‘I saw my brothers and I saw my son’: Alison Hammond shares emotional response to George Floyd death

‘It hurt me to the pit of my stomach to think that this is 2020 and we are seeing that’

Alison Hammond emotionally spoke about her support for the Black Lives Matter movement while appearing on This Morning.

The TV presenter phoned into the daily ITV show to discuss her emotional reaction to the death of George Floyd, which has sparked protests across America after a police officer knelt on his neck.

“Firstly, I am a mother of a 15-year-old black boy,” Hammond told presenters Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield. “When I saw that image of George Floyd, I saw my brothers, I saw my father and I saw my son, I saw everybody’s son and I was disgusted to my core.

“It hurt me to the pit of my stomach to think that this is 2020 and we are seeing that. Let’s be honest, this has been going on forever. My whole life, my mum’s life, my father’s life, everybody’s life.”

She continued: “I believe this movement, Black Lives Matter, is so very important and it’s so wonderful when I see my white, my Asian brothers and sisters standing by Black Lives Matter it means they understand. They can’t understand fully but they understand what we are going through as black people.

Addressing “all lives matter” counter-protesters, Hammond explained: “And don’t get offended when I say black people, I am not trying to offend white people. If you are offended by it then you need to look within yourself, appeal to your basic instinct of goodness.

“It’s not about ‘all lives matter’, obviously we know that, it’s all about the fact that if black lives mattered then we wouldn’t be in this situation. When black lives matter, then all lives will matter.”