Majority of Windrush compensation claimants still without payment

More than £1m has now been paid out by the Windrush Compensation Scheme – but the vast majority of claimants have still not received payment.

Official figures indicate that, as of July, a total of £1,053,223.17 had been paid out in response to 143 claims.

However, Windrush victims have made a total of 1,480 total claims since the scheme was launched in April last year.

The number of claims received has fallen each quarter since then, with 88 submitted in July 2020.

Since the previous set of figures was published last month, five more claims have been made on behalf of people who have already died, taking the total number to 65.

MPs have previously warned that there is a risk of people dying before they receive compensation owed unless the government steps up its efforts.

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Home Secretary Priti Patel has said the scheme is “complicated” and that she wants to see compensation “sped up”.

The scheme was set up after many people from Caribbean countries and their families were wrongly told they were in Britain illegally.

People from Caribbean countries had been encouraged to come to Britain to help fill post-war UK labour shortages between 1948 and 1971.

The group was labelled the Windrush Generation after travelling on the ship MV Empire Windrush, which docked in Tilbury, Essex, on 22 June 1948.