Windrush Review

Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2022 Westminster Hall

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

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) on securing this vital debate. The Windrush generation have given the UK so much. When they docked in Tilbury, they brought not just extra hands to rebuild this country, but dance, art, writing, cuisine and music, which transformed British culture. Areas across the UK such as Brixton, which partly falls in my constituency, were completely reshaped by the Windrush generation and became central hubs of British culture.

For the past five years we have had the opportunity to celebrate Windrush Day and recognise the contributions of that community up and down the country. Next year, when we celebrate the 75th anniversary of the docking of the Empire Windrush, I sincerely hope the Government will plan nationwide celebrations that are suitable for the commemoration of a day of such national significance.

I also sincerely hope that those celebrations will be a vast improvement on the £1 million act of gesture politics that was unveiled at Waterloo station this year. Although I commend Basil Watson’s artistry, it would have been nice if the Government had properly consulted Windrush campaigners and organisations, including the Windrush Foundation, to discuss its design and location. If the Government truly intend to honour the Windrush generation, they will take meaningful steps to fix the Windrush compensation scheme. The Government estimate that there are up to 15,000 people eligible to claim Windrush compensation. More than three years after the launch of the scheme, just 26% of that number have applied and only 11% have received compensation. At least 23 people have died waiting.

The compensation scheme is a scandal in itself, as my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton outlined. The Government’s failure to deliver compensation to victims of the Windrush scandal shows that it was a mistake to entrust the scheme to the Department that administered the Windrush generation’s suffering in the first place. The Windrush monument is a nice gesture, but an even nicer one would be justice. Take the scheme out of the Home Office’s hands and transfer it to an independent organisation that will properly deliver the compensation that those people deserve.

It adds insult to injury that the Government continue to deny the existence of institutional racism, which members of the Windrush generation and their descendants continue to experience. If the Government really want to honour the Windrush generation, they ought to complement that, starting with just immigration policies. Instead, they choose to push on with their hostile environment and the shameful Nationality and Borders Act 2022, as if they have learned nothing from the Windrush scandal.

A leaked Home Office report concluded recently that the deep-rooted racism of the Windrush scandal lies in the fact that between 1950 and 1981, every single piece of immigration or citizenship legislation was designed at least in part to reduce the number of people with black or brown skin who were permitted to live and work in the UK. That was an assessment of immigration policy from 50 years ago, but it feels like a similar assessment could be made of immigration policies today.

Wendy Williams boils down the 30 recommendations in her “Windrush Lessons Learned Review” to three main factors, one of which is that the Home Office must recognise that migration and wider Home Office policy are about people, and that, whatever the objective, they should be rooted in humanity. What part of the Rwanda policy would the Minister say is rooted in humanity? What part of splitting up families would the Minister say is rooted in humanity? What part of the recently announced deportation flights to Nigeria and Ghana, which, during Pride month, will attempt to deport LGBT asylum seekers, is rooted in humanity? Attempting to deport mothers and grandmothers of people who are British citizens and have been in this country for over 25 years—what part of that is rooted in humanity? It is only recently that the Government have changed their rules on citizenship fees for children who were born in this country or have lived here their entire life. The fees have now been reduced for those who cannot afford them, but what part of denying people who were born here access to the rights they deserve was rooted in humanity?

It seems that the Home Office, rather than enacting genuine change to apologise and atone for the Windrush scandal, would rather gesture towards change but continue with the same culture and practices. If it was serious about its commitment to change, it would enact in full the recommendations of the lessons learned review, it would invite Wendy Williams back in 18 months’ time to reassess its progress against those recommendations, and it would do more to implement change.

One of the clear recommendations, already mentioned today, is not deporting people who came here at a very young age. The Government repeatedly do that. They even want to do that to people who have been born here but do not have a certain type of immigration status at the time of being accused of a crime. When people have been here since a young age, no matter what offence they may have committed, the reality is that they are a product of British society. Where on earth are we sending them if they have already paid their dues in prison?

I put it to the Minister that there are some people among us—I will name the Prime Minister again—who were not born in this country. The Prime Minister has committed an offence, I would say. Should he be deported if he was somebody who needed to register for citizenship here? The Government have at times stated that they would want to do that—to see anyone who has committed some sort of offence removed from this country. I think that is absolutely disgraceful. The Government must implement Wendy Williams’s review in full if they want to move past the Windrush scandal.