PM rejects calls to topple Cook statues, declaring no link between Cook and slavery

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has firmly rejected calls to topple Captain Cook statues, arguing the Black Lives Matter movement has been hijacked by left-wing agendas. After statues of Edward Colston and Robert Milligan were pulled down in the UK, British group Topple the Racists called for all Captain Cook statues to follow suit. “People's treatment in custody or things like that is fair issue, but now it’s been taken over by other much more politically driven left-wing agendas,” Mr Morrison said on 2GB. “I’ve always said we have got to be honest about our history, we’ve got to acknowledge the positive and the negative. “This is not a license to go nuts on this stuff.” The Prime Minister also rejected any links between Captain Cook and slavery, saying "when you talk about someone like Captain James Cook, in his time, he was one of the most enlightened persons on these issues as you can imagine". "Australia when it was founded as a settlement was on the basis there be no slavery and while slaveships continued to travel around the world, when Australia was established, yes it was a brutal settlement, but there was no slavery in Australia," he said. Image: News Corp Australia

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