I HAVE felt distinctly uncomfortable since I watched the first excellent documentary episode, Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners, on BBC2.

I have always been proud of the fact that William Wilberforce, the member for parliament for Hull (later Yorkshire), helped abolished the evil practice of slavery after 200 years.

In my history lessons I never heard that the equivalent of £17 billion pounds today was paid in compensation to the slave owners - 46,000 of them.

They are listed in 1,631 ledgers. If this bribe had not been paid, slavery would have continued.

All those beautiful houses in London were built off the backs of intense human cruelty and suffering - including Harewood House in Yorkshire.

I wonder what the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, would have had to say at the time?

I am very pro business, but have we really moved forward that much in relative terms? A sizeable number of the working population do not have any security and have zero hours contracts and no rights.

Alongside this are the new super-rich traders who can earn their fortune sat on their backsides. Is history repeating itself?

All due credit to the Archbishop for launching fairness with the living wage ideal - now £7.85 an hour - and to Ikea which is to pay this to all staff from next year.

Keith Massey Bishopthorpe