PM tells anti-Captain James Cook statue crusaders to ‘get a grip: Cook was no slave trader’

Scott Morrison says activists calling for the removal of Captain James Cook statues should pull their heads in: Cook ‘was no slave trader’.

Captain James Cook.

Scott Morrison has told people calling for the removal of Captain James Cook statues to pull their heads in and “get a grip”.

But the prime minister has drawn criticism for claiming Australia does not have a history of slavery.

International Black Lives Matter protests have led to the removal of many statues linked to slavery.

Asked whether he supported the removal of Captain Cook statues, Mr Morrison said: “Cook was no slave-trader.” “He was one of the most enlightened persons on these issues you could imagine,” he told 3AW radio on Thursday.

“Australia when it was founded as a settlement, as NSW, was on the basis that there’d be no slavery.

“It was a pretty brutal place, but there was no slavery in Australia.” However, Australia does have a history of forced labour and stolen wages of Aboriginal people, which lasted until the 1970s.

Labor’s indigenous affairs spokeswoman Linda Burney said Mr Morrison’s comments highlighted the importance of truth-telling.

“The prime minister’s comments demonstrate a need for a greater understanding and awareness of our nation’s history,” she told AAP.

“We cannot achieve meaningful progress on matters such as reconciliation if, as a nation, we are not aware of the historical context of the challenges we face in the present.

“One of the crucial elements of the Uluru Statement was a national process of truth-telling.” The prime minister said Australian protesters raised fair issues about indigenous prison rates and deaths in custody, but said the movement was being hijacked by radical left-wingers to push other causes.

“This is not a licence for people to just go nuts on this stuff,” Mr Morrison told 2GB radio.

‘Topple the Racists’

It comes after an activists site urging Britons to “Topple The Racists’’ identified Captain James Cook statues to be removed across the country.

Topple The Racists, linked to the “Stop Trump Coalition’’ and backing Black Lives Matter supporters, has listed more than 60 statues and monuments around Britain to follow in the ­destruction of the Bristol statue of 17th-­century slave trader and philanthropist Edward Colston, which was thrown into Bristol Harbour on Monday.

The Topple list includes a statue of Cook in the village of his boyhood home of Great Ayton in North Yorkshire.

“James Cook was a colonialist who murdered Maori people in their homeland,” the site says.

There are several British statues commemorating Cook’s exploration in the Pacific, including a large statue overlooking Whitby, where he learned his sea-crafting skills, and in The Mall, in London.

The momentum to destroy and remove historic statues, some many centuries old, has sparked fury in Britain, with commentators saying it was rewriting history and that the achievements of those honoured was not being viewed in the context of their time, and pointing out that many statues being targeted didn’t have anything to do with slavery.

London mayor Sadiq Khan said London had to face an uncomfortable truth about its links to slavery and all London statues and streets would be reviewed; any with slavery connections should be taken down.

This week, a statue of slaveholder Robert Milligan, who owned plantations and more than 500 slaves in Jamaica, was removed from outside the Museum of London Docklands.

On Tuesday, Black Lives Matter supporters chanted “Rhodes, you’re next’’ after gathering outside Oriel college at Oxford University to demand the Cecil Rhodes monument be removed.

Demonstrators demand the removal of the Rhodes statue at Oxford University’s Oriel College. Picture: Getty Images

Others on the Topple The Racists hit list includes monuments of Sir Francis Drake at Plymouth, Sir Robert Peel, Christopher Columbus, Horatio Nelson, William Gladstone and Oliver Cromwell.

The Topple The Racists site said of Peel: “He was pivotal in setting up the police forces which maintained British rule in Ireland and a system which led to the poverty, famine and displacement of Irish people.

“Colonialism and racism — in this case anti-Catholic sentiment — are central to British history. Not only that but with the legitimacy of current policing in question, the history of policing, its origins in colonialism and its role in suppressing dissent deserves greater scrutiny.’’

The Cecil John Rhodes statue at the University of Oxford’s Oriel College. Picture: Getty Images

The activists say that sea captain­ Drake should be remembered not for his discoveries but for his contribution to the slave trade with cousin John Hawkins.

They said he attacked native villages and stole human cargo from Portuguese slave ships, transporting the slaves to the Spanish Caribbean.

Oxford University law student Ndjodi Ndeunyema, a former Rhodes scholar, organised the ­Oxford rally on Tuesday after starting the “Rhodes Must Fall” campaign five years ago.

“The glorification of him through his statue remaining here is an affront on the university’s support for movements such as Black Lives Matter,” Mr Ndeun­yema said. “Rhodes is not worthy of veneration or glorification because­ of the racism and sub­jugation he represents.”

Those protesting also knelt in respect of black man George Floyd, who was killed by a white policeman, sparking two weeks of protests across the US and in several other countries, including Australia.