Windrush victims demand damages
WINDRUSH campaigners have delivered a petition to Downing Street calling for action to address failings which led to the scandal and swift compensation payments for victims.
A group gathered outside No10 to condemn the “barbaric” treatment they have endured after being denied the right to work, access to healthcare and even threatened with deportation.
A scathing report published in March found the Windrush scandal was “foreseeable and avoidable” with victims let down by “systemic operational failings” at the Home Office.
The petition, signed by 130,000 people, urges the Government to “stop any racial discrimination” and implement the findings of the review in full.
Teaching assistant Michael Braithwaite was sacked from the north
London school he had worked at for 17 years in 2016 as a result of the Home Office’s refusal to believe that he was in the UK legally.
The 63-year-old, who arrived in the UK from Barbados when he was nine, said: “I think some criminals get a better cut of the cheese than us.
“It’s barbaric. It is messing with someone’s welfare, their mind.”
The father-of-three has now been issued with biometric ID confirming his status as a British citizen.
However, he said: “My life will never be the same. Leaving the house, I’d be frightened someone was going to come and take me. I’m still rebuilding myself. My family suffered.”