WEBVTT - Reparations Gone Wrong 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:08.520 Anthony Williams has been living in the UK since he 0:00:08.600 --> 0:00:11.600 was about seven years old. He came over with his 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:15.240 parents in the seventies from Jamaica, a former British colony. 0:00:16.079 --> 0:00:18.520 He went straight from school to the British Army, serving 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:23.759 for thirteen years and now lives in Birmingham. But he 0:00:23.840 --> 0:00:26.520 lost his job as a janitor because he couldn't prove 0:00:26.600 --> 0:00:30.160 he was a citizen. To make matters worse, he didn't 0:00:30.200 --> 0:00:33.520 qualify for unemployment benefits either, and that's when it all 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:38.080 hit the fan that always be entitled to maybe benefits 0:00:38.080 --> 0:00:42.600 because I was not any system that was pure confusion. 0:00:42.800 --> 0:00:47.080 And that's truly Anthony wasn't the only person experiencing this 0:00:47.240 --> 0:00:50.440 rude awakening. There's a name for the thousands of black 0:00:50.479 --> 0:00:54.000 people in Britain who, like Anthony, suddenly and for the 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:58.800 first time, found their citizenship status in question. They're part 0:00:58.800 --> 0:01:02.840 of a group called the wind Rush generation. The Empire 0:01:02.880 --> 0:01:06.240 wind Rush was a ship that in brought hundreds of people, 0:01:06.600 --> 0:01:09.640 mostly black, from British colonies in the Caribbean to help 0:01:09.680 --> 0:01:13.160 rebuild the United Kingdom after World War Two. From that 0:01:13.200 --> 0:01:16.200 point on, the UK saw a wave of arrivals from 0:01:16.200 --> 0:01:19.320 the islands that would last over the next twenty five years. 0:01:20.120 --> 0:01:23.679 The earliest arrivals came over as citizens of the British Empire, 0:01:24.440 --> 0:01:26.680 and those who came later were granted all the rights 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:31.280 provided to anyone born in the UK. But in a 0:01:31.319 --> 0:01:34.360 surge of immigration from Europe and criticism that the government 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:37.319 was losing its grip on its borders resulted in a 0:01:37.360 --> 0:01:42.399 broad crackdown on what the government called illegal migrants. That 0:01:42.440 --> 0:01:45.520 made things complicated for people like Anthony who had never 0:01:45.560 --> 0:01:49.840 been considered illegal migrants before, but who also didn't have 0:01:49.920 --> 0:01:52.760 the paperwork to prove their right to be in the country. 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:58.120 Many lost access to jobs, education, health care. Some were 0:01:58.160 --> 0:02:02.920 even deported. It is of Barbados or someone and actually 0:02:02.960 --> 0:02:07.000 makes it something to chea may. Regardless, whatever problem that 0:02:07.040 --> 0:02:10.640 seemed to be, a lot of people gained. Deporting back 0:02:10.680 --> 0:02:16.000 to our countries who have been in UK was the problem. Then, 0:02:17.240 --> 0:02:20.919 after public outcry over the mistreatment of the wind Rush generation, 0:02:21.639 --> 0:02:26.920 something remarkable happened. The wind Rush generation helped to build 0:02:26.919 --> 0:02:30.480 the country that we are today. And I want to 0:02:30.520 --> 0:02:33.760 dispel any impression that my government is in some sense 0:02:33.800 --> 0:02:36.920 clamping down on kind of world citizens, particularly those in 0:02:36.919 --> 0:02:40.880 the Caribbean who worked a life here. The Home Secretary 0:02:41.000 --> 0:02:45.120 apologized to her commons yesterday for any anxiety calls, and 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:49.360 I want to apologize to you today. Prime Minister Theresa 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:53.480 May herself in the UK government apologized and set aside 0:02:53.560 --> 0:02:58.040 what they called compensation for the harm cast. Only a 0:02:58.080 --> 0:03:02.120 handful of governments have ever done this. It's a big deal. 0:03:03.280 --> 0:03:07.400 But making amends for past injustices is that such an 0:03:07.400 --> 0:03:11.919 easy feat? That's something Alexandra Anger, who headed the wind 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:17.080 Rush compensation policy, would soon find out. I thought that 0:03:17.120 --> 0:03:21.080 this was a real opportunity, having myself worked in the 0:03:21.240 --> 0:03:24.960 area of truth and reconciliation. But little did I know 0:03:25.160 --> 0:03:35.320 that really wasn't the plan. It is the scandal which 0:03:35.360 --> 0:03:39.440 shamed Britain. Thousands from the so called wind Rush generation 0:03:39.560 --> 0:03:43.600 who came here legally were then told they were here illegally. 