UNBELIEVABLE (but maybe not)—A major issue in the UK involving what is basically similar (to the U.S.) poorbrace relationship issues, yet this was the only article appearing in the NYT describing it. I guess NYT just didn't deem it an important issue (maybe they might if they followed UK Channel 4) since it highlights an issue they would rather sweep under the rug—just like everyone else. Frankly, I'm incensed !
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Commonwealth citizens, British Subjects who possibly fought for Great Britain in World War I & II, come to the UK at their invitation, work, rebuild, assimilate, pay taxes etc. They never become UK Citizens,was it implied?? Were they pushed to get citizenship? or is this the same as a "Green Card" Resident Alien status? Whatever that means? Now what would happen if the USA changed the rules on "Green Card" residents there would be a war. However, these people were British subjects which would be greater status than a "Resident Alien" Right? Well this is another case where the rules get fizzy and politicians and law makers are weak.
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One requirement has been, four separate documents proving where you lived every four years since you arrived. Most alive now arrived as children.
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I'm somewhat of a nerd, I suppose, but let's put the blame on my university studies when I majored in European History as the guilty party for my watching Prime Minister's Questions each Sunday. This past week was one of the most heated sessions I've seen since the days of Betty Boothroyd. Typically nonplussed, I have never seen Teresa May look more uncomfortable than she did in trying to say that a Labor Home Secretary was responsible for burning old landing cards that would have helped to clarify the status of immigrants from long ago. No kudos to Jeremy Corbin since he only knows how to attack but offers no substance in return and, to May's credit, she apologized unreservedly to those who had felt harassed by immigration officials who seemed to threaten deportation after 50 odd years. Insult to injury? The Commonwealth was meeting in London as this mess was unfolding. Ouch. My take it the government will survive over this and a forceful apology from a politician is to be congratulated these days but let's say that this hasn't been a good week for PM May.
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How naive for anyone to think that Prince Harry marrying a mixed race American would solve the race relation problems in Britain.
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Why does article bother with irrelevant nonsense like the government's "regrets" and marriage partner choices of the monarchy while ignoring the obvious -- the UK government is using Britex to oppress people with few resources?
Has the journalism's foundation [who, what, when, where, why] been axed-- robbed of the all imperative "why"? Why?
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Certainly, it must be possible to amend the law to account for such cases as Renford McIntyre, and to grant him official citizenship, or else reinstate permanent residency status, and return to him his benefits, but otherwise enforce immigration controls for true illegals, and to actually repatriate true illegals.
This is an unintended outcome, which can be rectified, but it should not be used to oppose immigration controls for newer arrivals, who have come on mass.
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I find the diffences between comments on this article and a previous article on the Migrant Caravan fascinating.
This article elicits sentiments of support for Commonwealth people of color who find themselves in a terrible situation courtesy of right wing xenophobes, but the article on the Migrant Caravan was met with universal condemnation of those who seek asylum in the United States.
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In the US you come you live for half a decade then you apply and become a citizen. Was there no path for them or was it known that a Caribbean passport was good enough? What is applying for housing? Subsidized housing?
Thank you for mentioning those points.
All commonwealth migrants were offered neutralisation papers in the 1970s. Some took them up and applied for their British citizenship, others choose not to with plan/thoughts of returning up and many did.
Since the 1990s you need a valid passport to apply for work, school etc. If you dodged this by going for cash in hand opportunities why be upset.
The blame should be in the individuals not the government.
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We are on the same page Chichi.
“A nation shattered by WW2” means a nation that lost 1/2 a million men a scant 20 years after they lost the better part of a generation of males in WW2. Really so British to take exception to the people you used to remain a powerful nation. Kind of reminds me of all that Irish labor they killed building things like the Rideau canal during the war of 1812
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This is what happens when you issue blanket declarations on immigrants - a lot of innocent people get caught in the crossfire.
I understand why Britain, like the U.S., feels the need to crack down on illegal immigration, but these policies need to be well-planned and well-organized, so that legitimate citizens like the Windrush immigrants aren't hurt.
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The UK is ruled by the Conservative Party. Conservatives everywhere espouse "accountability" for actions. I guess PM is accountable on this. She is the one who should resign, I think. The policy and its implementation lays bare the anti-immigrant, anti-black philosophy of the May government...and these are the people who say life will be better outside the EU, Come On!
