Home Office should be stripped of ‘truly shameful’ Windrush compensation scheme, say MPs

The then troopship ‘Empire Windrush’ docked in Southampton in 195
PA Wire
David Hughes24 November 2021

Priti Patel’s Home Office should be stripped of responsibility for the Windrush compensation scheme, MPs said after a “litany of flaws” was identified in the way it operates.

The cross-party Commons Home Affairs Committee said the scheme should be transferred to an independent organisation to increase trust and encourage more applications.

The MPs said the design of the scheme contained the same “bureaucratic insensitivities” that led to the Windrush scandal in the first place, which was a “damning indictment of the Home Office”.

The scheme was set up to compensate members of the Windrush generation who were wrongly denied their lawful immigration status as a result of Home Office policies.

But the MPs found that, as of the end of September, only 20.1 per cent of the initially estimated 15,000 eligible claimants had applied, just 5.8 per cent had received any payment and 23 individuals had died without receiving compensation.

The committee said: “The treatment of the Windrush generation by successive governments and the Home Office was truly shameful.

“No amount of compensation could ever repay the fear, the humiliation and the hurt that was caused both to individuals and to communities affected.”

It was “deeply troubling” that the Home Office’s handling of claims “has repeated the same mistakes which led to the Windrush scandal in the first place”.

Home Affairs Committee chairwoman Yvette Cooper said the situation was ‘truly shocking’ (Kirsty O’Connor/PA)
PA Wire

Claimants face a “daunting application process”, “unreasonable requests for evidence” and were “left in limbo in the midst of inordinate delays”, the committee’s report said.

“Too often, injustice has been compounded rather than compensated,” the MPs said. “This is unacceptable and must not continue.”

The MPs welcomed changes introduced in December 2020 to improve the system but said the reforms had not gone far enough.

The committee’s Labour chairwoman Yvette Cooper said: “It has been four years since the Windrush scandal emerged and it is truly shocking how few people have received any compensation for the hardship they endured at the hands of the Home Office.

“It is particularly distressing that 23 individuals have died without receiving any compensation.

“Urgent action is needed to get compensation to those who have been so badly wronged.”

She said it was ”staggering, given the failures of the Windrush scandal, that the Home Office has allowed some of the same problems to affect the Windrush Compensation Scheme too”.

A Home Office spokeswoman said: “The Home Secretary and the department remain steadfast in our commitment to ensure that members of the Windrush generation receive every penny of compensation that they are entitled to.

“The Home Secretary overhauled the scheme in December to ensure more money is paid more quickly – since then the amount of compensation paid has risen from less than £3 million to over £31.6 million, with a further £5.6 million having been offered. There is no cap on the amount of compensation we will pay out.

“We are pleased this report welcomes the changes made to the scheme in December and we continue to make improvements, such as simplifying the application process, hiring more caseworkers and removing the end date.

“We firmly believe that moving the operation of the scheme out of the Home Office would risk significantly delaying vital payments to those affected.”

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in