Sajid Javid to apologise to 18 of the Windrush generation
The Home Secretary will formally apologise to 18 members of the UK's Windrush generation who may have been wrongfully removed or detained.
Sajid Javid will personally apologise and point them towards a compensation scheme, it was announced earlier today.
Amnesty International said the government's apology to just 18 people was “worrying” and it was just the tip of the iceberg.
The 18 people came to the UK from the Caribbean before 1973 but were unable to demonstrate their continuous residence in the country.
Of those, 11 left the country voluntarily while the other seven were detained before being released.
Javid said: “The experiences faced by some members of the Windrush generation are completely unacceptable and I am committed to righting the wrongs of the past.
“I would like to personally apologise to those identified in our review and am committed to providing them with the support and compensation they deserve.”
The apology comes after a review of 11,800 cases of removals and detentions of Caribbean nationals.
There were another 72 cases where people were "detained temporarily" for between a few minutes and a few hours at the UK border before being allowed to enter the country, the Home Office said.A further 74 left the UK for at least two years thereby losing their entitlement to indefinite leave to remain.
Steve Valdez-Symonds, Amnesty International UK’s Refugee and Migrant Rights Programme Director, said: "The Home Secretary’s apology to just 18 individuals is worrying and brings into question whether the Home Office has a realistic grasp on all the people it has wrongly detained and removed following the exposure of its appalling treatment of the Windrush generation.
“The Government’s focus remains narrow, casting doubt on its willingness to learn the full lessons of what has gone so badly wrong."