.

To the police who have been subject to the most dreadful abuse, you have my full backing as you act proportionately, fairly and courageously to maintain law and order.

To the criminal minority who have subverted this cause with their thuggery, I simply say this: your behaviour is shameful and you will face justice.

Updated

Here is a video clip from Priti Patel’s opening statement.

Nick Thomas-Symonds, the shadow home secretary, is responding for Labour.

He says he does not approve of the way the Edward Colston statue was torn down. But he says he is pleased to see it gone.

He says we have heard many accounts of the damage done by racism. Now is not the time for “divisive rhetoric”, he tells Patel.

UPDATE: Here is more from Thomas-Symond’s speech. He said:

We cannot allow this moment of global demand for justice to pass without action and we on these benches will be at the forefront of calls for change.

What is never the solution, though, is violence and vandalism. The vast majority of protesters are peaceful, but some of the actions we have seen from a minority are unacceptable.

I condemn those who have attacked the police and I want to pay tribute to the police officers putting themselves in harm’s way over the weekend.

Updated

Patel says 135 people have been arrested following weekend BLM protests

Patel says there were 200 protests over the weekend.

In total, 137,500 people have attended protests, she says.

Most were peaceful. But a minority of protesters were violent.

In London 35 officers have been injured.

The “thugs and criminals” are being arrested.

  • Patel says 135 people have been arrested following the weekend protests.

She says there is no excuse for what happened.

It is not acceptable for criminals to tear down statues, or to racially abuse police officers, she says.

She says she said she would back the police when she became home secretary.

She says she could not be clearer: “I want to see the violent minority responsible arrested and brought to justice.”

Updated

Patel says she was “sickened” by George Floyd’s death.

She says she understands why people wanted to protest about it.

Racism has no part in our society, she says.

And she says the government understands the importance of the right to protest.

In normal circumstances there would be no problem with a protest like this going ahead, she says.

But these are not normal circumstances. Large gatherings are unlawful to stop the spread of coronavirus. The pandemic has already cost more than 40,000 lives. Protesting like this puts people’s lives at risk.

Priti Patel's Commons statement on BLM protests

Priti Patel, the home secretary, has just started making her Commons statement on the Black Lives Matter protests.

Updated

'Whilst progress seems slow, I promise you it is permanent' - Sunak's message to BLM protesters

Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, has issued this statement about the weekend Black Lives Matter protests.

As well as being well outside the remit of his Treasury brief, it is unusually well crafted (with vague echoes of Martin Luther King) and infinitely more empathetic than the line coming out of Downing Street today (see 10.50am and 1.46pm.)

It will, for course, do nothing to quell speculation that he has ambitions to one day achieve an even more senior leadership post.

Updated

Here is more on the campaign to get the statue of Henry Dundas taken down in Edinburgh. Dundas was a prominent opponent of the abolition of slavery.

The statue has recently attracted protest grafitti.

Updated

The lord mayor of Cardiff, Dan De’Ath, has called for the statue of the former governor of Trinidad, Thomas Picton, to be removed from the city council’s marble hall.

In a letter to Cardiff council, De’Ath wrote:

Picton oversaw an authoritarian and highly brutal regime. Picton was placed on trial in 1806 for ordering the illegal torture of a 14-year-old mixed race girl.

Picton was convicted but the conviction was later overturned. Picton was also accused of the execution of a dozen slaves and his fortune was due in a large part to the slave trade.

I feel that it is no longer acceptable for Picton’s statue to be amongst the “heroes of Wales” in city hall and I am calling on you to arrange for its removal from the marble hall.

Asked about the letter, the Welsh first minister, Mark Drakeford, said:

I know the lord mayor of Cardiff very well, I know he will have thought carefully before he wrote such a letter and I hope and am confident that Cardiff council will respond to that in a careful and considered way and understanding the changed context in which we are living.

Separately, more than 1,000 people have signed a petition demanding that a monument to Picton be removed from Carmarthen in south-west Wales.

Updated

According to a snap YouGov poll, only 13% of people approve of the way the Edward Colston statue was taken down. But another 40% of people would like it to have been removed legitimately, the poll suggests.

The dramatic toppling of a statue of the slave trader Edward Colston at a Black Lives Matter protest in Bristol has reignited the campaign to remove a statue of the Victorian imperialist Cecil Rhodes at Oxford University, my colleague Aamna Mohdin reports.

Several Conservative MPs from the Blue Collar Conservatism caucus at Westminster joined the effort to clean graffiti from the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square.

One of them was Peter Gibson MP.

Peter Gibson MP cleaning graffiti from the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square today.
Peter Gibson MP cleaning graffiti from the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square today. Photograph: John Sibley/Reuters

The slogan “was a racist” was daubed on the plinth. While obviously disrespectful, and damaging to a much-loved national monument, this was not actually wrong. The historian Andrew Roberts is now seen as an establishment Tory, but he made his name in 1994 with a brilliant and iconoclastic book called Eminent Churchillians which included a chapter on Churchill and race. The opening paragraph was a cracker. It said:

It was during the premiership of Winston Churchill 40 years ago that Britain took her first steps towards becoming a multi-racial society. This is not without a certain irony, as although racist views were almost universally held until around the end of the 1950s, Churchill was more profoundly racist than most.

