Windrush: 70th Anniversary

Nigel Adams Excerpts

Thursday 14th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Nigel Adams)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is a great privilege to be at the Dispatch Box for the second time in front of your good self. I thank and commend the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) for securing this fantastic but vital debate. It has been incredibly powerful, and I congratulate all right hon. and hon. Members on sharing stories and memories of their families and those of their constituents. We have had passionate, brilliant and moving contributions not just from the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood, but from my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat) and the hon. Members for Glenrothes (Peter Grant), for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) and for Brent Central (Dawn Butler). We also heard, yet again, an incredible speech from the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy). I hope to be able to address some of the points raised in the time that is left.

Seventy years ago, in 1948, Britain had just emerged from an exhausting, destructive but victorious second world war. The country was making key decisions about its future direction, its prosperity and its position in the world. We rose to the challenge in that year by creating the national health service and by hosting the global community at the London Olympic games.

[Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)]

I had the opportunity to learn about the Windrush generation at university. Does my hon. Friend agree that we should give children in schools the opportunity to learn about the contribution that that generation made to this country in getting Britain back up off her knees after the second world war?

[Nigel Adams]

That is a very fair point. It is incumbent on schools and on teachers to ensure that the Windrush generation is included in the curriculum, because children could learn an awful lot as a result.

As has been discussed today, another seminal and momentous occasion took place as the United Kingdom welcomed the HMT Empire Windrush at the port of Tilbury on 21 June 1948, and what followed the day after has been subsequently and regularly debated in this House. While it should be recognised that black British history does not start with the Windrush, the arrival of 492 West Indians, many of them ex-servicemen and women, has become synonymous with the first wave of mass migration and the beginning of modem British multicultural society. Those people include Alfred Gardner, who lives up the road from me in Leeds. I understand that he is still going strong at the great age of 92, and I am sure that the whole House sends Alfred its best wishes.

Many from the Windrush generation left their homes to answer the call to come to a strange, foreign and cold land in order to help rebuild the mother country. The welcome for many from that community, and many other communities that followed, was mixed at best. I would not do this debate justice if I did not mention and recognise the struggle to adjust and to put down roots, with many arrivals receiving a hostile reception. A well-documented phrase present outside many houses at the time was “no blacks, no Irish, no dogs”. As a white man brought up here, it is difficult for me to understand how terrible the Windrush generation would have felt as they walked the streets of London and other cities looking for accommodation. Many people have stories about that and other appalling discriminatory times in the UK. The unique challenges for acceptance, integration and recognition were most noticeable in the Notting Hill riots of 1958, the Race Relations Act 1965 and the Scarman and Macpherson reports, to name but a few, and this struggle has come to symbolise part of the story.

[Mr John Hayes]

Earlier I mentioned the British Caribbean Association, with which a number of Members will be familiar. The association was formed following those riots in Notting Hill in the year of my birth, and it was formed precisely to foster good relations between the indigenous people and those incoming people—people with very much the values the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) tellingly identified in her speech. The welcome those people deserved but did not get does not mean the Government should now take an approach of unrestricted immigration, and it certainly does not mean conflating the Windrush issue with illegal migration. The right hon. Lady is absolutely right that that conflation is very unhelpful, and very unhealthy, too.

[Nigel Adams]

My right hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point, and the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) made it, too. Conflating the two issues is deeply damaging to this debate, and we all have to be mindful of that.

Nevertheless, the enduring spirit of the Windrush generation to overcome this struggle, hardship and adversity must not be understated or dismissed. This is part of our history, and we should all be proud of the patriotic, courageous men and women who, in spite of adversity, helped to rebuild this country after the war and have therefore enriched us not just economically but culturally and socially.

Several hon. and right hon. Members have rightly mentioned the Grenfell tragedy, which is particularly important today. The Grenfell fire was a terrible tragedy that should never have happened, and today is a time for reflection. My focus, and I am sure the focus of everyone in this House, is firmly on the community who were affected. Today we all remember those who lost their lives and the families and friends who lost loved ones on that terrible day. It is incredibly important that we respect the privacy of the community at this time.

The hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood, in her brilliant speech, asked whether we would be announcing an annual Windrush Day, which the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington also mentioned. The United Kingdom has long been a country of inward and outward migration. Post-war immigration, including of people on the Empire Windrush who were at the forefront of that migration, means we are now a richly diverse society. Members of our minority communities have made an enormous contribution to our social, economic and cultural life, and this should be celebrated.

To make sure that we commemorate the Windrush anniversary in the appropriate way, my colleague Lord Bourne has met key figures from community groups over the past few months to decide how best to celebrate it. We thank all those stakeholders for the excellent meetings and for the work they have done together. We are keen to continue these engagements to ensure that our work on the Windrush celebrations extends beyond the 70th anniversary and to ensure a lasting legacy of this celebration of British history.

It is important that we celebrate the contributions of the Windrush generation and their descendants each year, as they are part of what makes us the wonderfully diverse country we are today. Further information will be announced very shortly.

The hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood went on to mention the Black Cultural Archives and the funding difficulties it has had. She asked whether we will work with colleagues in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport on tackling this fantastic facility’s problems. The financial difficulties of the Black Cultural Archives are well known to us, and we agree that more should be done to protect these vital archives. I am pleased to confirm that my colleague Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth has been speaking to colleagues at DCMS on this very issue.

My neighbour the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), who is no longer in her place, asked about her Select Committee’s interim report on the hardship fund for the Windrush generation. We recognise the hardship that some of that generation have suffered, through no fault of their own. Sadly, that Select Committee does not scrutinise my Department, but I assure her that the relevant Department will respond in due course.

The right hon. Member for Tottenham gave a typically passionate and eloquent speech, in which he touched on the shameful practice of slavery. The transatlantic slave trade caused extreme suffering to millions of people, who lost their liberty and were forced to work as slaves. We have expressed our deep sorrow for what happened and fully recognise the strong sense of injustice that remains. We firmly believe that we should always remember history, no matter how difficult that history can be. He also went on to mention the hardship fund for the Windrush generation. He is absolutely right to say that we should design a compensation scheme that effectively addresses the issues faced by the Windrush generation, and to do that we have to listen. The Home Office has completed the call for evidence, which has given individuals and community groups the opportunity to share their stories and experiences.

The hon. Member for Glenrothes had the tricky job of following the right hon. Member for Tottenham, but he made a terrific speech.

[Ms Abbott]

I understand about the arrangements for compensation, but what about a hardship fund now—an interim hardship fund?

--- Later in debate ---

[Nigel Adams]

We have only a couple of minutes, but I can say to the right hon. Lady that I understand the Home Secretary has written to the right hon. Member for Tottenham to say that the hardship scheme remains under review. I am sure the Home Office will be coming forward with more on that. As I was saying, the hon. Member for Glenrothes made a fantastic speech, referencing his family history.

At this point, I wish to turn to the recent immigration issues faced by the Windrush generation. I would not want anyone who has made their life in the UK to feel unwelcome or be in any doubt about their right to remain here. I wish to conclude in order to give the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood enough time to finish off the debate, so let me turn to what the Government have been doing to celebrate the Windrush generation, as it is also vital that we show our appreciation for what they have achieved.

Lord Bourne responded to a debate in the House of Lords in January to answer the question of what we are doing to support the 70th anniversary. As he said, he has set out to work with stakeholders across the country to ensure that the Government celebrate the anniversary in the most appropriate way. He has done exactly that, meeting the relevant stakeholders. There will also be a suite of events taking place across the country in areas with prominent connections to Windrush, including Hackney, Tilbury and Lambeth.

So in this year of seminal commemorative events, Windrush 70 stands alongside NHS 70 and Vote 100 as a hugely important reminder of the progress and achievements this country has made over the past century. The contribution of the Windrush generation and their descendants to Britain cannot be overstated—we would be much diminished as a country without their presence, and it is vital that we fully recognise the importance of Windrush communities to Britain’s history and present.