Another Pointless Apology
It says something about our society that there are regular demands for apologies for historic wrongs. The latest involves children sent to Australia and Canada during the 20th Century.
Gordon Brown is planning to apologise for the UK’s role in sending thousands of its children to former colonies in the 20th century, the BBC has learned.
Under the Child Migrants Programme – which ended just 40 years ago – poor children were sent to a “better life” in Australia, Canada and elsewhere.
But many were abused and ended up in institutions or as labourers on farms.
The move comes as Australia’s Prime Minister prepares to apologise for the mistreatment of the children.
Here we go again. We’ve already had this over the slavery issue and now another group wants a meaningless apology. This practise ended forty years ago. How old was Gordon Brown then? Was he in government? The answers being that he was a teenager when this finished and he was not in government. Therefore, he has no right to apologise and neither has Kevin Rudd as neither of them was involved in the offence. An apology, to mean anything at all, must be proffered by the person or people who caused the original harm. You cannot apologise by proxy. To do so is empty gesturing. But, then, gesture politics is in vogue at the moment.
In a letter to the chairman of the Health Select Committee this weekend, Gordon Brown said “the time is now right” for the UK government to apologise for the actions of previous governments.
No. You do not have the right to apologise for the actions of previous governments. Only they have that right. There is something deeply disturbing about this hair-shirt-wearing, self-flagellating desire to proffer sanctimonious apologies for the sins of previous generations. Grow up and grow a spine.
What happened to these children was appalling, but it is the fault of neither Gordon Brown nor Kevin Rudd and they have no right to apologise for it and nor should they. As for those who demand one, well, it’s a bit late for that. The time to do so was when the perpetrators were around to take responsibility. Stop wallowing in a past that cannot be changed and harbouring resentment over the actions of people who are either dead or in their dotage and move on.
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