Updated

The Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton has used a series of Instagram posts to back the toppling of the Edward Colston statue. It should be left in the water, and replaced with a memorial to the slaves he sold, Hamilton says.

Back in the Commons, asked if she agrees that statues of white men who enslaved others should be removed, Priti Patel, the home secretary, said decisions like this should be taken democratically within the law.

Colston hall in Bristol to take down signage ahead of announcement of new name in autumn

The music venue Colston Hall in Bristol has issued a statement today confirming its intention to change its name. The plan to abandon the Colston name (derived from Edward Colston) was originally announced three years ago, and a new name was due to be unveiled this spring, as part of a development of the building. The work has been held up because of the coronavirus crisis, the statement says. It goes on:

We aim to announce a new name that is right for both the hall and the city in autumn 2020. There are a number of steps we need to take between now and then, but as a demonstration of our commitment, one of these will be removing the external signage from the building.

Colston Hall in Bristol.
Colston Hall in Bristol. Photograph: Matthew Childs/Reuters

And here’s the start of a Twitter thread from the historian and broadcaster Kate Williams on the toppling of the Edward Colston statue.

Colston’s girls’ school in Bristol, named after the slave trader Edward Colston, has removed its own statue of Colston from display, according to the Bristol Post.

Updated

David Olusoga, the historian and broadcaster, has written a terrific article for the Guardian about the toppling of the Edward Colston statue in Bristol. Here is an excerpt.

The fact that a man who died 299 years ago is today on the front pages of most of Britain’s newspapers suggests that Bristol has not been brilliant at coming to terms with its history. Despite the valiant and persistent efforts of campaigners, all attempts to have the statue peacefully removed were thwarted by Colston’s legion of defenders. In 2019, attempts to fix a plaque to the pedestal collapsed after Bristol’s Society of Merchant Venturers, the high priests of the Colston cult, insisted on watering down the text, adding qualifications that, it was felt, had the effect of minimising his crimes. Yet what repulsed many about the statue was not that it valorised Colston but that it was silent about his victims, those whose lives were destroyed to build the fortune he lavished upon the city …

Today is the first full day since 1895 on which the effigy of a mass murderer does not cast its shadow over Bristol’s city centre. Those who lament the dawning of this day, and who are appalled by what happened on Sunday, need to ask themselves some difficult questions. Do they honestly believe that Bristol was a better place yesterday because the figure of a slave trader stood at its centre? Are they genuinely unable – even now – to understand why those descended from Colston’s victims have always regarded his statue as an outrage and for decades pleaded for its removal?

And here is the full article.

Updated

Here is Marvin Rees, the mayor of Bristol, explaining to ITV why, as a descendent of Jamaicans, he found the Edward Colston statue so offensive. But there is a difference between understanding why people wanted to tear it down and condoning that, he explains.

Asha from Bristol placing her own dedication on the empty plinth where the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol stood until yesterday.
Asha from Bristol placing her own dedication on the empty plinth where the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol stood until yesterday. Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA

Updated

Priti Patel, the home secretary, is taking questions in the Commons now.

In response to the first question, from the acting Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey, Patel rules out abandoning the “no recourse to public funds” rule that prevents many migrants from accessing benefits as a visa condition. She claims other forms of support are available.

Joanna Cherry, the SNP’s justice and home affairs spokesperson, says this policy disproportionately affects BAME people.

Patel says she does not accept it is discriminatory. And she claims a plethora of other forms of support are available.

Updated

The Mirror’s Dan Bloom has a transcript of what happened at the No 10 lobby briefing, where the prime minister’s spokesman repeatedly dodged questions about whether or not the PM favoured the removal of statues of people like Edward Colston.

35 officers injured, including two hospitalised, and 36 people arrested in BLM protest, says Met

And here is the full statement from the Metropolitan police on the numbers of people arrested and officers injured in yesterday’s protest in London. It says:

A total of 36 people were arrested during protests on Sunday 7 June for offences including violent disorder, criminal damage and assaulting police.

A large number of people joined demonstrations that were largely peaceful and left central London after the event.

However, a number remained in the area around Whitehall and behaved antisocially before becoming violent towards officers.

Police used a variety of tactics including containment to tackle several violent and antisocial groups before dispersing the final protesters at around 02:00hrs on Monday 8 June.

By the early hours of today 35 officers reported suffering injuries. Two of these officers required hospital treatment, one after suffering a head wound and the second with a shoulder injury after a bottle was thrown.

Investigations are under way into a number of incidents including criminal damage to a statue, and other sites and buildings of national importance - officers are seeking to identify those responsible.

