Rudd to waive fees in wake of Windrush scandal

AMBER RUDD has announced that British citizenship fees and language tests will be waived for the Windrush generation amid fresh calls for her resignation over the scandal.

Addressing the House of Commons, the Home Secretary vowed to pay compensation and suggested the Government could pay to help people return to the UK from abroad if they chose.

She faced calls to step down after some Windrush migrants were threatened with deportation if they were unable to prove their right to stay. Ms Rudd was also accused of allowing the Prime Minister to use her as a “human shield” over the issue, amid claims it was Theresa May who initiated the socalled “hostile environment” policy which caused Windrush migrants to be caught in the crossfire.

Joanna Cherry, the SNP’S justice and home affairs spokesman, said Ms Rudd should “have the decency to resign”. She added: “The Home Secretary has used Home Office staff as a shield to hide behind, and in turn she herself is being used by the Prime Minister – not for the first time – as a human shield to protect the Prime Minister from the repugnant consequences of policies the Prime Minister authored.

“The time has come for this Home Secretary to bite the bullet – will she emerge from the shadow of the Prime Minister and scrap her predecessor’s hostile environment policy?”

Ms Rudd accepted blame for the scandal but declined to step aside, instead telling MPS: “I want to be the person to put it right.” She also vowed to change the “culture” of the Home Office, after criticising officials for failing to see the “human” side of immigration.

Ms Rudd said in a statement that she wanted “to enable the Windrush generation to acquire the status they deserve – British citizenship – quickly and at no cost.” Then, she said, she would waive the need for a Knowledge of Language and Life test; waive the fee for naturalisation of the children of the Windrush generation who were in the UK but were not British citizens; and would ensure those who had retired to their country of origin could return to the UK, with the cost of any fees associated with this process waived. She said staff were also checking that nobody had been deported by accident.

But she warned that the Home Office would continue to take a tough approach to illegal immigration.