There has been recently one of the periodic demands that the United Kingdom make reparations for slavery. These clickbait demands make headlines and are used by those who wish to aggrandise themselves and raise their public profile.

But there’s a catch. Britain has already paid. The UK bought the freedom of the slaves that were held as of 1833 to the tune of 40% of the UK national budget at the time. Yes, I recognise that this money went to those who had held slaves, but it was the only way to even make a start on ridding those parts of the world where Britain had influence of slavery. The Governments of the day could not wade in and seize the human property of the slave owners as this would have likely made a contentious social and political problem, that of the conflict between those in favour of slavery and the abolitionists even worse than it was. We might even have ended up with the sort of civil conflict that the USA saw over slavery being played out not just on the streets of British towns and cities but in places across the Empire. As a side note, a policy of seizure without compensation might also have made the UK into one of those countries where private property was not secure and could be seized by the government at any moment, something that is almost guaranteed to make investors nervous about putting money into the UK.

I don’t believe that the Governments in 19th century Britain had much choice but to compensate the slave owners if slavery was to be abolished and abolished without civil and political strife. This debt was so onerous that the final payments were made on this debt in 2015.

Britain paid financially not just in compensation to slave owners but in a rise in the cost of sugar from Empire sources as free workers cost more than enslaved ones. Because of the rise in costs Empire producers ended up being undercut by sugar producers outside of the UK’s sphere of influence producing sugar at lower cost by other nations who were still using slave labour.

Aside from the financial cost that Britain imposed on itself by suppressing the slave trade there was the human cost paid by Royal Navy sailors who were tasked with suppressing the trade in slaves. According to the UK Ministry of Defence, the sailors of the West Africa Squadron, which was in operation for 60 years, suffered horribly in the fight against slavery. 17,000 Royal Navy sailors lost their lives either directly because of the conflict, through drowning and from the terrible diseases found in Africa that the Europeans had no resistance to.

When I look at the history of Britain’s decision to abandon the slave trade and to use both military and diplomatic means to suppress this terrible trade, I do not see a nation that needs to cough up money we don’t have to those whose ancestors were enslaved. What I do see however is a nation that although was originally heavily involved with the slave trade, had a social, moral and political epiphany and turned towards abolition.

As far as I’m concerned when it comes to the abolition of slavery the United Kingdom has already paid up for that task. Britain paid with the lives of its sailors, paid financially by buying the freedom of those enslaved and paid with the economic disadvantages that the abolition of slavery caused.

Of course slavery is an abomination and I fully accept that the UK, like nations and societies since the dawn of civilisation has played its part in it. But it should never be forgotten that it was Britain that turned against this practise and went hell for leather to stop it. We should tell those who demand ‘reparations’ of slavery to sod off as Britain and the ancestors of modern Britons have already paid that massive price for abolition in full.