Northern Ireland

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch compares Labour’s stance over Kneecap legal challenge to Chagos Islands handover

Bizarre statement comes as rappers win High Court challenge prompted by Kemi Badenoch decision to pull music scheme funding

Former equalities minister Kemi Badenoch is the frontrunner in the Conservative Party leadership race
Kemi Badenoch was the then-UK government minister responsible for the decision to pull funding granted to Irish language rappers Kneecap. (Stefan Rousseau/PA)
By Paul Ainsworth

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has compared the UK Labour government’s “cowardly” decision not to back her withdrawal of funding to Kneecap to the ceding of British control of the Chagos Islands 6,000 miles away in the Indian Ocean.

Ms Badenoch, who was elected Conservative Party leader last month, hit out after the Belfast Irish language rap trio won their discrimination case against the British government at Belfast’s High Court on Friday.

She claimed not contesting Kneecap’s challenge was proof of Labour failing to “defend UK interests” and claimed the rappers “promote violence”.

The band launched legal action earlier this year after Ms Badenoch, who was then UK business and trade secretary, pulled funding of £14,250 the group had been awarded through the government-backed Music Export Growth Scheme, which aims to promote artists overseas.

Kneecap rap trio Móglaí Bap, Mo Chara, and DJ Próvaí.
Kneecap's Móglaí Bap, Mo Chara, and DJ Próvaí.

The band said they believed a poster for their 2019 tour, which featured a cartoon image of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson tied alongside former DUP leader Arlene Foster on top of a bonfire, had angered the Tory government.

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In February, a government spokesperson for Ms Badenoch said it was “hardly surprising” that UK taxpayers’ money should not be given to “people that oppose the United Kingdom itself”.

Friday’s High Court decision - that saw the government ordered to pay the group the same sum they had been denied - is an embarrassing blow to Ms Badenoch, who has hit out at both Kneecap and the Labour government for failing to fight the case.

A spokesperson for the Department for Business and Trade, now headed by Labour’s Jonathan Reynolds, said it was not in the public interest to contest Kneecap’s legal challenge.

In a bizarre statement, the Tory leader compared the case to the recent announcement that the UK will cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands in the Indian Ocean to Mauritius.

Some 61 Tamil Sri Lankan asylum seekers have been living on Diego Garcia in the Chagos Islands since being rescued at sea in 2021
The site of a strategic UK-US military base in the Chagos Islands. (Alamy Stock Photo)

The UK maintained control of the archipelago as part of its British Indian Ocean Territory, as Mauritius prepared for its independence from Britain in 1968.

The deal to cede sovereignty to Mauritius, which has yet to be officially signed, has been heavily criticised by the Tories, who said it undermines Britain’s defence interests.

UK foreign secretary David Lammy said the deal is being made in return for Britain to secure the future of a strategic UK-US military base on the islands, the site of which will be leased to the UK for 99 years.

Ms Badenoch said in Friday’s statement: “It is unbelievable Labour have chosen not to pursue this case - yet another cowardly decision after giving away the Chagos Islands.

“Labour will always capitulate rather than defend UK interests.”

She added: “This case is not about whether a band promotes violence or hates the UK, as Kneecap clearly do; this is about whether government ministers have the ability to stop taxpayers’ money subsidising people who neither need nor deserve it.”