Minors Entering the UK: 1948 to 1971 Debate

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Department: Home Office

Minors Entering the UK: 1948 to 1971

Yvette Cooper Excerpts
Monday 30th April 2018

(5 years, 11 months ago)

Westminster Hall
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Lyn Brown Portrait Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)
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It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Austin. I thank Patrick Vernon OBE for launching the petition and creating the space we urgently needed to discuss these awful and totally avoidable events. I also pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) for his exceptional speech and his tireless advocacy on the issue; my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) for her forensic interrogation and analysis of the former Home Secretary’s actions; and my right hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), who has so effectively led on the issue from the Front Bench.

Let me make it clear: this issue is personal to me, because, like many Londoners, I have family who are part of the Windrush generation. Lucy and her husband Cecil came here to help to rebuild Britain. Lucy is a fabulous, dedicated and caring nurse who worked in the NHS for her whole life, and Cecil is a skilled artisan. So, before I start, I will say, “Thank you”, to Lucy and Cecil for all they have done, and to all the Lucys and Cecils who came, worked and served our country—often, sadly, in brutal, racist circumstances.

Yvette Cooper Portrait Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)
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My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech about the importance of the Windrush generation to the whole country, our public services and our economy. Will she join me in thanking not only all those who have helped to build our country, but all those who have been so badly and shamefully hit by what has gone wrong in the Home Office, who have nevertheless had the bravery and strength to speak out, including telling their stories to the newspapers and to Amelia Gentleman, who has obviously played such an important role in telling their stories?

Lyn Brown Portrait Lyn Brown
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I certainly will, and I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention.

Cecil and Lucy really believed that they could make this country a home, and that it would be fit for their children and their grandchildren, and they did make it a home for them. They thought that they had secured for themselves and their children a place that was warm and welcoming. However, I assure Members that their family are angry now, because the contract they had with this country has been broken by this careless, callous Government. Their faith in this country has been crushed. They, their children and their grandchildren feel betrayed.

It is not just my family who are angered by that betrayal; many of my constituents, whether they have family among the Windrush generation or not, believe that this Prime Minister’s policies have betrayed a generation of their friends, neighbours and families.

I do not know how many of my constituents have been caught up in the Home Office’s “hostile” immigration strategy, because many people have not made their way to my door yet. However, I urge them to do so, so that I can help them sort this situation out.

One man, who I will call Gem, contacted me early last year. Gem travelled from Jamaica in 1969 and has lived here legally ever since. However, in August last year his housing benefit suddenly stopped, on the basis that he

“had no recourse to public funds.”

That was certainly news to him.

Gem has not kept hold of every official document that has come through his door for the last several decades, so when the Home Office demanded evidence for every single year that he had lived here he was understandably devastated and overwhelmed. I do not think many of us could produce that much evidence on demand; I certainly could not.

Gem was told that he would have to secure a new passport from Jamaica, at great expense and at a time when he was unable to work. The £2,500 fee for naturalisation was well out of the question. He now faces eviction, due to rent arrears, and he tells me that he has to report regularly to the immigration centre, as if he was a criminal. A few days ago, Gem’s daughter called the new hotline, but she is still waiting to be called back. I have contacted the Immigration Minister on Gem’s behalf and I will be happy to give her his details after this debate.

Gem is not the only constituent of mine who has been harmed by this “hostile” environment. Jessica travelled to Britain in 1970 from Dominica. She is 58 now but still remembers an immigration officer stamping her passport with the words, “Indefinite right to remain”. She grew up in this country, and she has worked and paid taxes here for the last 39 years. Last month, however, she was fired from her job with a local charity that supports migrants and refugees, on the basis that she could not prove her right to work in the UK. It is a bitter irony that someone who has worked to help those at risk because of immigration policies has now fallen victim to those policies herself. Jessica said:

“I have always been a positive person, but this is a terrible situation.”

I do not think that anybody could have failed to notice the oft-repeated use by the former Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Hastings and Rye (Amber Rudd), of the phrase “compliant environment” last week. However, as my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) said:

“Whether it’s compliance or hostility, it’s still a policy which has led to this debacle”.—[Official Report, 23 April 2018; Vol. 639, c. 633.]

