Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the oral contribution of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department on 17 January Official Report, cols 9-10, whether her Department has decided not to move the Windrush compensation scheme to an independent body for the reasons given by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary.

Moving the operation of the Scheme from the Home Office would risk significantly delaying payments to people.

We can understand the concerns of those who believe the department which caused the issues facing these individuals, is the one also deciding whether individuals are eligible to receive compensation or not. In response to these concerns the compensation scheme continues to be subject to robust internal scrutiny and regular scrutiny from external stakeholders.

The first stage in deciding a claim for compensation is to confirm an individual’s identity and eligibility and this is linked to the immigration status of an individual. It would be difficult to decouple this from the Home Office without increasing the time taken to process an individual’s claim and issue payments.

Since the changes we made to the Scheme in December, the amount of compensation paid has risen from less than £3 million to over £32.9 million, with a further £5.8 million having been offered, and there is no cap on the amount of compensation we will pay out.