The Windrush generation has been failed by the Compensation Scheme

Four years after the Windrush scandal first emerged, the Home Affairs Select Committee has found that the vast majority of people who applied for compensation through the Home Office have yet to receive a penny.

Our report on the matter found that instead of providing a remedy, for many people the Windrush Compensation Scheme has actually worsened the injustices faced as a result of the Windrush scandal.

In late 2017, stories emerged that longstanding UK residents were being wrongly classed as illegal immigrants and, among other services, were consequently denied access to:

• Employment
• Healthcare
• Housing

In some cases, people who had every right to live in the UK were:

• Targeted for removal
• Held in immigration detention
• Deported
• Prevented from returning to the UK from visits abroad

Upon trying to resolve their status with the Home Office, they faced obstacles such as “often insurmountable” requirements for decades-worth of evidence to demonstrate their time in the UK and significant application fees.

As of the end of September 2021, only 20% of the initially estimated 15,000 eligible claimants had applied to the Scheme and only 5% had received compensation. Twenty-three individuals have died before they received any compensation for the hardship they endured at the hands of the Home Office.

During its first year of operation, the Scheme began to attract criticism for making payments too slowly. Despite the initial Government estimates set out above:

• Fewer than 1,300 claims were submitted during the first twelve months of the two-year scheme
• Just £360,000 was paid to 60 claims

Where offers of compensation were received, there were concerns about whether they reflected the impacts suffered and the extent to which people were being compensated for their financial losses.

We found further flaws in the design and operation of the Scheme including:

• An excessive burden on claimants to provide documentary evidence of losses
• Long delays in processing
• Poor communication and inadequate staffing

It is a damning indictment of the Home Office that the design and operation of the Compensation Scheme contain many of the same bureaucratic insensitivities that led to the Windrush scandal in the first place.

Our report welcomes the changes made to the Scheme by the Home Office in December 2020 to accelerate payments and make improvements to the Scheme, but these changes do not go far enough.

We urge immediate action to increase the number of people applying for the Scheme and to ensure that every individual affected is granted some compensation quickly.

There must also now be an increase in the general award tariff, guaranteed access to legal assistance for all claimants, an independent appeal process and greater support for grassroots campaigns and community outreach work to increase confidence in the Scheme.

By keeping the Windrush Compensation Scheme within the very Department that caused the scandal in the first place, the Government has undermined confidence in the Scheme. To increase trust and encourage more applicants, we call for the Scheme to be transferred from the Home Office to an independent organisation.

The Government must now respond to our report.

Our report, The Windrush Compensation Scheme, was published on 24 November.

Detailed information from our inquiry can be found on our Committee website.

If you’re interested in our work, you can find out more on the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee website. You can also follow our work on Twitter.

The Home Affairs Committee is a cross-party committee of MPs responsible for scrutinising the work of the Home Office and its associated bodies. It examines government policy, spending and the law in areas including immigration, security and policing.