The verdict in the trial of the Colston Four has little to do with efforts to tackle racism in Bristol, the city’s mayor has said as he defended himself against criticism for not acting sooner over the statue of the slave trader Edward Colston. Speaking to the Guardian after three men and a woman were cleared of criminal damage in toppling the statue in 2020, Marvin Rees said the fate of the statue was symbolic but he had “no reaction” to the verdict. “More power to them as individuals,” Rees said. “I hope they have good lives and all the rest of it, but what happened to them in court really has very little to do with what we are trying to get done in the city. “My business in Bristol is about holding the city together and tackling racism. Whatever happened to the individuals who pulled the statue down has very little to do with the drive to tackle race and class inequality in the city.” On Wednesday a jury acquitted Jake Skuse, Rhian Graham, Milo Ponsford and Sage Willoughby, who played key roles in bringing down the statue of the 17th-century slave trader at a Black Lives Matter protest and pushing it into the River Avon. Rees and the council had been criticised for not acting more quickly on the Colston statue. The council’s head of culture, Jon Finch, who attended court to give evidence for the prosecution, acknowledged it caused offence but said no official action was under way at the time of the toppling. Rees became the first directly elected black mayor in Europe in 2016. Taking office amid a toxic debate around Brexit, he said he could not afford to waste political capital to prioritise taking down a statue. He said: “What [then] happens to my political capital to actually take action on employment, housing, education? What happens? It evaporates. So you could end up sacrificing real substantial politics for symbolic politics. “I think also what could have happened [is that] you could have scared people and made it very difficult for black people who come after me to get elected. So there’s a context to this that people who talk from privilege would not understand, that really matters and is getting lost in the sensation.” Before the toppling of Colston, the big debate around the slave trader’s legacy in Bristol had been about Colston Hall, the city’s most important arts venue, Rees said. Efforts had been focused there and a name change agreed, only to be delayed by the coronavirus pandemic. “So factually it’s incorrect to say nothing was happening. We may not have prioritised the statue at that particular point in time but that’s a strategic decision of what to focus our energies on,” he said. Rees denied claims that the council supported the prosecution. “We were asked to give a factual account of what happened and we provided it,” he said. “And our head of culture was called as a witness for one side or the other, of course he’s going to turn up. What’s he going to do? Not go?” Ultimately, Rees said, he was happy that the statue of Colston was no longer there. “I’m glad there is no statue of a slaver up in the city,” he said. “My great-great-great-great-grandfather, I found out, was hung by the British for participating in the Morant Bay rebellion; my family may have been owned by Colston, transported by Colston, right? “I’m a descendant of enslaved Africans, I don’t want the statue up in the middle of the city. But that’s a discussion.”