Toppled slave trader statutes should be housed in a sculpture cemetery in Kent, says Tory MP Craig Mackinley

A TORY MP wants to create a “sculpture cemetery” tourist attraction to house controversial slave trader statues.

Craig Mackinlay suggested land in Ramsgate, Kent, could be used as a final resting place for unwanted colonial sculptures, torn down in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement.

⚠️ Click here for the latest news on Black Lives Matter

The MP for South Thanet approached the district council with the idea and is hoping they will help find an area where statues of historical figures with unsavoury pasts from around the country could be collected and displayed for educational purposes.

It was also suggested that the "sculpture cemetery" of British slave traders could become a tourist attraction.

Questions of what to do with public dedications to controversial figures have gained traction since Black Lives Matter protesters threw a statue of slaver Edward Colston into Bristol Harbour on Sunday.

Mr Mackinlay said: "From Saddam Hussein to Karl Marx, Abraham Lincoln and Gandhi to a currently soggy Edward Colston from Bristol, all could have a new lease of life with appropriate historical context and educational focus, whether loved or despised.

"This could become a significant tourist attraction and I have identified land on the Westcliff, next to the boating pool, as a perfect underused site for such a new scheme."

Mr Mackinlay has taken inspiration from other similar statue cemeteries across the world, including one in Laos, in south east Asia.

He said: "The idea is not a new one with many such sites around the world serving as a resting place for the unloved, unfashionable or truly despised.

"They have become significant and successful visitor attractions."

One such park in Lithuania is called Grutas Park, and is home to hundreds of sculptures of Soviet figures such as Lenin and Stalin.

He added: "With a new surge of historic revisionism taking hold, why not create something bold in Ramsgate, giving a new home for unloved statues from around the world, and a new opportunity for domestic ones as well which might well be looking for a new home?"

Tap to activate, pinch to zoom and drag around then tap on an icon to see where/what they are in the UK

Commemorative statues across the country have been at the centre of intense debate this week, as the government told police they must take the decision whether to intervene if anti-racism protesters try to forcibly remove them.

Downing Street said it is an operational decision for forces to make, after police in Bristol stood back to allow protesters to rip down the monument to Colston.

Home Secretary Priti Patel was reported to have had a "firm" discussion with Avon and Somerset Police's chief constable, Andy Marsh, over the decision.

On Tuesday, London Mayor Sadiq Khan announced a review would be carried out into similar monuments around the capital, that includes Thomas Guy, the founder of Guy's Hospital in Southwark, South London.

It came as a statue of Scottish merchant, Robert Milligan, was taken down from its position in West India Quay docks in East London by the Canal and River Trust.

The South Thanet MP's proposal follows his recent comments condemning the actions of protesters defacing sculptures as part of anti-racist protests.

On his Facebook page on Wednesday, Mr Mackinlay posted a picture of the Roman Emperor Claudius, who conquered Britain in the first century AD, asking if he should be removed for enslaving the local tribes. The post was criticised by constituents who compared the approach of Germany, where the Holocaust is documented widely in museums and memorials without statues featuring members of the Nazi regime.

Mr Mackinlay wrote on his website: "The death of George Floyd at the hands of police in Minneapolis has, quite correctly, attracted international condemnation and so it should.

"His death was unacceptable but this is surely an issue for the citizens of the State of Minnesota and the people of the USA.

"I therefore find the actions by some in London truly incoherent to the aim of eliminating racism by their desecration of the Cenotaph and the defacement of the statues of Churchill and Abraham Lincoln in Parliament Square."

Protesters have drawn up a map mentioning 60 statues and road names across the UK they want to be pulled down or renamed.

The list of the "racist" statues include memorials of Captain Cook and Wetherspoons pubs named after slave owners has been put up on a website called Topple the Racists.

The group said: "We believe these statues and other memorials to slave-owners and colonialists need to be removed so that Britain can finally face the truth about its past – and how it shapes our present."

Two statues of wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill have already been targeted.

The one in Parliament Squared was vandalised on June 7 while another in located in Woodford Green in northeast London has also been attacked.