Updated

A worker removing graffiti this morning from the statue of Field Marshal Smuts in Parliament Square. Smuts was prime minister of South Africa.
A worker removing graffiti this morning from the statue of Field Marshal Smuts in Parliament Square. Smuts was prime minister of South Africa. Photograph: Facundo Arrizabalaga/EPA

Updated

Boris Johnson does not think Britain racist country, says No 10

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the prime minister’s spokesman was asked about the PM’s views on yesterday’s Black Lives Matter protests. Here are the main points.

  • The spokesman said Boris Johnson viewed the removal of the Edward Colston statue as a “criminal act”. Asked about the PM’s view of what happened in Bristol, the spokesman said:

The PM’s view is that in this country, where there is strong opinion, there is a democratic process which should be followed. People can campaign for the removal of a statue but what happened yesterday was a criminal act and when the criminal law is broken that is unacceptable and the police will want to hold to account those responsible.

The PM absolutely understands the strength of feeling, but in this country we settle our differences democratically and if people wanted the removal of the statue there are democratic routes which can be followed.

  • The spokesman refused to say whether Boris Johnson thought statues of other people involved in the slave trade should be removed. And although the spokesman criticised the way the Colston statue was taken down, he would not say whether or not the PM wanted it to be put back up.
  • The spokesman said Johnson did not think the UK was a racist country. Asked if the PM thought it was, the spokesman said:

The PM doesn’t doubt that there continues to be discrimination and racism but does not agree that this is a racist country.

We have made very significant progress on this issue but there remains more to do and we will not be complacent in our efforts to stamp out racism and discrimination where it happens.

  • The spokesman said that Johnson had been briefed on the protests yesterday by Cressida Dick, commissioner of the Metropolitan police in London. And the spokesman said Priti Patel, the home secretary, had been getting daily briefings from the Met and other forces, including Avon and Somerset police.

Updated

From Sky’s home affairs correspondent, Mark White

In Edinburgh a placard has been attached to the statue of the philosopher David Hume drawing attention to his racism. It features a Hume quote saying: “I am apt to suspect the negroes to be naturally inferior to the whites.” Hume was a leading philosopher of the Scottish Enlightenment in the 18th century. He is still generally revered as a thinker, although increasing focus on his racist views has led to his reputation being reconsidered.

A placard attached to the statue of the 18th Century philosopher David Hume on the Royal Mile, Edinburgh
A placard attached to the statue of the 18th century philosopher David Hume on the Royal Mile, Edinburgh. Photograph: Jane Barlow/PA

Updated

These are from the Conservative MP Claire Coutinho on yesterday’s Black Lives Matter protests.

Updated

Police would have triggered 'violent confrontation' if they had tried to protect Colston statue, says chief constable

Andy Marsh, the chief constable of Avon and Somerset police, has posted a video message on Twitter defending his officers’ decisions not to intervene when Black Lives Matters protesters tore down the Edward Colston statue yesterday and dumped it in the water. He said that if the police had got involved, they would have provoked “a very violent confrontation”. He said:

I wanted to speak to you about the policing of the protest in Bristol over the weekend.

We went to lengths before the protests to caution people against attending because of the risk of spreading Covid. But as expected, people turned up and there was a crowd of over 10,000.

Midway through the protest we saw CCTV images in our control room of people on top of the Colston statue.

Within two minutes that statue had been pulled down.

We had deployed officers to respond to take appropriate action but the commanders on the ground made the decision not to intervene.

To arrest suspects would likely lead to injuries to suspects, injuries to officers and people who were not involved in damaging property being thrown into a very violent confrontation with the police that could have had serious ramifications for the city of Bristol and beyond.

Can you imagine scenes of police in Bristol fighting with protesters who were damaging the statue of a man who is reputed to have gathered much of his fortune through the slave trade?

I think there would have been very serious implications and whilst I certainly do not condone crime or damage of any sort, I fully support the actions of my officers.

They responded with common sense, sound judgment and in the best interest of public safety.

Updated

In an interview with Emma Barnett on Radio 5 Live the former Labour cabinet minister Lord Mandelson said that the police should arrest those responsible for bringing down the Edward Colston statue in Bristol. What happened amounted to “mob rule”, he implied. He told the programme:

Personally I’m not going to shed a tear for that statue. Personally I regard the history surrounding it as completely disgusting, but … I find mob rule very disturbing indeed, and if we’re going to let it go this time, where is it going to go next? Who is going to be taken on, what’s going to be toppled, who is going to take these decisions into their own hands, regardless of the views of other people?

Asked if those responsible should be arrested and punished, he said they should. He explained:

Because otherwise, you’re just giving the green light for the same sort of action and mob rule that anyone else wants to do, take the law into their own hands, and do as they please. I mean, that’s the law of the jungle, isn’t it?

