Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to help (a) increase the number of eligible individuals receiving compensation from the Windrush Compensation scheme and (b) decrease the time taking to issue compensation.

To the end of December 2021, we have offered or paid more than £41 million in compensation of which £35.3 million has been paid.

Since April 2019 we have attended or hosted approximately 200 outreach and engagement events, reaching over 3000 people.

In 2020, we launched a new national communications campaign, to make sure those most affected around the UK are aware of the support available to them and how to apply for both schemes.

We have designed the compensation scheme to be as clear and simple as possible, so people do not need legal assistance to make a claim.

We have made the evidential threshold as low as possible and the scheme operates fully on the balance of probabilities.

Our intent is that we ask for the minimum evidence necessary to reduce the burden on individuals whilst maximising the offers we can make.

In doing so we are seeking to strike the right balance between ensuring the scheme is comprehensive and covers the broadest range of circumstances and making it easy to navigate.

For those who want or need support to make a claim the Home Office provides free assistance in making applications through our independent claims assistance provider - We Are Digital.

We are processing claims as quickly as possible - this is our priority. However, we recognise we have more to do to decrease the time between submission and decision on claims.

To do this we are recruiting additional caseworkers, directing resources to maximise final decision output and refining our processes so cases progress as quickly as possible, including revising our data-sharing agreements with other departments.