Windrush victims from Hackney and Camden have hit out at home secretary Priti Patel after she said conflating them with criminals who are being deported was “not only misjudged and upsetting but deeply offensive”.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, the Home Secretary said: “The Windrush scandal is a stain on our country’s history.
“That generation made an enormous contribution to our country and were wronged by successive governments.
“To see ill-informed Labour politicians and do-gooding celebrities attempting to conflate the victims of Windrush with these vile criminals set for deportation is not only misjudged and upsetting but deeply offensive.”
Michael Braithwaite, a 68-year-old from Camden, who arrived from Barbados as a child in 1961, lost his job as a special needs teaching assistant for not having an up-to-date identity document two years ago.
The father-of-three said: “I’ve listened to her speak and I think she has no empathy for people like me.
“I don’t know if she realises, or the people who work for her realise, who those people are on the plane. They should talk to people like me.”
Glenda Caesar, 59, who lost her job as a GP administrator when the Home Office wrongly decided she had no right to work in the UK after 20 years in the NHS, said: “She hasn’t taken the time to meet with us or speak with us. How can she know what’s deeply offensive for us?”
Ms Caesar, a mother-of-four from Hackney, who arrived in the UK from Dominica legally in 1961 when she was three months old, said: “She’s never met us. She doesn’t know how we feel.”
While stating she did not condone crime, Ms Caesar said if the prisoners being deported spent their childhoods in the UK then she could understand how they would feel about being taken to a country “they don’t even know”.
She added: “Why not give a person a second chance? They have already been punished, this is a second punishment, I don’t agree with that.”
Ms Patel said the government would “never stand in solidarity with rapists and murderers” and was “committed to removing these foreign criminals from our country” as they had violated British laws and had no right be remain in the country.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here