Updated

A worker cleaning the statue of Churchill in Parliament Square in London this morning. Yesterday, during the Black Lives Matter protest, the words ‘was a racist’ were sprayed on the plinth.
A worker cleaning the statue of Churchill in Parliament Square in London this morning. Yesterday, during the Black Lives Matter protest, the words ‘was a racist’ were sprayed on the plinth. Photograph: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images

Avon and Somerset police have said they made a tactical decision not to intervene yesterday when the Edward Colston statue was toppled, dragged through the city and dumped in the water. No arrests were made but officers are now collating footage of people filmed taking part in the action. According to BBC Bristol, 17 people have already been identified by police in relation to the incident.

Updated

Bristol city council says it is keeping all the signs left at yesterday’s Black Lives Matter protest in the city for display in the museum.

We’ve split our UK live blogs this morning to reflect the fact that there are two big stories running that have relatively little overlap.

This blog will now be focusing predominantly on the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter protests, including Priti Patel’s statement later in the Commons.

And my colleague Matthew Weaver will be covering all the latest coronavirus developments on a UK coronavirus live blog.

Lammy suggests more statues of people like slave traders should be taken down

Here is David Lammy, the shadow justice secretary, speaking on Good Morning Britain this morning about the pulling down of the Edward Colston statue in Bristol yesterday. While Lammy just about stayed within the parameters of the Labour line set out by Sir Keir Starmer on LBC (disapproval of the means used by the protesters, but support for their intent – see 10.21am), he sounded (understandably) far more supportive towards them.

Here are two of his main points.

  • Lammy said the people who pulled down the Edward Colston statue were following in the tradition of great civil rights protesters like Martin Luther King and the suffragettes. He explained:

We have a tradition in our country of protest. We’ve had great men and women, people like Emmeline Pankhurst and the suffragettes, who have faced imprisonment because of their protests. I’m quite sure that those young people who brought that statue down knew that they would be facing the law. But that was a price that they were prepared to pay. And there are many, many examples throughout history – from Martin Luther King to Harvey Milk, protests on behalf of gay rights – men and women following these people have been prepared to break the law because they believe that the issue of justice, that they wanted to shine a light on, is a bigger project.

  • He called for more statues of people like slave traders to be removed. He said:

I’m afraid the time has come in the United Kingdom to look at these statues and say is it now right to celebrate these people who murdered so many men, women and children. There may be a role for statues such as this in museums, where there is proper context … but when we put statues up, we are saying these are beloved figures.

Updated

In the Commons this afternoon there will be an urgent question on the reproduction number, R, followed by a statement from Priti Patel, the home secretary, on public disorder.

The harbour master in Bristol this morning checking the depth of the area of water where the statue of Edward Colston was dumped yesterday.
The harbour master in Bristol this morning checking the depth of the area of water where the statue of Edward Colston was dumped yesterday. Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA

A petition to rename a street in Northern Ireland named after a prominent 19th century slavery advocate has gathered steam on social media.

By Monday morning more than 620 people had signed the request on change.org asking authorities in Newry to rename John Mitchel Place, which honours a hero of Irish nationalism who went on to champion slavery in the United States. Newry also has a statue of Mitchel.

“Is a street named after a racist really the reflection we want shone on Newry in this modern, multicultural society?” asked the petition organiser, Padraig Mac Cionnaith.

Mitchel grew up in Newry and became a leader of Young Ireland, a group that campaigned against British rule. He was deported in 1848 to a penal colony in Australia and escaped to the US, where he urged Americans to take pride in slavery.

Mac Cionnaith suggested authorities rename the street Equality Place or after the goalkeeper Pat Jennings or even Luv Bug, a Newry pop group which represented Ireland in the 1986 Eurovision.

Several GAA sports clubs around Ireland are named after Mitchel. Several people on Twitter urged the clubs to change their name.

Here are two contrasting Labour/left views on Sir Keir Starmer’s comment about the toppling of the Colston statue.

From Kerry-Anne Mendoza, editor of the Jeremy Corbyn-supporting website, the Canary

From David Clark, a former special adviser to Robin Cook

Patel backs Johnson in saying BLM protests 'subverted by thuggery'

This is from Priti Patel, the home secretary.

Patel’s line about the demonstrations being “subverted by thuggery” is a direct quote from what Boris Johnson said on this in his own tweet last night.

More than 7m people in Britain have suffered from “lockdown loneliness”, according to the Office for National Statistics.

In a report out this morning, the ONS said that in the first month of the lockdown 7.4m people reported that within the past seven days their wellbeing had been affected by their being lonely.

But levels of “chronic loneliness” – defined as when people say they are lonely often or always - were about the same as before the lockdown, the ONS said. It explained:

From 3 April to 3 May 2020, 5.0% of people said they feel lonely “often or always”, around 2.6m people across Great Britain. Throughout this release we refer to this group as “chronically lonely”.

During the same period, 30.9% of those asked said their wellbeing had been affected through feeling lonely in the past seven days, around 7.4m people across Great Britain. We refer to this group as “lockdown lonely”. If we adjusted this to be representative of the entire Great British population this would be equivalent to 14.3%.

