Windrush Day 2021

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Thursday 1st July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) for securing this important debate. It is truly an honour to follow the brilliant contribution from my hon. Friend the Member for Erith and Thamesmead (Abena Oppong-Asare).

This year marks the fourth national Windrush Day, commemorating the arrival, on board the Empire Windrush, of the first Caribbean immigrants to the UK, who played a vital role in rebuilding Britain after the second world war. After the ravages of war, Britain had to heal, rebuild and recover. It was a task that we could not and did not manage alone. This wonderful Windrush generation were the drivers, the nurses and the workers who helped not only to rebuild Britain, but to shape the Britain that we have today, and it is all the better for it. Towns and cities across the country rightly pay tribute to their efforts, including in Luton, where the Windrush flag was raised above our town hall. The ceremony was organised by young leaders in Luton and supported by the African Caribbean Community Development Forum.

I am proud that our town’s tribute and gratitude live on through the generations, but gratitude is something that a Government must not only show and express—at the moment, the only thing this Government are paying is lip service to the Windrush generation, not the compensation that is owed. That is simply not good enough. How many more people must die before they get the justice that is rightly owed to them? When will all the Windrush generation get the compensation that is owed to them? Until we start to see the words match the action, I am afraid that warm words will continue to be cold comfort to those who gave so much. The scale and depth of this injustice is huge: deportations, innocent people being detained, all under a Government who have moved so far to the right that the centre ground is barely visible, let alone the ability to see people as humans and fellow brothers and sisters.

I welcomed the Home Office’s apology, but an injustice on this scale needs to be followed with action. I will come on to the virtually non-existent compensation later, but I am talking about genuinely learning lessons from the past. Instead of taking a more humane, humble and appreciative, as well as economically sound approach to what people from other countries give to and do for this country, the Government have steered down an ever-more hostile and fiercely right-wing approach. Those who seek refuge in our country are now to be processed—such a horrible word in itself when we are talking about people who are fleeing famine, war or oppression in another country. We have seen “Go Home” vans. Healthcare workers who have given their all throughout the pandemic are subjected to immigration health surcharges to pay for the very health service that they are working in. The Prime Minister cosies up to divisive leaders and is himself yet to apologise for racist remarks about Muslim women and black people.

Since their apology to the Windrush generation of 2018, this Government have not learned from their past mistakes. In fact, the situation is getting worse. After I raised multiple questions on the compensation scheme, the Home Office refused to tell me how many people in Luton North, or even in the region, had been awarded compensation. It cited some nonsense about telling me the number of people who had received compensation—I just asked for a number—potentially identifying people, which it would never do. So I ask again: how many people in Luton North and in Bedfordshire are still waiting for what is owed to them? If the Minister will not share that with us, why not? Why has so little of the £200 million compensation fund been allocated to the people who deserve it?

Last year, I wrote to the Home Secretary on behalf of a constituent. I was days away from having my baby. I got a response when that baby was crawling, nearly eight months later. That is simply not good enough. I appreciate that we have had a pandemic and things will take longer for Departments to deal with than normal, but eight months is far too long for the Windrush generation to wait to hear an answer, particularly an older generation that has been left more vulnerable and disproportionately affected during the pandemic.

I hope that the Windrush generation’s wait for justice will soon be over, because far too many of their peers never lived to see the day and that injustice can now never be redressed. Now the Minister must act. The compensation owed to people must find its way to their pockets and their bank accounts as soon as possible, and we must know when that is going to happen. If the Government are to truly learn the lessons of the past, they must end the hostile environment that so many of our black, Asian and minority ethnic communities have to live in every day.