HOME SECRETARY Priti Patel has today (Monday 22 June) launched the Windrush cross-government Working Group.
The Group, co-chaired by the Home Secretary and Bishop Derek Webley, brings together stakeholders and community leaders with senior representatives from a number of government departments to address the challenges faced by the Windrush generation and their descendants.
The purpose of the Group is to:
- Provide strategic input into the Home Office’s response to the Wendy Williams Lessons Learned Review
- Support the design and delivery of practical solutions to address the wider challenges that disproportionately affect people from Black and wider BAME backgrounds. This will include programmes on education, work and health
- Advise on the design and delivery of the Windrush Schemes Community Fund
Home Secretary Priti Patel said: “This group is crucial to delivering on our promise to right the wrongs experienced by the Windrush generation and it is right that we advance these issues in a constructive, sensitive and responsible way.
“We know that the best way to make sure we reach all those affected is by listening to them and hearing their voices, including how best to address the wider challenges that disproportionately affect those from BAME backgrounds.
She continued: “From issues affecting education, work and health, this group will support Government to deliver practical solutions as well as advising on the design of the Windrush Community Fund scheme and response to the Wendy Williams review.
“What we need most now is action and I am excited to work in partnership with this group who themselves hold valuable experience within the community and are driven to bring the ultimate change that we all want to achieve, which is making a difference to people’s lives.”
Bishop Derek Webley, co-chair of the Windrush Cross-Government Working Group said:
“It’s an honour to be able to serve members of the Windrush generation who have served this country with dignity and pride, and helped to build this country over many years.
“This Working Group recognises that the work we’re doing can’t be done without the voices of the community, and we will work with them and the government in finding a way forward that would meet the satisfaction of the Windrush community.”
Group members include stakeholders and community leaders representing the affected communities, including Bishop Joe Aldred from Churches Together in England; Paulette Simpson, Executive Director of the Voice; Blondel Cluff, Chief Executive of the West India Committee and Kunle Olulode, Director of Voice4Change England.
All members bring a balance of experience in community engagement and specific sector expertise.
Members also will include representation at a senior level from a number of government departments, including No10, the Home Office, the Department for Education, the Department of Health and Social Care, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Department for Work and Pensions.
Member of the Group, Duwayne Brooks OBE said: “The Windrush Generation were treated terribly by successive governments and it is time this is put right.
“I am pleased that the government is committed to righting these wrongs and I am looking forward to working with the Home Secretary and others to ensure all those affected come forward to claim the compensation they deserve and get the support they need to move on.”
Blondel Cluff CBE, who is also a member on the Group said: “We are at a seminal moment as a nation and as such I welcome the invitation to serve on the Cross-Government Windrush Group, particularly given the evident ‘buy in’ across government.
“I trust that together we shall make tangible, positive, and sustainable progress on this critical matter.”
The Home Office, as requested by Wendy Williams, is carefully considering the Lessons Learned Review.
The Home Secretary has agreed to respond in full by the end of September and has also committed to provide an update to Parliament before summer recess.
The Group will play an important role in assisting with the Home Office’s response by providing insight and guidance, as well as help to ensure that the lessons from the Windrush review are shared across government.
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The Home Secretary Patel Patel has launched the Windrush cross-government Working Group; with Home Office appointed African-skinned Clergymen and women as representative of England’s African-skinned Subjects: who task will be to hold government, the Home Office and the Civil servants to account for illegally exiling English Subjects of Caribbean heritage in 2018. This behaviour from the Home Secretary is classic paternalist racism.
Firstly, England’s African Caribbean administrated Churches have spectacularly failed to create any figure like Dr. Martin Luther King or overtly use their leadership to challenge or oppose or offer the leadership which is so lacking amongst England’s African-skinned communities. The African-skinned Churches have not criticised, challenged, or strongly opposed the litany of colour disparity from Labour and the Conservative government.
For this reason, Voice readers, along with England’s African-skinned people should demand of those people who have been appointed to speak on our behalf, a letter published in the Voice detailing their political views, contribution and explaining how they intend to hold the Home Office to account for the illegal exiling of English Subjects of Caribbean heritage in 2018.
If these Home Office appointed representative care about the responsibility of representing England’s African-skinned Subjects, as a minimum I call on the co-chair, Bishop Webley; Bishop Joe Aldred from Churches Together in England; Paulette Simpson, Executive Director of the Voice; Blondel Cluff, Chief Executive of the West India Committee and Kunle Olulode, Director of Voice4Change England to publicly give an account of themselves and how they intend to hold the Home Office; the Civil servants and the Houses of Parliament to account for the illegal exiling of English Subjects of Caribbean heritage.
It is a form of paternalistic racism for the Home Secretary to appoint people to represent England’s African-skinned Subjects if the representatives failed to publicly seek the consent of those they have been appointed to present.
England’s African-skinned Churches are compliant conservative establishment wish has failed to protect their traditional interpretation of the Messiah’s Gospel Message, and has failed to be relevant to the majority of England’s African-skinned youth.