We investigated measures of loneliness from a range of sources to see whether people are more or less lonely since the lockdown began, and who is most affected. We found that while reported estimates vary between surveys because of differences in wording or in how the survey was completed, chronic loneliness does not seem to have changed significantly as a result of lockdown.

People experiencing chronic loneliness or “lockdown loneliness” were also likely to score less well on three of the key measures used to measure wellbeing (ie, happiness), as this chart shows.

Relationship between loneliness and wellbeing
Relationship between loneliness and wellbeing Photograph: ONS

Updated

The empty plinth in Bristol this morning where the statue of Edward Colston stood until yesterday.
The empty plinth in Bristol this morning where the statue of Edward Colston stood until yesterday. Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA

Starmer's LBC phone-in - Summary and analysis

As Labour leader, at PMQs and elsewhere, Sir Keir Starmer seems to be adopting a strategy of presenting himself as Westminster’s responsible adult, or designated driver – the leader offering mainstream, sensible, evidence-based politics. He may be a disappointment to anyone yearning for some Corbynite passion and radicalism, but even supporters of Boris Johnson’s government would have to admit that gravitas, experience and competence have not been its defining characteristics, and so Starmer has arguable spotted a gap in the market. In this, his first LBC phone-in, he was at it again – repeatedly stressing his desire for consensus and cooperation. He was strikingly non-partisan.

He also sounded very different from his predecessor. During the Labour leadership contest he mostly played down the obvious differences between his politics and Jeremy Corbyn’s. But the gap between them is considerable, as was well demonstrated by what Starmer said about the toppling of the Edward Colston statue in Bristol. It is hard to imagine Corbyn describing what happened as “completely wrong”.

Here are the main points.

  • Starmer said that, although the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol should have been removed years go, the manner in which it was pulled down was “completely wrong”. Asked for his reaction to what happened yesterday, Starmer said:

It shouldn’t be done in that way. Completely wrong to pull a statue down like that.

But, stepping back, that statue should have been taken down a long, long time ago. You can’t, in 21st-century Britain, have a slaver on a statue.

A statue is there to honour people. And you can’t have that in 21st-century Britain. That statue should have been brought down properly with consent and put, I would say, in a museum.

This was a man who was responsible for 100,000 people being moved from Africa to the Caribbean as slaves, including women and children who were branded on their chests with the name of the company that he ran. Of the 100,000, 20,000 died en route and they were chucked in the sea.

  • He defended the decision of the police in Bristol not to intervene. He said:

I was very struck by Superintendent Andy Bennett, who was the police officer, the superintendent, on the ground who judged the situation. And he said he was really disappointed by the vandalism and the bringing down of the statue. But he didn’t think it was the right thing to intervene, because it might make the situation worse.

  • He said the Labour MP Barry Gardiner was wrong to attend a Black Lives Matter rally, in breach of social distancing guidelines. Asked about this, he said Gardiner was “wrong to do it” and that MPs had to lead by example.
  • Starmer suggested that the government’s 14-day quarantine scheme for new arrivals at airports should be replaced with a testing system for people coming to the country.
  • He said the government’s furlough system should be made more flexible, with increased support for workers in particular sectors.
  • He said he considered “the leave/remain divide is over”.
  • He refused to back calls for the post-Brexit transition to be extended. But he said he wanted to avoid a no deal.
Keir Starmer on LBC.
Keir Starmer on LBC. Photograph: LBC

Updated

International travellers arriving in Scotland will face fines of up to £480 or prosecution for failing to meet new rules on self-quarantine and location reporting being introduced today.

The measures, introduced by the Scottish government to match similar rules announced for England last month, are less punitive than those for travellers arriving at English airports, ports and train stations.

All overseas travellers from outside the common travel area with Ireland, the Channel Islands and Isle of Man whose destination is in Scotland will be expected to fill out an online form stating where they will self-isolate for 14 days.

Under regulations being introduced in the Scottish parliament today, failing or refusing to fill out that form will incur a fixed penalty of £60 from the Border Force rising to £480 for persistent refusals, while breaching the quarantine will result in a £480 fine. Persistent breaches could lead to prosecution and a maximum fine of £5,000.

In England and Northern Ireland, the first fine for failing to provide a self-quarantine address is £100 rising to £1,000 for those who fail to self-isolate. In England, the maximum penalty for breaching the quarantine is £10,000.

There are no commercial flights operating from Welsh airports, and the Welsh government refers international travellers to the UK government’s regulations.

Humza Yousaf, the Scottish justice secretary, said the lower fines reflected Scotland’s different legal system, which required fines above £500 to follow prosecution by a procurator fiscal rather than be issued by police.

The Scottish tourism industry has, alongside airlines, protested vigorously against the proposed regulations, arguing it will damage tourism and the recovery of their businesses. Nicola Sturgeon said last week her government had been checking its rules were compatible with European human rights legislation before introducing them.

Yousaf said:

We are, as a country and across the world, continuing to deal with unprecedented challenges that this pandemic brings. These public health measures will play an important part in helping to prevent further spread of the disease.

