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Exclusive: Haberdashers’ Aske’s could change name over slavery links

Chris Ware/Keystone Features/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

In the wake of last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests, a number of leading British private schools announced plans to decolonise their syllabus. Winchester, Fettes, Ampleforth and St Paul’s Girls were all reported to be ‘formulating new approaches’ to teaching about Britain’s colonial past and whether subject curriculums were inclusive enough.

Now Mr S can reveal that the Haberdashers’ Aske’s schools are the latest to join the list. The governing body of the Haberdashers’ Company has written to parents and guardians at its famous boys and girls schools in Elstree and its sister Federation in South London about its benefactor Robert Aske, a London merchant who died in 1689. In a letter seen by Steerpike, chairman Simon Cartmell reports that it ‘is with great sadness’ the schools have become aware that Aske whose ‘bequest over three hundred years ago laid the foundations for the education of children across London, was a shareholder in the Royal African Company.’

He continues: ‘It is clear to us all that the role of the Royal African Company, and the other companies involved in the slave trade, was deplorable and abhorrent.

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Steerpike

Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

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