Coronavirus: Government accused of using ‘racist policy’ to drive black people back to work during pandemic

Minister rejects accusation, says UK ‘one of the best countries in the world to be a black person’

The government has been accused in the House of Commons of using a “racist policy” to drive black people back to work during the coronavirus outbreak.

The SNP’s Alison Thewliss made the allegation as MPs debated the recent report on the causes behind the higher rate of Covid-19 deaths among black and minority ethnic (Bame) communities.

But equalities minister Kemi Badenoch accused her of “confected outrage” and declared that Britain is “one of the best countries in the world to be a black person”.

Ms Thewliss told the Commons that Bame people were being denied the chance to stay home to protect their health during the pandemic because of the government’s “no recourse to public funds” policy, which bars many migrants from receiving welfare benefits.

Boris Johnson last week agreed to “look at” the rule after apparently being unaware of it during a grilling by MPs, but made clear at Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday that he was not planning to reform it.

Ms Thewliss told the Commons: “It is one thing to say ‘black lives matter’, but quite another to force black people and people from Bame backgrounds out to work because they have no choice whether they go to work because they have no recourse to public funds.

“No recourse to public funds is a racist policy. Will she abolish it?”

Ms Badenoch – who is herself of Nigerian background, but was born in the UK – retorted: “It is wrong to conflate all black people with recent migrants… I’m a black woman who is out at work.”

To an angry response from the opposition benches, she accused the SNP MP of inflaming racial tensions for the sake of publicity.

“It is wrong to conflate different issues and merge them into one just so you can get traction in the press,” said Ms Badenoch.

“It’s not right for us to use confected outrage. We need courage to say the right things and we need to be courageous to calm down racial tensions, not enflame them just so we have something to put on social media.”