These steps are aimed at protecting people and ensuring that we limit spread when our own infection rates are falling. However, they are temporary and will not be in place any longer than deemed necessary to protect public health – as such, they will be reviewed after three weeks.

Humza Yousaf.
Humza Yousaf. Photograph: Fraser Bremner/Scottish Daily Mail/PA

Updated

Q: You supported Jeremy Corbyn, and did not stand up for the Jewish community when he was Labour leader?

Starmer says he reached out to the Jewish community as soon as he became leader.

He is asking them to give him the space.

I will kick antisemites out of the Labour party.

Q: And you are not opposed to the Equality and Human Rights Commission investigation into Labour?

No, says Starmer. He says he campaigned to set the EHRC up. He will read the report and implement its recommendations.

Q: Are you called Keir after Keir Hardie (one of the Labour party founders)?

Yes, says Starmer. But he says he cannot take credit for that; it was not his decision.

And that’s it. The phone-in is over.

I will post a summary soon.

Updated

Q: What is your policy on Europe now?

Starmer starts by saying he is determined to root out antisemitism in Labour. (The caller mentioned that she is Jewish.)

He says the UK has left the EU. “The leave/remain divide is over,” he says. He says the issue now is what the UK’s relationship must be with the EU.

Q: Do you want the transition to be extended?

Starmer says the government says it can get a deal. Labour will hold them to that.

Q: Sadiq Khan says there should be an extension.

Starmer repeats the point about holding the government to account. It is important to avoid no deal.

Q: So if we were facing no deal, you would extend?

Starmer says Labour lost the election. It cannot decide this now.

Updated

Q: How did you feel when you saw the video of George Floyd being killed?

Starmer says he was “genuinely shocked”. It was chilling, particularly the sight of the police officer apparently unmoved by what was happening.

Q: What has happened to your constructive approach to the government? I’m not seeing it.

Starmer says he is trying to be constructive.

He urges people to follow the government guidance. He is not seeking to undermine it at all.

Labour has not been voting against the government on this.

But he has also been pointing out areas where the government has got it wrong, such as on PPE, he says.

He says he will continue to support the government where he can. In a crisis people do not want to see the opposition opposing the government for the sake of it.

On Sunday trading, he says Labour will consider whether to back plans to relax Sunday trading laws. But he says that is not necessarily a Labour/Tory split.

Q: What would Labour do for people who are shielding?

Starmer says he supports extending the furlough system for workers who have to shield.

The furlough system has been welcome, he says.

But he says it now needs to be made more flexible.

And he says the cut-off date of 10 June (the final date for new applications) should not apply to anyone who subsequently gets told they need to shield.

Starmer says he has tried to cooperate with the government on getting pupils back to school. But the government has not welcomed his offer, he says.

He says parents need reassurance. But he says he thinks children can go back to school safely.

Starmer says Colston statue should have been removed years ago, but pulling it down yesterday 'completely wrong'

Q: What do you think of the decision to pull down the statue of the slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol?

Starmer says that “should not have been done in that way”. Removing the statue like that was “completely wrong”, he says.

But he says the statue should have been removed “a long, long time ago”.

He refuses to criticise the police for not intervening, saying it was up to the commander on the ground to judge what action was best.

Updated

Q: Should the Labour MP Barry Gardiner have attended a Black Lives Matter protest, flouting social distancing laws?

No, says Starmer. He says MPs should follow the guidance.

Q: If you were in power, what would you be doing to help the aviation industry?

Starmer says he backs the furlough scheme, but it should be made flexible, sector by sector.

He says he is constructive with the government. He wants to support them where possible.

But they make it difficult, he says.

He says the government did not introduce a quarantine system earlier.

But now they are doing it late.

And he says there are reports saying it is unworkable.

He says he supports some measures. But there is “a lot of inconsistency”.

Q: So what does Labour want?

Starmer says it would be better to test people on arrival.

But he says Labour has to choose in parliament between backing the quarantine system, and opposing it altogether. If they voted against it, there would be nothing in place. He does not favour that.

Q: But how would testing on arrival work? There is not enough capacity.

Starmer says that is a problem Labour has highlighted.

But he suggests that people should be tested, with results produced within 24 hours. He questions whether that would be worse than the government’s system.

Updated

Q: Black people are not treated fairly in the criminal justice system. What would you do about that?

Starmer says he ran the CPS for five years. There is no doubt that there is a problem. David Lammy, who is now shadow justice secretary, did a report for the government on this. Some of his recommendations have not been implemented.

Q: What were they?

Starmer says Lammy proposed much better training. And training is important too, he says. He says some of this is unconscious.

Q: So do we have to wait for the next election?

No, says Starmer.

He says this should be a cross-party initiative. He says this is not the sort of change that should be reversed when a new government comes in.

Q: Should officers take the knee at these protests?

The caller (a police officer) says it would depend on the context. Not if the protest were violent.

