Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 5:45 pm on 10 February 2020.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
The Minister of State, Home Department, Minister for Equalities (Department for International Development)
5:45,
10 February 2020
My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will repeat in the form of a Statement the response to an Urgent Question given by my Honourable Friend the Immigration Minister in the other place. The Statement is as follows:
“Thank you, Mr Speaker. Righting the wrongs suffered by the Windrush generation has been an absolute priority for this Government. People who arrived in this country as little more than infants, who had built lives and raised families here, were told that they were no longer welcome. This should never have happened. It was a terrible mistake by successive Governments and by the Home Office. Since these injustices came to light, the Government have moved swiftly to give those affected the certainty they need.
That is why we set up a task force to help people confirm their status. I can confirm that over 8,000 people have been granted some form of documentation, including over 5,000 grants of citizenship, under the scheme. We have also launched a compensation scheme, to redress the financial hardship suffered by those left unable to work or to access other support systems. To ensure nothing like this ever happens again, the former Home Secretary commissioned an independent lessons learned review.
In recent days, news coverage has referenced extracts of a draft report that were leaked in June last year in the context of a planned deportation charter flight to Jamaica. I am not going to comment on leaks, but let me be very clear: the lessons learned report has not been suppressed. The report is yet to be submitted to Ministers by the independent adviser, Wendy Williams. It will be for the Home Secretary to publish her report once it has been received. It is vital that we allow Wendy Williams the time and space to produce her report without political interference. When it is available, the Home Office is committed to publishing it as soon as is practically possible and will take its findings, and any recommendations, very seriously.
With regard to tomorrow’s charter flight, the Home Secretary is required by law to issue a deportation order for anyone who is a serious or persistent foreign national offender. It does not matter which part of the world they are from, whether it is the United States, Jamaica, Australia or Canada; it is criminality, not nationality, which counts. It is a legal requirement, as set out in the UK Borders Act 2007, introduced under a Labour Government. Just to remind the right honourable Member for Tottenham, he was a member of that Government and did not, as far as I recall, raise objections at the time to its provisions.
We cannot breach the Act, and we will not allow foreign nationals who are convicted of the most serious offences, including rape and child sexual abuse, to remain in Britain. Tomorrow’s flight is about keeping the public safe. It cannot and should not be conflated with the wrongs suffered by the Windrush generation.”
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