#BTColumn – UK PM backs Day of Hope

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by this author are their own and do not represent the official position of the Barbados Today.

by Vincent “Boo” Nurse

November 27, 2020 marked the 20th anniversary of the brutal slaying of 10-year-old Damilola Taylor in Peckham, South London.

The Nigerian-born Black school boy was stabbed by two of his peers who subsequently were convicted of manslaughter.

The lawless and apparently unprovoked slaughter occurred in the well of the stairs in the block of flats where Damilola lived. The action of those thugs touched the heart of the entire nation.

Since then, the date of Damilola’s death has been a signal for his father and others to remind the community of the agony that is visited upon friends and relatives when one of their own is suddenly and brutally taken away because of the senseless and violent acts of young Black men on the streets of London.

Damilola would have been 31 a few days ago, and Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson visited Peckham to lend support to the Taylor family, their friends and supporters who gathered in pained memory of that fateful event.

In a moving address, the Prime Minister announced that December 7th should be enshrined into the calendar as a National Day of Hope to honour the life of the fallen Damilola.

Mr Johnson addressed the subject of knife crime on the streets of the UK and especially London, fully.

He is to be commended for his open admission that successive governments have not effectively dealt with this crime.

Writing in the UK Sun newspaper, he said that governments have failed to learn from Damilola’s death.

The murder of Damilola seemed to spark an escalation in the number of Black teenagers who were knifed to death on the streets of London.

Sadly, many of the incidents were seen to have been committed by other young Black men. They (murders) have increased year-on-year since 2000.

The Prime Minister accepts that the problem of knife crime goes further than lawlessness with young men, idle and compliant in the general use of drugs.

It is an interesting departure from the views of many hardliners, both Black and White, who believe in the ‘hang em and flog em’ methods of correction.

He said: “You cannot beat this problem just by locking people up. We need to change the lives of the young people who are being sucked into this world and who become the victims of this culture of violence.”

Mr Johnson would appear tacitly to disagree with the generally stated views of the London Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick who champions the full use of ‘stop and search’ which would ultimately lead to the arrest and detention of many young Black men and by implied extension, go a long way to solve the problem.

Whatever the colour of your political rosette, one is inclined to agree with the Prime Minister that solving the problem is not a simple matter.

His admission that first we must change the lives of the many who daily have little to look forward to is commendable.

However, lest he was to forget, he must constantly be reminded that the reigns of government and power to act are firmly
in his hands.

COVID-19 has served to drive knife crime, particularly in the Black community in London from headline news. But the problem is still with us.

Only a few weeks ago, a young mother and her three-year-old child were stabbed to death, and more recently, a 15-year-old boy was murdered in London apparently because he tried to resist thugs who attempted to steal his mobile phone.

These atrocities, although numbing in the effect on the victims’ relatives, appear now to be ignored by the general public and are treated individually as another killing that will quickly fade from the conscious minds of the public as a seven-day news event.

Perhaps minds are fixed on COVID-19, its implications, and where do we go after; hopefully, we return to normal practices.

However, sadly, one feels that unless steps are taken to improve the lives of the young and deprived members of the inner cities of the UK which are heavily populated by Black men, it will be business as usual on the other side of this pandemic.

Richard Taylor, Damilola’s dad, has from the early days after his son’s death campaigned tirelessly to have measures put in place where there would be many attractions to engage the minds and aspirations of young Black men and women in the community as they seek to move away from the drudgery of some of the inner-city areas of this country.

Twenty years later, neither Mr Taylor’s head nor his will have buckled under the grief that plainly still fills his heart.

Mr Taylor said: “I wish that we could pretend that we had driven knife crime off the streets of London and other cities.”

As I look back on the past 20 years that have seen the many stabbings and murders of young Black people on the streets of London, I wonder if it will ever end.

The lives of many who held ambitions to be professionals, like Damilola who dreamed to be a doctor, have expired in inexplicable and wanton acts of violence.

Heaven only knows what loss there has been to our community.

Vincent “Boo” Nurse is a Barbadian living in London who is a retired land Revenue Manager, Pensions and Investment Adviser. He is passionate about the development of his island home and disapora.