Asked by: Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Murray of Blidworth on 10 July (HL8747), how many claims are yet to be settled under the Windrush Compensation Scheme; and when they expect those claims to be settled.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The latest Transparency data for the Windrush Compensation Scheme was published on 21 June 2023, which covers the period up to the end of May 2023.
We understand ‘yet to be settled’ to mean claims which have not received a final decision and are in the ‘Work in Progress’ category.
The requested information, regarding how many claims are in the ‘Work in Progress’ (WIP) category can be found on Tab WCS_05 of Windrush Compensation Scheme data: May 2023 - GOV.UK
The Transparency data note 12 defines WIP as “WIP defined as claims at Registration, Eligibility, Preliminary Payment Consideration, Casework and QA stages, excluding any claim that has received a final offer at Payment, and any claim at Tier 1 and Tier 2.”
The department does not impose time limit targets for concluding claims, as each person’s claim is deeply personal and deserves to be processed with the utmost care and sensitivity. This holistic approach necessarily takes time but is ultimately beneficial to individuals.
Asked by: Bambos Charalambous (Labour - Enfield, Southgate)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of the progress of the Windrush compensation scheme.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The victims of the Windrush scandal suffered terrible injustices, and this Government remains steadfast in our commitment to do everything in our power to right the wrongs. We are determined to ensure everyone who was affected receives every penny of the compensation to which they are entitled at the earliest point possible. The Windrush Compensation Scheme is making significant progress towards achieving this aim. As at the end of May 2023 the scheme had paid or offered more than £75 million in compensation and over 66% of claims received by the end of May 2023 had been given a final decision.
Since its launch, the Home Office has continued to listen and respond to feedback from affected communities and stakeholders about how the Scheme operates and its accessibility. The changes made to the Scheme in December 2020 and August 2022, mean people receive significantly more money more quickly. Last year redesigned claim forms were published along with refreshed casework guidance, with the aim of reducing the time taken to process claims and improving individuals’ experiences of applying to the Scheme. Changes were also made to the Homelessness category and a new ‘Living Costs’ category was created, to compensate close family members for certain contributions to a primary claimant’s living costs. These significant and positive policy changes were made following consultation with claimants and stakeholders.
Asked by: Claudia Webbe (Independent - Leicester East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many applicants for compensation under the Windrush compensation scheme died while waiting for a decision on their application.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Windrush Compensation Scheme staff are working hard to ensure where they are aware of claimants with critical or life-limiting illnesses, their cases are prioritised.
In the unfortunate circumstances where a claimant has passed away after submitting a compensation claim, but before the claim is fully resolved, the team continues to work closely with the appointed representative, usually members of the family, to ensure the compensation payment is made as quickly as possible to the family member.
The latest Transparency data is available at Gov.UK: Windrush Compensation Scheme data: May 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Please note that this data is manually recorded and is reliant on the person receiving the information on a claimant’s death, notifying the Windrush Compensation Scheme to record this information.
Asked by: Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what progress they have made in dealing with compensation claims by Windrush victims.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The victims of the Windrush scandal suffered terrible injustices, and this Government remains steadfast in our commitment to do everything in our power to right the wrongs. We are determined to ensure everyone who was affected receives every penny of the compensation to which they are entitled. We are making significant progress towards achieving this aim, and we have now paid or offered more than £75 million in compensation as at the end of May 2023. Over 66% of claims received by the end of May 2023 have had a final decision.
Since its launch, the Home Office has continued to listen and respond to feedback from affected communities and stakeholders about how the Scheme operates and its accessibility. The changes we made to the Scheme in December 2020 and August 2022, mean people receive significantly more money more quickly. Last year we published redesigned claim forms and refreshed casework guidance, with the aim of reducing the time taken to process claims and improving individuals’ experiences of applying to the Scheme. We also made changes to the Homelessness category and created a new category, ‘Living Costs’, to compensate close family members for certain contributions to a primary claimant’s living costs. These significant and positive policy changes were made following consultation with claimants and stakeholders.
Asked by: Vicky Foxcroft (Labour - Lewisham, Deptford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she has made an assessment of the implications for her Department's policies of the report entitled Reforming the Windrush Compensation Scheme published by Justice in 2021.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The victims of the Windrush scandal suffered terrible injustices, and this Government remains steadfast in our commitment to do everything in our power to right the wrongs. We are determined to ensure everyone who was affected receives every penny of the compensation to which they are entitled. We are making significant progress towards achieving this aim, and we have now paid or offered more than £72.5 million in compensation.
Since its launch, the Home Office has continued to listen and respond to feedback from affected communities and stakeholders about how the Scheme operates and its accessibility. The changes we made to the Scheme in December 2020 and August 2022, mean people receive significantly more money more quickly. Last year we published redesigned claim forms and refreshed casework guidance, with the aim of reducing the time taken to process claims and improving individuals’ experiences of applying to the Scheme. We also made changes to the Homelessness category and created a new category, ‘Living Costs’, to compensate close family members for certain contributions to a primary claimant’s living costs. These significant and positive policy changes were made following consultation with claimants and stakeholders.
Asked by: Vicky Foxcroft (Labour - Lewisham, Deptford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to allocate additional funds to the Windrush Compensation Scheme; and if she will make a statement to mark the 75th anniversary of the arrival of the HMT Empire Windrush in Britain.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Scheme has reached its public commitment of deploying 154 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) Executive Office (EO) Decision Makers by Quarter 2 2023. The Scheme also continues to run ongoing recruitment campaigns to ensure the necessary level of staffing is maintained and has continued to backfill those who leave.
As set out by the Home Secretary at the Windrush Working Group Meeting on 24 January 2023, additional experienced EO decision makers have also been deployed on a temporary basis to assist with accelerating decision making; these staff are in addition to meeting the public commitment to post 154 substantive EO decision makers recruited.
Regarding allocating additional funds to the Windrush Compensation Scheme, there is no cap on the amount of compensation the Scheme will pay out. The Government is determined to right the wrongs for affected members of the Windrush generation and will ensure that all funding requirements are met.
Asked by: Vicky Foxcroft (Labour - Lewisham, Deptford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department is taking steps to increase the number of full time equivalent staff working on processing Windrush Compensation Scheme claims.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Scheme has reached its public commitment of deploying 154 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) Executive Office (EO) Decision Makers by Quarter 2 2023. The Scheme also continues to run ongoing recruitment campaigns to ensure the necessary level of staffing is maintained and has continued to backfill those who leave.
As set out by the Home Secretary at the Windrush Working Group Meeting on 24 January 2023, additional experienced EO decision makers have also been deployed on a temporary basis to assist with accelerating decision making; these staff are in addition to meeting the public commitment to post 154 substantive EO decision makers recruited.
Regarding allocating additional funds to the Windrush Compensation Scheme, there is no cap on the amount of compensation the Scheme will pay out. The Government is determined to right the wrongs for affected members of the Windrush generation and will ensure that all funding requirements are met.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much and what proportion of the total budget for the Windrush compensation scheme has been allocated.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
There is no cap on the amount of compensation the Windrush Compensation Scheme will pay out. The Government is determined to right the wrongs for affected members of the Windrush generation and will ensure that all funding requirements are met.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many full-time civil servants above Grade 7 have worked on the Windrush compensation scheme in each financial quarter since the scheme was established.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Home Office does not hold this data in a reportable format.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make an estimate of the average time taken to complete an application for the Windrush compensation scheme in the most recent period for which data is available.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Home Office has no published data to answer this question and the information is not readily available in a reportable format.