0:03:43.960 --> 0:03:47.480 The data shows that the median white family has ten 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:51.800 times more wealth than the average black family. Economists often 0:03:51.880 --> 0:03:55.800 point to the absence of African American generational wealth. It 0:03:56.000 --> 0:04:00.200 is inhumane and cruel for so many of that wind 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:05.160 Druss generation to have suffered so long. It's much easier 0:04:05.200 --> 0:04:08.240 to integrate a lunch content than it is to guarantee 0:04:08.240 --> 0:04:11.080 an annual income. For instance, to get rid of positive 0:04:11.640 --> 0:04:15.800 hundreds of Black Britons were failed who after decades were 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:25.400 British but not British enough. Welcome back to the paycheck. 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:29.600 I'm Jackie Simmons and I'm Rebecca Greenfield. In our last 0:04:29.640 --> 0:04:33.080 episode we talked about the movement to pay reparations in 0:04:33.120 --> 0:04:36.240 the United States. The money would go to descendants of 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:40.320 people who were enslaved to acknowledge the harm done, and 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:43.039 a knock on effect is that it helps close the 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:47.040 racial wealth gap. Last week, the House advanced a bill 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:50.800 that would study reparations for descendants of slaves, but any 0:04:50.800 --> 0:04:54.440 payments to black people still face a major uphill battle. 0:04:55.080 --> 0:04:57.680 There are other countries that have given cash payments to 0:04:57.760 --> 0:05:02.200 populations for persecution andcluding our friends just across the Atlantic, 0:05:03.040 --> 0:05:05.039 the UK is in the midst of what it calls 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:08.440 a compensation scheme to pay back members of the wind 0:05:08.520 --> 0:05:11.760 Rush generation. The story of wind Rush might sound like 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:15.240 an immigration story, but it's also a story about black 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:20.080 economic inequality in the UK. Around four of the UK 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:25.240 population is non white, and in London of residents are 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:30.600 ethnic minorities. Many of those people immigrated from former British colonies, 0:05:31.040 --> 0:05:34.440 some of them descendants of slaves, and when they came 0:05:34.480 --> 0:05:38.000 to the UK they faced discrimination in where they could 0:05:38.000 --> 0:05:41.520 live and what jobs they could have. They also faced 0:05:41.560 --> 0:05:46.240 outright violence based on their race, much like in the US. 0:05:46.279 --> 0:05:50.360 Some of that historic discrimination manifests in a vast racial 0:05:50.360 --> 0:05:54.799 wealth gap today. A recent report found white British households 0:05:54.839 --> 0:05:57.680 have nine times the median total wealth of a family 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:00.960 headed by someone from a black African background, and more 0:06:01.000 --> 0:06:03.360 than twice the proportion of black people live in low 0:06:03.400 --> 0:06:07.440 income households than white people. But the wind Rush compensation 0:06:07.480 --> 0:06:11.000 scheme wasn't set up to address any of that. The 0:06:11.040 --> 0:06:14.359 government has approached it more like fixing a bureaucratic error, 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:17.840 which is partly why it's less of a model and 0:06:17.920 --> 0:06:22.560 more of a cautionary tale. Olivia Carnte Hulu, a reporter 0:06:22.600 --> 0:06:29.960 in Bloomberg's London bureau, has more m Let's go back 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:32.760 to Anthony Williams. He's the man you heard about at 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:35.159 the start of the show. Things were fine for him 0:06:35.240 --> 0:06:37.320 until shortly after he started a job as a head 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:40.640 janitor in two thousand and thirteen. He