Gem and Jessica will receive absolutely no comfort if I tell them that, although they have lost nearly everything, the Government did not mean to be “hostile”. That is cold comfort, because let us be in no doubt that this scandal is leaving a legacy of fear and anxiety among the communities and individuals that it has betrayed.

Nevertheless, I welcome the Government’s pledges to waive fees for members of the Windrush generation as they apply for documents and rightful naturalisation, and to scrap the requirement for a citizenship test, as well as the free services that they have created for the victims. Those were absolutely the right things to do, but the problem stems from the policy itself. The “hostile environment” has been hardened over time, in the service of an arbitrary target. That is hardly the way to encourage careful evaluation of an individual’s rights.

The canned response that we keep hearing from the Government is that the Windrush generation are different, or an exception. We know the phrase, “the exception proves the rule”, and there are already new cases coming to light of British citizens from other backgrounds who have been caught up by this Government’s approach. So how many exceptions will it take before the rule is changed? Will cases that do not appear to be Windrush related need to make their own headlines before they are recognised? If so, that is not only nonsensical, but cruel.

The right to appeal through an immigration tribunal was scrapped, for most cases, by 2014. When, on top of that, there is no longer recourse to legal aid, the inevitable wrong decisions are so much harder to challenge. I hope that the new Home Secretary will fix this matter urgently, although I do not hold my breath.

“Regret”, no matter how bitter or heartfelt, cannot take the place of a substantial policy change. It is simply not good enough to redress the consequences each time after the fact. Policy change is the only way to prevent this situation from happening again, but even that will not undo the damage that has already been done; that pain will never go away. The petition that we are considering rightly calls on the Government to take into account “loss & hurt”. The “loss” of a job, of benefits, of medical treatment, of pensions, or of citizenship can be measured.

--- Later in debate ---
Caroline Nokes Portrait Caroline Nokes
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I am absolutely unaware of any bonus scheme for removals. What I want to focus on today is not removals but making sure, for the Windrush generation, that we get their British citizenship granted as swiftly as we can and at no cost to them.

Yvette Cooper Portrait Yvette Cooper
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rose

Caroline Nokes Portrait Caroline Nokes
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The right hon. Lady has sat silently so far—I am surprised.

Yvette Cooper Portrait Yvette Cooper
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I have been listening, and I wanted to hear the contributions—I will want to speak in the debate on Wednesday. My hon. Friend’s question is important, because I heard rumours that the head of immigration enforcement and senior enforcement officials have had bonuses linked to enforcement performance, including meeting removals targets. I appreciate that the Minister may not know the details right now, but it is really important that she finds some urgent clarity on that. It would be very disturbing to have a target-driven system that rewards people for removals they make, when there are no independent appeals against many removals and enforcement.

Caroline Nokes Portrait Caroline Nokes
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The right hon. Lady has asked a specific question about bonuses, and I have said on the record I am not aware of any such system of bonuses. However, I will undertake to go away and find out, prior to Wednesday’s debate, when I look forward to being able to go over this issue in more detail, with more time, in the main Chamber.

I know, as everyone here and—I believe—everyone in this House knows, that we regard the Windrush generation as being of us and part of us. I believe the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green referred to them as being “part of the furniture”. We regard them as British, but we need to ensure that they have the legal documentation confirming that. Nationality law is incredibly complicated, and I want to ensure that their legal status is cemented as soon as possible. We have made it clear that we wish the process to be simple and that nobody should have to undergo a life in the UK test or attend a citizenship ceremony unless they wish to. Some may, and we would want to make that available to them.

Of course, some may not wish to be British citizens at all. We respect that position, but we still need to confirm their status here—free of charge—as someone able to remain in the UK and access services. This point was made earlier: there will also be people in the Windrush generation who, having worked all their lives in Britain, have retired to the country of their birth but obviously retain strong ties here. We should respect and nurture those ties. Should they wish to come back, we will allow that.

I sympathise with anyone who has found the process difficult, and I would like to assure hon. Members that we are doing everything we can to ensure that it is as smooth as possible. I am pleased that more than 100 people have now been issued with the documentation they sought, but please be assured that I am in no way complacent about that. We will continue to improve the service provided.