Starmer says he agrees.

Keir Starmer's LBC phone-in

Sir Keir Starmer is starting the first of what will be a monthly phone-in on LBC. Nick Ferrari is presenting.

Asked how much of a challenge it has been taking over as Labour leader, Starmer says the lockdown has made it unusual. He gave his acceptance speech from his living room, he says.

Trust is everything, he says. He says he wants to listen - which is partly why he is doing the phone-in.

Updated

Agenda for the day

Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, taking over from Matthew Weaver.

Here is the agenda for what’s coming up.

9am: Sir Keir Starmer hosts his new LBC phone-in.

9.30am: The Office for National Statistics releases figures relating to loneliness during the pandemic.

12pm: Downing Street lobby briefing.

12.30pm: The Scottish and Welsh governments are due to hold their daily government briefings.

2.30pm: Priti Patel, the home secretary, is due to take questions in the Commons.

2.45pm: Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, gives evidence to the Commons procedure committee about Commons sitting arrangements post-coronavirus.

After 3.30pm: MPs hold an emergency debate on the abolition of remote voting.

5pm: The UK government holds its daily briefing.

Updated

Malthouse also defended the controversial new quarantine rules for travellers.

It’s clear from the science that we have a low infection rate it’s even more important that you don’t take the risk of reintroducing Covid-19.

Asked to produce evidence that science backs the measures, Malthouse said:

My understanding is that that that’s been part of the Sage considerations … I’m not a scientist but my understanding is that the science tells us that when our infection rate is low, that is the time at which you want to press home your advantage.

Malthouse said it was important the quarantine rules were clear even if it meant forcing travellers from countries such as New Zealand, where there is no coronavirus, into 14 days’ quarantine in the UK.

He said: “It’s very important that we don’t take any risks about reintroducing new infection from overseas.”

Updated

Policing minister says people may be prosecuted over tearing down of Colston statue

The policing minister, Kit Malthouse, has condemned the tearing down of the statue of the slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol.

Asked on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme whether the protesters’ actions were right or wrong, Malthouse said:

It was wrong and it was an act of criminal damage, and no doubt there will be a police investigation and prosecutions may follow. The argument about whether he should be there, memorialised in a statue, is separate from whether we allow groups of people just to go about doing as they wish. I know it’s been a source of significant debate in the city for some time. But we can’t condone these kinds of acts of criminal damage and vandalism and it shouldn’t have happened.

We have many statues across the United Kingdom, with figures from history who have good and bad attached to them. We can’t just have a kind of arbitrary rule about who should or shouldn’t go up, well, that’s the point.

Earlier, he told BBC Breakfast: “What we can’t have is mobs just turning up and deciding to do whatever they feel like against the law.”

Malthouse stopped short of condemning Avon and Somerset police for failing to intervene to protect the statue. He told Today the force faced a “difficult decision”.

He added: “No doubt there will be a postmortem of the public order situation in Bristol and indeed elsewhere in the country to make sure that lessons can be learned.”

Updated

Lucy Moreton, professional officer at the Immigration Services Union, said Border Force staff were angered at the “shambolic” way the new quarantine rules had been implemented.

She told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that technical papers explaining to staff what to check for only arrived on Friday and were still not available to those operating on the front line of the devolved administrations.

Moreton said:

The staff are really angry that this does appear to be very shambolic and they don’t want to be blamed for that.

She added that there was “no provision to check the address” that arrivals had given for where they would self-isolate and that the system was built on “trust”.

Updated

The shadow chancellor, Anneliese Dodds, has said the country “is crying out for a leader that will seek to unite communities” in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests.

Speaking on BBC Breakfast, she said: “People are hurting so please let’s seek to heal those divisions and unite people and then move forward as a country.”

Commenting on protesters pulling down the statue of the slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol, she said

Vandalism is not acceptable but let’s look into why that happened. People had called for many years for that statue to be removed.

It was a visible symbol of slavery, nothing had happened so I will never condone vandalism but really we need to understand why that action was taken and try and do something about the discrimination that so many people in our society still feel and is very, very visible.

Discussing the controversy over the statue of colonialist Cecil Rhodes in her Oxford East constituency, Dodds said:

We have had a number of changes in the city over visible symbols of colonialism, we have had a lot of changes in our museums to recognise that and I think they have been very productive changes.

They have led to a lot more people in the city understanding far better that appalling history of slavery and oppression.

Dodds refused to say definitively whether the Rhodes statue should be removed. She said:

My view is that it staying where it is without any other symbol there that would highlight what occurred during those awful times is not helpful.”

Some people want an opposing symbol there, you have others who want it to be removed – for me the critical thing is to listen to the black community within Oxford and those who are directly impacted by this.

I am not going to seek to speak for them, I don’t think that would be helpful.

