Toxic is one of those long established words that have gained much traction in the 21st Century. Traditionally it referred to materials that were dangerous and injurious to animal and/or human health. Nowadays one is likely to hear it applied to describe an undesirable state of affairs where the reputation of a person or an organisation is called into question in a negative sense.
The BBC reported today upon the Unfortunate Antoinette Sandbach, Mrs Matthew Sherratt (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66648763) who much to her chagrin became one of the subjects of research by a certain Mr Malik Al Nasir Mr Al Nasir, a poet and an author, who has researched his family’s links to the transatlantic slave trade and has discovered that Mrs Sherratt is a descendant of a Mr Samuel Sandbach, a Liverpool merchant with interests in plantations in the West Indies.
Mrs Sherratt is most upset and insists that there is no public interest in identifying her as his descendant.
I would agree, but as a former politician Mrs Sherratt will know that what is of interest to the public is not necessarily in the public interest!
Mrs Sherratt is comfortably off and appears to have assets that have been handed down for generations in one form or another. Thus it is a racing certainty that the unfortunate Mrs Sherratt will find herself facing calls for “reparations” from members of certain “communities”!
Mrs Sherratt of course is not the only victim and depressingly will only be one of many people who will be targeted by reparations activists.
The main target of course of these activists will be HMG! We as UK taxpayers are already being faced with calls for over £18 trillion (https://youtu.be/uGkakhzWj1c?si=nTdCACU5THvVF701)!
Nothing will happen this side of a general election, but I do not doubt that the wokeists in the Labour Party (that constitutes a majority of them!) will call for a reparations tax to be applied on certain historial assets. To avoid making the link to slavery too blatant a Labour Chancellor might well call it the “Historial Assets Tax” or HAT for short. It is likely to take the form of a wealth tax applied on an annual basis and the contributions ring fenced to contribute to a specific fund to assist Caribbean nations and Caribbean communities.
This of course will be a highly political tax as it will be taking money from those least likely to vote Labour and hand it to those most likely to vote Labour! The USA has a term for this; “pork barrel politics”!
The reason why this will be so toxic an issue will be that many disadvantaged communities who are not of Caribbean heritage will feel that they are being discriminated against. This will apply particularly to poor white working class communities. Being told that they benefit from “white privilege” will not help!
Were this the only piece of anti-white woke discrimination imposed upon the indigenous population by Labour it would be bad enough but this will be accompanied by a raft of others. Not only that but Labour’s obsession with achieving “Net Zero” – that exceeds that of the Tories by a comfortable margin – can only serve to exacerbate the situation!
The reason why this is so serious is that it will inevitably create a backlash.
The Unfortunate Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London and Member for Tooting is experiencing this with his extension of ULEZ.
The Unfortunate Khan’s woes have caused Sir Kier Starmer to worry about Labour’s prospects. Well, Sir Kier’s worries are well founded for what the Unfortunate Khan’s actions have demonstrated is that ordinary folk need their cars and get very angry when their mobility is threatened! Achieving Net Zero means depriving all but the well to do of their motor cars! Achieving “Net Zero” in 2050 will mean reducing private car ownership to 1950 levels!
This is NOT a policy that will bring votes for those who introduce and support it!