The Labour leader Sir Kier Starmer has attempted to place some ground between himself and the Black Lives Matter movement. When asked on the BBC yesterday morning about BLM’s aims to defund the police force Sir Kier said “ That’s nonsense and nobody should be saying anything about defunding the police. I would have no truck with that”.
This is the first time that Sir Keir, the former director of public prosecutions, has been publicly critical of the movement. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has yet to address the BLM group in the same way. This has led to the Brexit Party leader to say, via twitter “Heartily agree with @Keir_Starmer’s condemnation of the Black Lives Matter organisation”. In a more controversial opinion, Mr Farage followed this up with “Is Starmer now more Conservative than Boris, who does not have the moral courage to condemn the anti-police marxists?”.
These developments represent a significant u-turn by Starmer, who on June the 9th posted a picture of him kneeling accompanied by the hashtag, Black Lives Matter. Sir Keir has also received criticism for the BLM UK movement who, following his comments took to Twitter to say “As a public prosecutor, Sir Keir Starmer was a cop in an expensive suit. While black people are now incarcerated at the same rate as African Americans, the prison population in Britain has almost doubled since the 1980s. This has affected all working-class people in Britain”.
The statement went on to say: “The expansion of police and prison power has not made our communities safer. We can no longer allow governments from any party to police or imprison away social problems. Neither can we allow former Prosecutors to tell us what our demands should be”.
This presents itself as a story that is far from being finished, with some anticipating problems within the Labour party for Sir Kier from those who disagree with him. UNN’s Oliver Down will certainly be tracking this story.
Current Affairs Correspondent | My name is Oliver Down I am 22, and a staunch brexiteer. I am a Bristolian lad who studied politics in Leicester. I believe in free speech and accurate journalism and I won’t be afraid to give you “the other side” of the story!
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