Home secretary Suella Braverman's team vows it is 'not betraying' Windrush generation over u-turn reports

National media outlets reported that home secretary and Fareham MP Suella Braverman was set to abandon reforms promised following a scathing review into the culture of her department.

This included reneging on plans for a migrants’ commissioner, increasing the powers of the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration (ICIBI) and holding reconciliation event, according to sources.

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Now, her colleague Sarah Dines has said ministers and officials were ‘100 per cent committed’ to the pledges that have been made ahead of this year’s 75th anniversary of the arrival of the Windrush generation in Britain.

Ms Dines said in the House of Commons: ‘This government is absolutely not betraying this generation. Successive governments of all colours have failed to step up to the mark, but it is this government that is stepping up.

‘The Windrush generation rightly identified those who are British and had the right to be in this country. This remains separate from many of the narrative issues that have been risen.

‘I am very clear that we must compensate members of the Windrush generation and their families.’

A scandal erupted in 2018 when British citizens, mostly from the Caribbean, were wrongly detained, deported or threatened with deportation, despite having the right to live in Britain.

Many lost homes and jobs, and were denied access to healthcare and benefits.

Solicitor Wendy Williams made a raft of recommendations for change in a 2020 report into how the Windrush scandal happened, concluding that it was ‘foreseeable and avoidable’.

Former home secretary Priti Patel accepted all 30 recommendations. But on reviewing progress made by the Home Office in March, Ms Williams said she was ‘disappointed’ that only eight had been implemented in full.

Some recommendations might ‘never be fully implemented’, she added, because they would ‘need to be continuously reviewed’ to ensure they were having the desired effect.

Reconciliation events with members of the Windrush generation, due to be attended by ministers and Home Office staff, will reportedly no longer take place.