was then told 0:06:40.640 --> 0:06:43.279 he was no longer employable and he didn't have the 0:06:43.400 --> 0:06:47.440 right to work in the UK. A year earlier, Thereason May, 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:50.320 who at that time was Home Secretary and leading the 0:06:50.320 --> 0:06:53.599 government's new immigration strategy, brought in what would become known 0:06:53.640 --> 0:06:57.240 as the Hostile Environment. She introduced a series of new 0:06:57.279 --> 0:07:02.480 measures which included requiring landlords, the National Health Service, charities 0:07:02.520 --> 0:07:06.520 and other organizations to carry out ID checks. The government 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:10.000 also starts a communication drive across London, telling people who 0:07:10.080 --> 0:07:13.120 they called illegal immigrants to go home or face being 0:07:13.200 --> 0:07:16.680 arrested and detained. The aim was to make the UK 0:07:16.840 --> 0:07:20.240 a really harsh place to live for undocumented migrants. We 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:22.880 want to ensure that only legal migrants have access to 0:07:22.920 --> 0:07:26.240 the labor market, free health services, housing, bank accounts and 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:29.200 driving licenses. And it is not just about making the 0:07:29.280 --> 0:07:32.360 UK a more hostile place for illegal migrants. It is 0:07:32.400 --> 0:07:38.520 also about fairness. The national if you like narrative was around. 0:07:39.520 --> 0:07:42.680 We've got to show that if you don't have the 0:07:42.800 --> 0:07:46.320 right to be here, we're gonna make it really hostile 0:07:46.800 --> 0:07:53.720 so you leave. Unfortunately, people who had the absolute right 0:07:53.800 --> 0:07:57.360 to be here, who had come from the Commonwealth, often 0:07:57.440 --> 0:08:01.880 of their parents. They were being told, if you can't 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:04.520 prove you've got the right to be here. We're going 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:08.480 to take away your access to your job, to healthcare, 0:08:08.840 --> 0:08:15.520 to education. And this was shocking because you know, there'd 0:08:15.560 --> 0:08:20.480 always been this idea that if you'd come from the Commonwealth, 0:08:20.840 --> 0:08:23.120 you just had the right to be here. You you 0:08:23.120 --> 0:08:26.400 didn't need to prove the right to be here. That's 0:08:26.400 --> 0:08:30.240 Alexandra Anchor from the Windress Compensation scheme. She's worked as 0:08:30.240 --> 0:08:34.400 a barrister and an expert on restorative justice. Alexandra's not 0:08:34.440 --> 0:08:37.720 from the Windress generation herself, but the father's from Garnet 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:40.120 and she knew someone whose parent was a fellow ger 0:08:40.160 --> 0:08:43.600 name who was caught up in the scandal. Anthony, who 0:08:43.679 --> 0:08:46.880 never needs any paperwork before found out he was lacking 0:08:46.920 --> 0:08:49.360 crucial proof of his right to work, which made it 0:08:49.360 --> 0:08:52.160 impossible for him to get a job. And what he 0:08:52.200 --> 0:08:56.160 saw in newspapers about the government's new immigration strategy scared him. 0:08:57.040 --> 0:08:59.520 How people get picked up on the streets. The van 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:03.120 had been around with a massive sign saying if you're 0:09:03.120 --> 0:09:06.560 here illegally, pack three bags, we were coming to get you. 0:09:07.000 --> 0:09:09.320 That kind of stuff and put really frightened people. So, 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:10.760 you know, I mean, some people are on the ground. 0:09:11.160 --> 0:09:13.480 The money was sure. I mean, come the winter, Tom, 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:15.520 I did the stupid things like I just turned my 0:09:15.559 --> 0:09:19.280 fridge off. It is that cold in the flat. Anthony's 0:09:19.280 --> 0:09:23.800 limbo lasted five years. During that time, he couldn't access healthcare. 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:26.439 He was unable to get treatment when he had a 0:09:26.480 --> 0:09:29.760 serious gum infection and lost most of his teeth. I 0:09:29.840 --> 0:09:31.800 was confused. I think that was going on, and I 0:09:31.840 --> 0:09:34.200 believe that was I was the only person exactly too. 