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A disturbing article. In the current season of the popular series " Call The Midwife" a West Indian midwife joined the cast. Apparently the series' soft pedaling of the prejudice that her real life counterparts faced accurately reflects Britain's attempts to push this ugly situation under a rug.
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Couldn't agree more, a very biased article.
I was shocked at the number of Island folks living here in Hartford, CT! Thanks for the article.
I find it difficult to fathom that in all the years they lived in Britain no one ever needed to apply for documentation verifying citizenship. Applying for a driver's licence in the province of BC, Canada there is a list of what government documents are accepted or not recognized. Surely, even if a travel document such as a passport was never needed ID confirming the right to residency or Citizenship for voting, health coverage would have had to be presented at some time in the course of fifty or so years?
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These people all had the sort of everyday ID that was all that was needed in the UK until the recent changes- rent agreements, bank statements, utility bills, pay slips, national insurance numbers, school certificates- evidence of growing up, living and working here for decades. All of these were perfectly adequate to identify you to get registered with a doctor, open a bank account, take on a tenancy, get hired or claim benefits (no ID is required to vote in the UK).
It was only when the government introduced an obligation on employers, landlords and the NHS to refuse services unless people could prove that they had a right of residency that people found that they needed official documentation of citizenship. At this point they found that they needed evidence of when they arrived forty years ago and up to four pieces of evidence showing continual residence for every single year since 1973.
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These people *were* issued all the documents they needed to live and work in the U.K. including the equivalent of a social security number.
Imagine that the law in the US (or Canada) was changed to say that you needed an original birth certificate to get a drivers licence. And that the police started telling drivers who had previously valid licenses that they were driving illegally and then locking them up in jail for doing so. Now imagine that the only drivers who got this treatment were black. Welcome to the Windrush scandal.
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Here of course we have an understanding of why Rupert Murdoch controlled media has ceaselessly sought to defame British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. The issue at all costs, at the cost even of British democracy is to ruin Corbyn and Labour for the spoils of a democracy-mocking Conservative government.
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After that business with the football stampede you can’t believe murdock is still a household name...
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Golly, what with the introduction of Acorn and Britbox TV we now know that Britain has their proportionate share of Bubbas and living there is as attractive as living at “cold comfort farm” or Cabrini Towers. And, they too have their share of “guardians of the food stamp”. We were all told how much better the British colonies were ruled as opposed to the French, German, and Belgium colonies - how much better the indigenous populations were prepared for self government. Now, those myths are exposed by new thoroughly researched histories exposing the myths to not only being a crock but hiding a horrific brutal reality. My own uncle on my mother’s side was a member of the Colonial Office in London, later like so many others, serving in the UN as an apologist for the benefits of colonialism and promoting the myth. Good people feel a helpless responsibility while careerist bureaucrats blithely move onto their next post. The British government needs to make restitution, period.
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The question is... who’s worse: us or them? Hint: lots more of us with a much more powerful military, weekly school shooters and a psychopath for a president
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The British -- like us, the Americans -- have much to apologize for. We need to follow the lead of the Germans in the apologies department. The British moved millions (tens of millions?) of dark skinned humans around the world like cattle to further their own economic and political interests in their far flung colonies. When those dark skinned humans were no longer of use to the British, they abandoned them -- thousands of miles from their native countries -- despite the contribution of these dark skinned humans to the British empire. Shame on the British for ignoring their past. Modern Britain would not exist without the hard (often back breaking work) of people from Africa, South Asia, and the Caribbean.
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AS the Brexit vote demonstrated racism and xenophobia are alive and well in the UK. From the Ugandan "Asians" to the Windrush generation all they are doing is "controlling immigration". It is no accident that people of colour get controlled the most!
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This British government is impossible, against democracy and concern for the needs of ordinary citizens or residents. Where is the Britain I have so loved? All I hope for is that this government be turned out of office.
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It’s unusual to see The Guardian and the Daily Mail both united in cause against the government. That just speaks to the level of outrage over here over this. The hostile environment policy is designed to make people permanently anxious and enough to subtly encourage leaving. I suspect they have a similar policy in place for disabled/ill people who need welfare based on some of the cases/premature deaths that have occurred.
