William Hague and Alan Johnson are inviting fellow MPs to a special parliamentary screening of Amazing Grace, the new feature film about William Wilberforce.

|PIC1|William Hague, Shadow Foreign Secretary, has written a new biography - William Wilberforce: The Life of the Great Anti-slave Trade Campaigner - due out in the summer.

Alan Johnson, Secretary of State for Education and Skills, represents Kingston upon Hull, the birthplace of Wilberforce.

The bill to abolish the slave trade throughout the British Empire was passed 200 years ago, on 25 March 1807. The parliamentary preview, scheduled for Wednesday 21 March, follows a special screening in Cardiff, attended by Rhodri Morgan, First Minister for Wales.

"Amazing Grace is an excellent film," said Rhodri Morgan, "brilliantly directed and acted and very moving. The bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade is an important opportunity to pay tribute to the courage and moral conviction of all those - black and white - who campaigned for its abolition. It is also an opportunity to demand to know why slavery still exists in some parts of the world."

More than 260 Canadian MPs, senators, ambassadors and staff attended a similar preview in Ottawa, Canada.

"We are delighted so many political leaders have shown real interest in the film," said May-Lynn Chang of Bristol Bay Productions. "Through it, we hope people of all backgrounds will feel empowered to become catalysts for change in our own times."

Amazing Grace tells the story of Wilberforce's 20-year parliamentary struggle. From the filmmakers of Ray and directed by Michael Apted, the film boasts an impressive line-up of leading British actors including Ioan Gruffudd (Wilberforce), Michael Gambon, Albert Finney (who plays John Newton, a reformed slave ship captain and writer of the hymn from which the film derives its title), Benedict Cumberbatch and Rufus Sewell.

Wilberforce was elected to the House of Commons when only 21 and dedicated his life to the Reformation of Manners in order to build a just and fair society. He advocated prison reform, better hospital care, improving conditions of the poor and other areas of social reform but his passion was to abolish slavery in all its forms. In 1807 the Commons voted to abolish the slave trade throughout the British Empire, but it took until 1833 for total abolition to be achieved. Three days after this latter event, in July 1833, Wilberforce died.

The hymn "Amazing Grace" from which the movie derives its title, stands as the personal testimony of John Newton, a former slave trader who had a dramatic conversion to Christianity. Wilberforce and Newton met on several occasions and Wilberforce used the words of Newton's hymn to prick the conscience of influential members of the Commons and the Lords to support the Anti-Slavery Bill. John Newton died the same year as the bill passed into law - 1807.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams, in the run-up to the abolition of the slave trade anniversary, delivered an unconditional apology for the Church's role in the slave trade. To celebrate the abolition, he will lead a major Service of Reconciliation in Westminster Abbey on March 27.

The film goes on general release in the UK on March 23rd.

For more information: www.amazinggracethemovie.co.uk