An access to justice organisation for people subject to immigration control is hoping to support more victims of the Windrush immigration scandal after relaunching a pro bono advice scheme.

The Windrush Legal Initiative, set up last year by the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCIW) in partnership with eight City firms, transferred from JCIW to the Greater Manchester Immigration Aid Unit (GMIAU) in January.

Legal aid is not available for Windrush compensation scheme applications – the initiative provides free advice and assistance.

GMIAU has now received funding from the Access to Justice Foundation to conduct community outreach work to make more people aware of the Home Office’s compensation scheme and support them.

GMIAU solicitor Nicola Burgess, a former legal director at JCWI, told the Gazette: ‘We had difficulty in reaching as many clients as we had hoped and anticipated. This is in part due to potential applicants not knowing they are eligible to apply and for those who do, a reluctance and fear to again engage with the Home Office as the party responsible for the historic injustice they have endured.

‘This is why we are so thrilled to have been given funding by the Access to Justice Foundation so we can conduct community outreach and information sessions to make more people aware of the scheme and more importantly to ensure they are supported and legally represented through the confusing and complex application process.’

Burgess also revealed that accountancy giant EY will provide support. ‘The beauty of having forensic accountants is they can go through voluminous records and calculate the actual losses that have occurred, hopefully allowing applicants to be properly compensated in real-life terms.’

The eight partner firms are Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner, Charles Russell Speechlys, Debevoise & Plimpton, Dechert, Latham & Watkins, Linklaters, Taylor Wessing and White & Case.

On the importance of the scheme, Jamie Wiseman-Clarke, a partner at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner, told the Gazette that the Windrush Compensation Scheme process is not straightforward.

A report published by the National Audit Office last year found that, on average, it takes 154 hours to process a case through to payment approval, considerably longer than the Home Office’s 30-hour estimate.

As well as supporting clients to pull together detailed and compelling evidence to support their claims, ‘our clients have told us that, in listening to, and documenting, their experiences, we have helped them feel validated and shared, to a degree, a psychological burden that they had previously been bearing alone,’ Wiseman-Clarke added.

Today The Guardian reports that a paper commissioned by the Home Office concluded that the origins of a Windrush scandal lay in 30 years of racist immigration legislation. The Home Office told the newspaper it was making progress towards becoming 'becoming a more compassionate and open organisation'.

 

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