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:36.840 I didn't have no one to talk to about it, really, 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:38.280 because it's not I don't I don't want to talk 0:09:38.280 --> 0:09:41.280 about because of my past being that being in the army, 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:43.959 and now I'm being treated in this way and it's 0:09:44.000 --> 0:09:47.079 a it's actually hurting my pride of it. They really 0:09:47.080 --> 0:10:01.640 have to really nderstand why this is a story about 0:10:01.720 --> 0:10:04.640 racial dynamics in the UK. We have to go back 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:08.959 a few centuries well before, when the Empire wind Rust 0:10:09.000 --> 0:10:11.199 sailed into the Tilbury Docks in the east of England, 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:15.440 carrying hundreds of people to help the country rebuild. I 0:10:15.480 --> 0:10:18.560 talked to my colleague from City Lab Brenon Mock, who's 0:10:18.600 --> 0:10:21.120 written about the history of afric Caribbeans in the UK 0:10:21.720 --> 0:10:26.360 and about how the wind Dress generation fits in Hey Brenon, Hey, Olivia. 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:29.600 So I wrote about this last year for Bloomberg City 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:33.000 lab and it's important to understand that the United Kingdom 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:36.320 colonized many of the Caribbean islands in the sixteen hundreds, 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:39.440 and in the centuries that followed, they'd go on to 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:42.840 form a key part of the Empire's trade network. The 0:10:42.920 --> 0:10:45.920 colonies took millions of black people from Africa to work 0:10:45.960 --> 0:10:50.319 on sugar plantations in London's Financial District, became the center 0:10:50.360 --> 0:10:54.960 of an economic system built on Caribbean slavery. When slavery 0:10:55.160 --> 0:10:58.839 ended across the British Empire in the eighteen thirties, white 0:10:58.840 --> 0:11:03.440 elites and governors stopped investing in infrastructure, education, and business 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:07.480 development on these islands. So to achieve some semblance of 0:11:07.480 --> 0:11:11.439 economic mobility, the newly freed Afro Caribbeans traveled to other 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:14.120 parts of the British Empire and also the Americans to 0:11:14.120 --> 0:11:17.080 earn money, much of which they sent back to their families. 0:11:19.120 --> 0:11:21.880 World War Two is a massive turning point for Britain 0:11:22.000 --> 0:11:25.840 and its relationship with its Caribbean colonies. Thousands of people 0:11:25.880 --> 0:11:29.000 from the islands joined the armed forces as British subjects 0:11:29.440 --> 0:11:31.640 and When the fighting was over, many of them traveled 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:33.880 to Britain to help rebuild the nation they felt a 0:11:33.960 --> 0:11:37.840 sense of loyalty to, and this is where we're beginning 0:11:37.840 --> 0:11:41.199 our story of the wind Rush generation. Many of their 0:11:41.240 --> 0:11:44.480 ancestors were enslaved and their children were considered subjects of 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:47.400 the British Empire and its colonies, so many of them 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:52.200 weren't really immigrants, at least not those first arrivals. Yet 0:11:52.280 --> 0:11:57.520 the new Afro Caribbean arrivals experienced both over in casual racism, 0:11:57.559 --> 0:12:00.720 they were harassed and because white people refused to work 0:12:00.760 --> 0:12:05.280 alongside them, they were denied jobs. The day the Empire, 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:08.600 when Russia arrived in England, a group of lawmakers wrote 0:12:08.600 --> 0:12:11.400 to the Prime Minister warning about the consequences of what 0:12:11.520 --> 0:12:19.520 they call quote an influx of colored people. Today, some 0:12:19.600 --> 0:12:22.319 people are proud of the UK's imperial history, when at 0:12:22.320 --> 0:12:24.520 one point it held power over around quarter of the 0:12:24.520 --> 0:12:28.560 world's population. Othersly the period is one of huge economic 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:31.240 exploitation and human suffering, which was the starting point for 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:33.960 gaping and equality, not just within the UK but across 0:12:34.000 --> 0:12:36.720 the globe. And then there's thads who see the truth 0:12:36.720 --> 0:12:39.960 that somewhere in between the two. One thing is clear. 