Bristol mayor: Colston statue removal was act of 'historical poetry'

Marvin Rees on the slave trader, institutional racism and his mixed heritage experience

Marvin Rees, the directly elected mayor of Bristol, has trod a very delicate line this week. He could not - and would not - condone the spectacular attack on the statue of the slave trader Edward Colston.

But nor did he hide his satisfaction that it was hauled from its plinth and thrown off a quayside where Colston's ships would have docked close to a bridge named in honour of the 18^th century Bristol slave Pero Jones.