Just like in the US, things are not ‘normal’ here at the moment. Ten years ago, Rudd will have resigned by now over this (as would Hunt the other week, but over a different matter). The fact she hasn’t speaks to both May’s political weakness and the divided cabinet. It also speaks to how worn-out the Tory Party are - there is no decent experienced alternative who toes the party line, who wants the job, doesn’t have a history and is anti-Brexit (to replace Rudd, an anti-Brexit, to balance the pro/anti numbers in the cabinet).
Rudd was once seen as a possible PM not too long ago, until the last election anyway which reduced Rudd’s majority to less than 1000 and she may well get kicked out in the next election. May herself (very anti-immigration) also bears a large portion of responsibility for the Windrush scandal, and making Rudd a scapegoat only speaks to part of the problem.
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The most remarkable thing about the story is that the Home Office (under pressure from politicians) had taken the attitude that it was better to deprive elderly British citizens of work, homes, benefits and health care and threaten to deport them to a foreign country they last saw as small children than to run the risk of letting someone stay here who came in a few months or years late.
The stories coming to light are not of borderline or doubtful cases, or indeed any case where the Home Office had any reason at all to think the person's account wasn't legitimate. They are simply cases where documentation, demanded for the first time decades after the event, wasn't judged complete.
There is nothing more basic than your right to live and work in the country you are a citizen of. To have that taken away not even on any genuine doubt about your identity but purely because you can't get hold of enough forty year old paperwork is unbelievable.
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Living in the brecknock ,camden rd area of north london in the early seventies there were still cards in the windows of rooms to let saying no blacks ,no Irish .Dogs it seems had become acceptable.
E.Tillotson.
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The Guardian, had a number of articles on this subject and someone commented, and quoted legislation, that inferred the right of commonwealth citizens to move to Britain to study and work was actually meant for second generation offspring of former English citizens that had gone to the Colonies. It was never meant to be applied for nationals from the Caribbean and other Commonwealth countries. My wording of this issue is not verbatim.
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Actual rights and inferred rights are not the same thing.
The other thing the Home Office did was to destroy the ship registers from that time so that people could not prove when they arrived. Nice.
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When will Countries stop using Immigration as a shield when it's really about people of Color? Yet those in Power all go to their Places of Worship hold their heads high and pray. Such Hypocrocy!
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Their places of worship are at their chartered accountant, merchant banker and stock broker.
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I'm not a fan of amnesty for illegal immigrants in the US much, but would accept it as part of a plan to actually solve our long term illegal immigrant problem. However this is entirely different. These people came to England legally and were allowed to stay legally for half a century only to be turned out as they approach/enter retirement. Good on them for getting it fixed.
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Well, speaking as someone who was a resident of Britain during the times in question, I can say with confidence that nobody I knew ever "encouraged" residents of the West Indies to move to the UK and the UK government certainly did not ask British citizens what they thought about this idea. In fact, West Indian immigrants were viewed with suspicion from the beginning, not least because they have consistently had the highest crime rate of any immigrant population in the UK in that they comprise only 2.7% but 13.7% of the prison population, according to wikipedia. So, despite what the NY Times states, they came to the UK of their own volition and they have not been a positive for the country.
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You probably could get a lot of British Immigrants to return to their country of origin if you took the money that Britain extracted from their country of origin during the imperial times and offered the money (with appropriate interest) as an incentive. I doubt Britain could afford it, though....
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There is a book out by Douglas Murray, a British neoconservative writer and commentator. "The Strange Death of Europe" earmarks Windrush immigrants brought over from the Caribbean to fill jobs in the mills and the subsequent arrival of their families as the starting point of massive immigration into Britain. I mention this as your comment that the "UK government certainly did not ask British citizens what they thought about this idea" is exactly what Murray states in his book, their was never any consultation. And that is one of his main criticisms of the immigration policy in Britain and Europe.
