Honours Committee set to eliminate the word ‘Empire’ from the honours and awards, reports suggest

Reports are emerging that members of the honours committee are set to eliminate the word ‘Empire’ from the OBE as well as MBE awards. This potential move comes after the Black Lives Matter movement bringing up the titles’ links to slavery. The awards are given by ‘The Order of the British Empire’ recognises contributions to the UK across the sections of arts and sciences, charity, public service as well as the military.

A senior source from within the Commons honours committee has confirmed that the recent BLM protests have reignited the debate about the Empire’s association with brutality and slavery. The source has said ‘This has been a live issue for some time but there has been heightened discussion about it among members of the committee since the protests. Some members favour the removal of the word “empire” from the existing honours, but others would prefer the introduction of a new medal that better reflects a more diverse 21st-century Britain’. 

The source did add that the change is currently ‘only under discussion’ but that it is a very real possibility that a full government review could be commissioned. This isn’t the first time that this has been mentioned. Earlier this year, while campaigning to become Labour leader, Lisa Nandy advocated that the word ‘Empire’ be swapped for the word ‘Excellence’. 

The Conservative MP Ben Bradley has offered his thoughts on these developments via Twitter. He said “Let me get in early here and say that Government should absolutely 100% IGNORE calls from this ‘source’ to review the use of the word Empire on our honours system. We should not apologise for our country’s past and we shouldn’t seek to erase it either!”. 

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