Campaigners in Oxford want a statue of the British imperialist Cecil Rhodes to be removed
Campaigners in Oxford want a statue of the British imperialist Cecil Rhodes to be removed. Photograph: Martin Godwin/The Guardian

Updated

New quarantine rules will cause 'untold devastation' to tourism industry, says Ryanair boss

Travellers arriving in Britain will face 14 days in quarantine from today to prevent a second coronavirus outbreak
Travellers arriving in Britain will face 14 days in quarantine from today to prevent a second coronavirus outbreak Photograph: Tolga Akmen/AFP/Getty Images

Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary has warned that the new travel quarantine rules that come into force today will cause “untold devastation” for the country’s tourism industry.

He told BBC Radio’s 4’s Today programme:

What it is going to do is untold devastation, not just to the airlines but to British tourism. The thousands of hotels, the thousands of visitor attractions, restaurants in the next couple of months – July and August are the two key months for British tourism in the tourism industry.

We’re facing thousands of jobs losses because of a stupid, ineffective quarantine.

He said Ryanair bookings were down about 50% on the same time last year but that outbound flights remained popular compared with inbound journeys, with European travellers being put off coming to the UK due to the restrictions to self-isolate for 14 days upon arrival.

Updated

Minister: protests threatened collective health

Kit Malthouse, the minister for crime and policing, said protests over the weekend breach lockdown rules.

Speaking on BBC Breakfast he said:

We would point out to people that it is in contravention of the regulations to show up on these demonstrations and it does breach our individual responsibility towards our collective health.

Asked if the lockdown regulations were now in ruins, Malthouse said:

No I don’t think so. It’s worth remembering that the vast majority of the 65 million people in this country have been extremely compliant with the regulations.

Feelings were running very high following that appalling event in the United States, and so I can understand why people might feel the need to come out onto the streets and express their frustration, anger about that event, and possibly wider issues, but we would stress to people that we do have to obey the rules.

We have an individual duty towards our collective health and we have to restore that sense now, at this critical moment in our battle against this virus, just as we are starting to win. We can’t see the infection rate rise again.

Asked why most police officers were not wearing face masks, Malthouse said:

It’s for individual officers to make a dynamic risk assessment themselves about the posture they take, and about what they use the PPE. Obviously on that particular occasion officers decided, given the distance, between them and the crowds, certainly initially, that they didn’t require a face mask.

Updated

The home secretary, Priti Patel, said the “scenes of lawlessness” during anti-racist protests over the weekend were “completely unacceptable”.

Writing in the Telegraph she says:

The police have our full support in tackling any violence, vandalism or disorderly behaviour.

There is no excuse for throwing bikes at police horses and attacking officers. I’m sure that many of those who protested peacefully will feel just as angry and frustrated by this thuggish behaviour, which does nothing but undermine their cause.

Patel is due to answer questions in the Commons from around 2.30pm, according to Politico.

The Police Federation, which represents all officers in England and Wales, has criticised Avon and Somerset police for its decision not to intervene in a protest in Bristol where a statue of a slave trader was torn down.

John Apter, the federation’s chairman, told BBC Breakfast:

To have no police presence there I think sent quite a negative message. I understand there has been a lot of controversy about this statue for many years – so the question is why didn’t those in the local authority consider taking it down long before rather than waiting for these actions?

I am a police officer so I don’t support this lawlessness we saw where this statue was ripped down and rolled down the street and pushed into the river because that is not how we do things.

I understand the anger but not to have a police presence there was something – I have been a police officer for 27 years – that was a decision I have not seen taken before.

Updated

Marvin Rees, the Labour mayor of Bristol, said he felt no “sense of loss” after the city’s statue to slave trader Edward Colston was pulled down during racial equality protests.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, he said:

As an elected politician, obviously I cannot condone the damage and I am very concerned about the implications of a mass gathering on the possibility of a second Covid wave.

But I am of Jamaican heritage and I cannot pretend that I have any real sense of loss for the statue and I cannot pretend it was anything other than a personal affront to me to have it in the middle of Bristol, the city in which I grew up.

Asked whether he wanted to see those involved with removing the statue charged, Rees added:

That is up to the criminal justice system. I don’t really intervene in criminal matters like that - that’s not for me to go and be a cheerleader to the police in any criminal investigations.

Rees warned that it would take more than the removal of a controversial statue to tackle racism that was “stitched into the system”.

Updated

Boris Johnson says anti-racist protests were 'subverted by thuggery'

Welcome to our UK coronavirus live blog with all the latest on the pandemic and the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter protests.

Boris Johnson, has claimed anti racist protests over the weekend were “subverted by thuggery”. Speaking after some protesters clashed with police in London, the prime minister said people had the right to protest but he suggested that engaging in violence was a “betrayal” of the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Metropolitan police’s superintendent, Jo Edwards, said the “scenes of violence and disorder” were “entirely unacceptable”.

Meanwhile, controversial quarantine rules for new arrivals come into force today as Britain’s three biggest airlines begin a challenge against the measures.

And there is a report in the FT that the government is planning to allow pubs and restaurants to serve customers outside from 22 June.

Updated

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