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@S Sm the same can be said about the states. How many IT workers and their fellow citizens did the U.S. government ask if it's a good idea to bring in people on H-1B visas, mostly from India, to work in Silicon valley. Or the H-2B visas to fill seasonal jobs like the ones at Trump's resort in Florida to hire cooks and waiters? The fact is those jobs in the mills were private industry jobs needed to be filled with cheap labor. Both countries have representative governments and not democratic governments like ancient Greece. Congress does what it wants by passing laws to benefit corporations that lobby them. This is nothing new so I'm not sure why this issue is brought up as if it should be given serious thought.
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Another disenfranchised group of people are unjustly treated. May the Windrush immigrants be treated with fairness, especially given their age and life experience. What a terrible surprise in one's later years. Shame on the UK government.
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Rudd and May should both resign. All the apologies in the world are completely meaningless until people like Mr. McIntyre get the help they need and deserve. The UK INVITED these people's parents to come and live and work there, and now wants to toss their children aside in the rush to Brexit. Disgusting.
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Reading this article, I noticed too many uncanny similarities to what's going on here at the moment -- could this be what awaits African-Americans in the future?
It's a frightening thought that somehow doesn't seem outside the realm of possibility.
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People being kicked out, after a lifetime of working and paying taxes? Sounds eerily like somewhere else I can think of ...
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This situation is a disgrace. If they were "British Subjects; Citizens of the UK and Colonies" they should have automatically been granted British Citizenship when the colonies were given independence. Especially so if they had been living in the UK for decades at the express desire of the UK government at the time they came.
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I am confused with much of this. I understood (wrongly it seems) that these people who immigrated into Britain came in on passports issued by Britain that indicated their status and that this included legal residency in the UK.
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they did not "immigrate". They were British subjects, who came to work in the UK.
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We are talking about children who came in on their parents' passports. They didn't have documentation of their own and the only official record of their arrival in the country seem to be the landing cards that were destroyed several years ago. Their actual status is not the issue- they are British citizens with a right of residence. However they have been unable to prove that status by proving when they came in and that they have been permanent residents for the whole time since to the satisfaction of the Home Office.
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It's appalling read some of the events that transpired in this article. So the Home Office made rules that they knew would have an adverse effect on people from the Caribbean who arrived to help rebuild the U.S. after the last war but did not to help them leaving some homeless and without work. Then saying they apologize as if that will rectify the damage.
And the not long ago history is even telling:
"As late as the 1960s, Mr. Keen said, notices were displayed saying, “No Irish, no dogs, no blacks.”
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"The Labour Party, in the person most prominently of David Lammy, a black member of Parliament whose parents were Windrush-era migrants,"
Both Mr. McIntyre and Mr. Lammy seem to be around the same age, and both apparently arrived to Britain in the same way: as children of the so-called Windrush immigrants. How is it possible that Mr. Lammy is an MP and Mr. McIntyre has been declared an illegal immigrant? Why the difference in treatment? There are important pieces of information missing here!
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Mr. Lammy was born in Great Britain. The people in limbo are those who were born in the Caribbean but brought to the UK as young children, and therefore didn't require passports at that time.
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Teresa May and Amber Rudd have no shame. They are no better than Trump and The Republican Congress here in the States.
These "Windrush Immigrants" did their bit for Britain when England was being rebuilt. They arrived thinking they were Citizens and when they try to claim their rightful benefits, they are denied. Yet they were good enough to have come rebuild the devastation after WWll.
They all should be reinstated and financially reimbursed.
And here in the States we should be doing the same thing.
Shame on Britain and America. Both shining examples of ignorance and prejudice.
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It's more than that: they were asked to migrate and help rebuild. They.Were.Asked.
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Something the article should emphasize more is that the Windrush immigrants came to the UK legally, stayed in the UK legally, and have a legal right to British citizenship. Which makes their treatment all the more shameful.
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They kind of covered that issue in the article The Empire Haunts Britain.
But as you already mentioned, not clear enough. I my opinion this topic should receive much more attention in the media here in west europe, it hasn't been a really hot topic here in the daily news in switzerland, not the slightest sign of any movement or statement. This is not just a shame for britain.
Similar cases, but not in any comparable size, have occured in switzerland, where immigrants living in here for years, integrated into our society, speaking our language and respected by everyone int their communitiy had to leave. Even after heavy protests from their communities, friends, workplaces or even classmates. Either because of the slow bureaucracy or some simple, but justifiably fault of their own.
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