A man from the Windrush generation who was forced to sleep on park benches when the Home Office wrongly accused him of not being British is still battling to get compensation.
Delroy Foster, 63, who was born in Jamaica, moved to West Norwood, south London, when he was only three months old.
“I have vivid memories of growing up as a kid in England,” he says, as he reminisces on riding the bus to school reading Beano comics.
“I was the only Black kid at school and a redhead came and gave me a kiss on the cheek and the white boys didn’t like it,” he recalls.
At 13, he moved away and lived in various places across North America.
But when he tried to return to the UK in 2018, the British embassy refused to allow him entry, falsely claiming he was not British.
Last year Mr Foster was advised to make a claim to the compensation scheme, which led to the Home Office being forced to admit their mistake.
His eligibility for compensation has been approved and he is currently waiting for an outcome of how much cash he’ll get.
“I’ve been fighting the Home Office for anything and everything,” Mr Foster says.
After not being able to go back to the UK in 2018, he returned to Jamaica. He is claiming money for the loss of earnings he could have earned if he was able to continue his work as a contractor in the UK.
When he eventually came back to England last September, Mr Foster received no support from the Government.
“They had me sleeping on the streets and park benches until October sometime when they decided to give me a hotel,” he says. “In November, I got a call saying I had to leave.”
Forced to go back to Jamaica again, he only returned to the UK this February.
The battle to settle back in London - where he spent the majority of his childhood - has now been ongoing for half a decade.
“I applied for benefits but everything I applied for I never got. I started making a major fuss and in the last two weeks they sent me £450,” he says.
“I was complaining about having no winter shoes, no winter jacket. They had me out here walking around in the cold with nothing.
“I applied for £5,000 to pay some debt and buy some clothes and they gave me £400.”
Mr Foster adds: “I expected a little bit of assistance from the Home Office but they gave me pennies and nickels. They’re not assisting you to be better. They’re just keeping you in a poverty state.”
Looking back on the Windrush scandal - and why they refused him entry into the UK - Mr Foster says it was all about racism, adding: “They had no other reason to say no.”
The Windrush scandal was when people from the Caribbean, who had been invited to the UK after the war, were wrongly accused of being here in the country illegally.
In 2019 the Home Office - after admitting its errors - opened up a compensation scheme.
However, as of January only 12.8% of the estimated 11,500 eligible claimants had been compensated, according to Human Rights Watch analysis of official figures.
The Home Office says it has paid out £62.72million as of June 21. This compares to the department’s original estimate of between £120million and £310million for compensation pay-outs.
Mr Foster says he has encountered “problems every step of the way” with the compensation scheme.
He describes himself as a confident individual and says he’s concerned that people who are more timid won’t be sticking up for themselves.
“Right now I’m trying to study law because there are a lot of people getting screwed over,” he says. “There are a lot of people who aren’t confident and are afraid to go up against the government.”
Home Secretary Suella Braverman and Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove hosted a reception on Tuesday in Downing Street ahead of Windrush Day today, which marks the 75th anniversary of the arrival of HMT Empire Windrush at Tilbury Docks, Essex, in 1948.
On hearing about the event, Mr Foster said: “They’re always going to take bows for things that they’re not doing. They keep going around saying: ‘We approved however many millions of pounds.’
“I’d like to ask them one question: out of the millions of pounds they’ve approved, how much of that did you pay out to the people? If you don’t give it out, how are you helping the people?”
Jacqueline McKenzie, a partner at the law firm Leigh Day who has helped hundreds of people needing help with their claims, this week accused the Home Office of institutional racism, saying she believed no other group of people in society would be treated "this callously".
Ms McKenzie said the "system is so slow", adding: "It takes about 12 months to get an initial decision. And then those initial decisions are often wrong."
She said her law firm had a client who put an application in and was told he was not entitled to any compensation, but when it was reviewed he was told he is entitled to £289,000.
Another case saw a mother and two daughters go from zero to being told they are entitled to between £70,000 and £100,000.
Asked why there case reviews brought such drastic changes, Ms McKenzie said the Home Office was “inefficient” and “under-resourced”.
"I think there are people in the Home Office who really care," she said.
"I think it's a mixture of inefficiency, lack of prioritisation and institutional racism. I don't believe they would treat another group in society this callously."
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The whole of Government remains absolutely committed to righting the wrongs of the Windrush scandal.
“We have paid or offered more than £75million in compensation to those affected and we continue to make improvements so people receive the maximum award as quickly as possible, but we know there is more to do, and will work tirelessly to make sure such an injustice is never repeated.”
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