I challenged the Prime Minister on his Windrush Record

Only one in four applicants to the Windrush Compensation Scheme have received compensation. On Wednesday I was able to raise this fact with the Prime Minister in his last outing at the dispatch box. One of his biggest failures as Prime Minister, and there are many, has been his government’s continued betrayal of the Windrush generation. The Windrush Compensation Scheme was launched in 2018. Two Tory Prime Ministers later and twenty-eight people have passed away without ever having received compensation and the vast majority of those who have made a claim are yet to receive a penny.

Anybody who cares to listen to those affected can see exactly why the compensation scheme has failed. It’s run by the same department responsible for the scandal in the first place. Many of those affected are simply to terrified of ever engaging with the Home Office again after their lives were torn apart. The underlying problems that led to the Windrush scandal occurring in the first place (including treating claimants as numbers rather than humans, adopting a ‘guilty until proven innocent’ approach, understaffing and under resourcing) remain a part of the Home Office’s culture and fabric therefore the culture and fabric of the compensation scheme itself.

But in his last Prime Ministers Questions, Boris Johnson didn’t want to engage with that record of failure. Instead, he chose to play party politics, mumbling some half-baked nonsense without even attempting to address the question. That was as good an example as we could get of the way in which Boris Johnson’s Government have dealt with the Windrush scandal. Uninterested in the substantial problems, only seeking to deal with any PR issues that might arise from the cruel acts regularly carried out by the Home Office. Unwilling to stop the cruelty itself.

Whoever replaces Boris Johnson, they are unlikely to take a different approach. Years after the scandal came to our attention, justice for the Windrush generation is sadly a long way off.

Heat Wave is a warning

This week Britain regularly broke its record for the highest ever recorded temperature which led to the Met issuing its first ever red warning for ‘extreme heat’. While there was much to enjoy about the hot weather, I know that many of my constituents experienced a lot of disruption and concern as a result of the record-breaking temperatures. With temperatures reaching as high as 39c in Enfield, many trains were cancelled while other services were reduced. But despite the extreme weather TFL did a good job of keep as much of the normal service running as possible.

But the fact is that the UK doesn’t have the infrastructure to cope with this extreme heat. While humanity can still prevent global warming above 1.5 degrees, it’s already too late to prevent catastrophic global warming. That means that even in the best-case scenario we need to prepare for temperatures above 40c being a regular occurrence and if we continue to make as little progress reducing carbon emissions as we have been, we need to prepare for far far worse.

That means that alongside reaching net-zero we need to invest in public transport so that it copes with more extreme weather and make urban environments more extreme heat friendly by drastically increasing green areas and tree cover across cities. We need to adapt the way we live as a result of our failure to tackle climate change and we need to redouble our efforts to stop this crisis from worsening further to the point at which we are no longer able to adapt.

Sunny weather is always welcome, but I hope that this extreme heat wave, which killed hundreds and led to the busiest day for the London Fire Brigade since the second world war, acts as a wake-up call for those in power.

Northern Ireland Protocol

This week the Government pushed forward with its Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, with the Third Reading of the Bill taking place on Wednesday. I voted against it. The Government’s approach to Northern Ireland throughout the entire Brexit process has not only risked the peace process but shown a repeated disregard for International Law.

It is never acceptable or justifiable to break international law and I will never support it in any context or under any circumstances. The Government signed an agreement and now has obligations under the terms of those agreements. It can negotiate for changes and adjustments, but it must not unilaterally break the agreement.  Doing so will put the entire trade agreement with the EU at risk and send out a message to the world that deals signed with the UK, of any kind, are not worth the paper they are written on.

We must avoid creating a hard border in Ireland at all costs and if the Government does not believe that it is practically possible to implement the Northern Ireland protocol without doing that then rather than breaking international law, it should come out and admit that the deal has failed Northern Ireland, risks the peace process, and must be renegotiated

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Thank you for taking the time to read my latest update, if you have any issues that you would like to raise directly with me then please do email  edmontonconstituency@parliament.uk. I’m always happy to help whenever possible.

Kind regards,

Kate Osamor MP