Andy Burnham hints he will back Bill to add 'black English' and 'Asian English' categories to Census

Published: 07:52 EST, 11 November 2026 | Updated: 07:52 EST, 11 November 2026 Andy Burnham has hinted he will back a Bill to add 'black English' and 'Asian English' categories to the Census.The PM said he 'wants' to support the legislation when he was challenged by Lib Dem leader Ed Davey in the Commons this afternoon. Sir Ed said the move would tackle 'racist' attitudes towards people who were born and raised in England - but denied the right to call themselves English.Mr Burnham replied: 'I haven't looked at the detail of the Bill but I stand here thinking that I would want to support that Bill, to directly take on the poisonous politics that we have seen from some in this House.' Reform UK MP Suella Braverman sparked a row recently when she argued that only white people can be English. Andy Burnham has hinted he will back a Bill to add 'black English' and 'Asian English' categories to the CensusIntroducing the English ethnic identity (census particulars) Bill to the Commons yesterday, Lib Dem MP Josh Babarinde called for ethnicity questions on the census to be overhauled with more options, including black English and Asian English.He said the current situation treats English people with black and Asian heritage as 'marginal', including Conservative former prime minister Rishi Sunak.The 10-Minute Rule Bill is unlikely to proceed unless it gets Government backing.It has received some cross-party support, including from Labour's former deputy PM David Lammy.Mr Babarinde also called it the St George's Bill, named after the patron saint of England who, according to tradition, was from modern-day Turkey.The Eastbourne MP said: 'Do you have to be white to be English? This St George's Bill says no.'I am a proud Englishman. I have proud Nigerian heritage.'But my parents and I were born in England, we grew up in England, our home is in England.'Yet some voices attempt to reduce Englishness to a skin colour and to a bloodline.'Well, if we're going to go down that path, my mum's side of the family has been English for as far back as we have traced.'He told MPs that since introducing the Bill, he has received death threats, with one telling him to 'go home while you have the legs and breath to carry you'.He said: 'In the ethnicity question in the census, the only box that says English sits under the white category.'If you are black, the form offers you black British, if you are Asian, it offers you Asian British – but not English.'Now, the same question in the Welsh census offers a Black Welsh category. In Scotland, the census offers Scottish Asian, for example. The PM said he 'wants' to support the legislation when he was challenged by Lib Dem leader Ed Davey in the Commons this afternoon'Yet the best that England offers in our census is a miscellaneous writing box that may as well be the margin.'But is (Rishi Sunak) a former prime minister, only marginal to our country? Is (David Lammy) a former deputy prime minister and co-sponsor of this Bill only marginal to our country? What about Ian Wright, Lewis Hamilton, Cynthia Erivo?'It is due to return to the Commons on April 23 2027 – St George's Day.