Jess Brown-Fuller

It is a pleasure to speak in today’s debate on Black History Month and follow some incredible contributions from the Minister, the shadow Minister and the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra). I thank the Government for ensuring that the debate takes place in Government time, as that is a clear indication of just how important the subject is. Britain’s black communities have enriched the social fabric of the United Kingdom, adding vitality to our streets, shops, frontline services and culture throughout the country. We would be a poorer, less dynamic, less exciting and less colourful country had individuals not boarded ships such as the HMT Empire Windrush and made Britain their home. As the Minister acknowledged, Black History Month has been marked for 39 years and when it was first celebrated, there were just three black MPs. Its purpose is to remember those who came before—as the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston said, we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us—but it also looks to the future to address the systemic issues that our black communities still face. In Chichester and throughout the country, we owe our black communities so much, yet, in truth, society has let them down badly and continues to do so. The lives of far too many people are still blighted by prejudice, discrimination and inequality. I thank the Minister for raising the case that Munya Chawawa has brought into the light this week. He is an actor, comedian and social commentator, and his social commentary about his experience in the past six weeks in Chichester has broken my heart. He spoke out about the experience of the cast of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, who have been with us over the past six weeks doing a really cool production—it is one of the best versions that I have ever had the privilege of watching. It is also Munya’s first time taking to the stage—in a Shakespeare play—and it was incredibly inspiring to have kids from the BRIT School come and watch the performance. Munya has established the Black Boys Theatre Club, and it is his ambition to ensure that black children have access to theatre. I watched with delight all these young children talking about how much they had enjoyed watching Shakespeare in Chichester and how cool their first experience of theatre was in my constituency. Munya spoke about a homophobic attack—it has now been called a hate crime, and an arrest has been made—that caused the show not to go up. When that happened, the rest of the cast spoke about their experiences over the past six weeks of just walking through the city. When they went for a night out in Brighton to get out of Chichester, they experienced racism there. Munya has said that he experienced more racism and xenophobia in six weeks than he had experienced in his entire life. He has been a tireless campaigner against discrimination —he is very good at calling it out and doing so in a comedic way that lots of people identify with; that is why he has such a huge following on social media—and I am really grateful to him for calling it out. I declare an interest, as a trustee of Chichester Festival Theatre. The theatre has been trying to tackle this issue for years and years, and we have been having a conversation about it with the board. When we invite talented actors to Chichester Festival Theatre, we want them to feel like it is their home. We want them to feel welcome and included, so how do we make the environment around the theatre like that for them? I have been somewhat reassured by the outpouring of love both on social media and in my inbox from people saying, “I had no idea. What can we do?” One of the reflections that the cast shared with the theatre was that they were in the city centre when these things happened, but nobody called them out.