Windrush Compensation Scheme (Expenditure) Bill

Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons & Money resolution & Programme motion
Monday 10th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)]

I thank the many Members who have spoken in this debate, particularly those who spoke with such high regard for the Windrush generation. My family first started moving to this country from Ghana in West Africa in the late sixties, so I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum) and for Coventry South (Zarah Sultana) for their interventions, which pointed out the impact of the Windrush scandal on all Commonwealth citizens, not just those from the Caribbean.

The hon. Members for Delyn (Rob Roberts), for Devizes (Danny Kruger) and for Wycombe (Mr Baker) pointed out that we need a more humane immigration system. I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss), for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell), for West Ham (Ms Brown) and for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) for the moving testimonies of their constituents. My hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) said what many of us on these Benches know, which is that the Windrush compensation scheme is not fit for purpose. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) pointed out, only 3% of those who have applied to the scheme have received any compensation. The hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) rightly pointed out that the amount that they have been given is not enough to count for the significant loss that they have sustained.

There were also thoughtful contributions from the hon. Members for Birmingham, Northfield (Gary Sambrook), for Bishop Auckland (Dehenna Davison), for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney), and for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double). I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) for making the very important point that we were swifter to pay compensation to slave owners than we were to the descendants of the enslaved.

As Members will have heard, we do not intend to oppose this Bill today. It is only right that compensation is finally paid, however lacking it is and whatever the shortcomings of the scheme. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) said, the compensation scheme is deeply flawed in numerous ways. I wish to reiterate that we, on the Labour Benches, are in favour of the payment of compensation in this scandalous case. We do not endorse the Government’s compensation scheme and we will continue to press the Government for a statutory scheme as the basis for a fair and just compensation.

We will continue to press for major changes to the amounts offered, for the types of compensation that are awarded, for improvement to eligibility, and for a change in the recognition of those who are victims both in terms of generation and in terms of country of origin, which are both wider than the Government care to admit. We will also press not only for major changes to the publicity surrounding the scheme, but to increase awareness of it. Above all, we seek justice and fairness, which the Windrush victims have not received to date from this Government.

A series of important questions regarding the scheme were posed during the course of this debate. I am not convinced that an objective listener would take the view that those questions received full answers, or, in some cases, any answers at all. The Minister did not make it clear why this scheme cannot be put on a statutory basis in order to ensure fairness. Furthermore, we have received no clear indication from Ministers as to why they believe that the original decision for the early closure of the scheme had to be revoked as unworkable. There has also been little to enlighten us on why there has been such a poor take-up to date of the compensation scheme, and whether Ministers have taken any decisive steps to improve that.

My right hon. Friend made the forceful point that more than 8,000 people have applied for the necessary documentation to establish their right to be here since April 2018, but it is not at all clear what proactive steps the Minister’s Department has taken to engage with them. There is also the question of the wider engagement with all those who are genuine victims of this scandal. They come from all over the Commonwealth, not solely the Caribbean.

I am also unsure whether we had full answers from those on the Government Benches about what is being done to alert these communities to their eligibility for the scheme. Separately, what has been done to include all further generations of the initial victims of the Windrush scandal who also find themselves victimised? Does the Minister not accept that much more needs to be done, and needs to be done as an urgent priority?

An impartial listener to this debate will also, I think, have struggled to hear any convincing argument as to why victims should not be compensated for the legal costs incurred in fighting all the injustices that they have suffered in the course of this scandal.

Finally, I want to address my remarks not solely to hon. and right hon. Members of this House, but to the victims of this scandal and their loved ones. Some of the people who were treated so terribly died before they ever received any apology, let alone compensation from this Government. People were denied drivers’ licences. They were made unemployed. They lost their homes and were put in immigration detention centres. Some were deported, and others were refused re-entry to this country after they had briefly been overseas, breaking up their families. They were British citizens, and this is still happening to them and their loved ones. I want to say to all of them, whatever their country of origin and whatever the country of origin of their parents or grandparents, they are one of us. The Labour party will not rest—and I will not rest—until this extraordinary injustice is brought to an end.