Is this REALLY how we want pupils to be taught?
As leading human rights lawyer hosts schools’ mock trial of wealthy Tory MP over family links to slave trade...
A HIGH-profile human rights lawyer has been accused of brainwashing schoolchildren after he organised a mock trial of a Tory MP over his ancestors’ links to slavery.
Clive Stafford Smith – who defended Guantanamo Bay detainees such as Moazzam Begg – held the ‘Generation on Trial’ which saw 40 pupils, some as young as 12, take part in the ‘prosecution’ of an actor playing their local MP.
The children took on the roles of prosecution and defence barristers, and three juries, in the ‘case’ of Richard Drax, whose family set up a sugar plantation in the West Indies in the 17th century.
The MP, who is believed to be the wealthiest landowner in the House of Commons with an 13,000-acre estate, was ‘charged’ with ‘benefiting from the proceeds of slavery’.
Mr Stafford Smith, 62, appointed himself as judge in the proceedings last week, the first in a series of events by his charity 3DCentre, which helps young people enter careers in human rights law and charity work.
Future mock trials will put Boris Johnson, Priti Patel, Tony Blair and Nigel Farage in the dock.
Education campaigners condemned the events.
Chris McGovern, a retired headteacher and chairman of the Campaign for Real Education, said: ‘I do not think school children should be putting anyone on trial.
‘This is an example of out-of-control brainwashing and it should not be allowed as schools are duty bound to be impartial, not have an agenda. There is room for a balanced debate based on knowledge but this is a type of fanaticism.’
The mock trial at Bridport Town Hall, Dorset, tried to pin slavery ‘charges’ on Mr Drax over his family’s historic connections to the transatlantic slave trade.
The South Dorset MP inherited the Drax Hall sugar plantation in Barbados, along with his Dorset estate, Charborough House. Drax Hall, in the family since the 1620s, historically used slave labour.
Mr Drax declined an invitation to offer a defence, and local aristocrat Sir Philip Colfox was brought in to play the ‘posh defendant’ with instructions to respond how he thought Mr Drax might do.
The juries played by the children, aged 12 to 18 and from All Saints School in Weymouth and The Woodroffe School in Lyme Regis, all ‘convicted’ Mr Drax of ‘benefiting from the proceeds of slavery’. But they dismissed a second count he ‘had acted like his ancestors while performing his role as MP’.
Mr Stafford Smith said: ‘We had students from two schools doing a series called Generation on Trial where we are putting people from my generation on trial for how they have messed up the world for the young generation. We put the local MP Richard Drax on trial for benefiting from the proceeds of slavery because his family made all their money from that. The kids were actually very open-minded.’
Woodroffe School headmaster Dan Watts said: ‘We are extremely proud of our students and their keen interest in the world beyond the school gates.
‘This an academic discussion and did not purport to be a real trial, but an educational process.
‘Care was taken by the organisers to ensure the arguments heard by our students were balanced.’
Mr Drax, 63, has previously described his ancestors’ links with the slave trade as ‘deeply regrettable’ but said no one today can be held responsible for events hundreds of years ago. He declined to comment on the mock trial.
All Saints School was contacted for comment.