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:43.480 Over the years, Black communities in Britain have registered their 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:47.160 anger with what they see is continued unequal treatment. When 0:12:47.200 --> 0:12:50.160 the US police officer murdered George Floyd last year, there 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:52.480 was an outpouring of grief for the discrimination that black 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:55.600 people have experienced in the UK that explodes into a 0:12:55.640 --> 0:12:57.920 series of protests like the ones we saw in the US. 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:00.920 Much of that frustration was targeted at how the wind 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:04.000 Dress generation has been treated. There's been a lot of 0:13:04.040 --> 0:13:07.400 soul searching since then. Financial heavyweights in the City of 0:13:07.440 --> 0:13:09.640 London have begun to apologize for the roles they played 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:13.199 in financing and profiting from the slave trade. The wind 0:13:13.240 --> 0:13:16.840 Dress compensation scheme was established before the George Floyd protests. 0:13:17.160 --> 0:13:19.400 It was never about trying to address these wider issues 0:13:19.440 --> 0:13:23.800 and apologizing for racism and slavery. It's about making amends 0:13:23.920 --> 0:13:29.720 for a series of errors. The most significant of those 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:33.120 mistakes took place in the nineteen seventies, about a decade 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:37.120 after the majority of British colonies became independent. There was 0:13:37.160 --> 0:13:39.880 a growing feeling within the government but also across the 0:13:39.960 --> 0:13:42.360 country that too many people were coming to live in 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:45.760 Britain so they introduced legislation to make it harder for 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:49.000 people to get to the UK. One of those laws 0:13:49.040 --> 0:13:51.200 decided that everyone who arrived in the country from the 0:13:51.240 --> 0:13:56.360 former empire before nineteen seventy three could stay, but authorities 0:13:56.400 --> 0:13:58.679 kept no official record of everyone that they gave that 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:03.040 permission to. There was no paperwork or any kind of identification, 0:14:03.120 --> 0:14:06.640 in what has since been called a profound institutional failure 0:14:07.000 --> 0:14:11.440 by an independent review. Then in two thousand and ten, 0:14:11.720 --> 0:14:14.400 the Home Office, the ministry in charge of Domestic Affairs, 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:18.040 destroyed the immigrants landing cards. It says that decision was 0:14:18.080 --> 0:14:20.960 for data protection reasons and they didn't think the information 0:14:21.000 --> 0:14:24.640 on the cars was that important. The Black Caribbean British 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:27.160 residents were left with absolutely no way of proving their 0:14:27.240 --> 0:14:29.520 right to live in the country, and they had never 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:34.480 needed that until the hostile environment policies were introduced. We'll 0:14:34.480 --> 0:14:36.640 probably never know how many members of the win Dress 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:39.840 generation got caught up in this policy. It's safe to 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:46.640 say thousands. The compensation scheme that the UK government came 0:14:46.720 --> 0:14:48.840 up with aimed to right the wrongs of the scandal, 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:54.000 paying what they described as quote eligible individuals who did 0:14:54.000 --> 0:14:56.480 not have the right documentation to prove their status in 0:14:56.520 --> 0:14:58.960 the UK and suffered adverse effects on their life as 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:02.760 a result. To achieve this, they've break down all the 0:15:02.800 --> 0:15:05.200 way someone could have been effecting, from losing their job 0:15:05.280 --> 0:15:08.040 to the general impact on their life and use public 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:13.320 funds to pay for it. I felt really optimistic at 0:15:13.320 --> 0:15:18.040 the beginning, feeling this was an opportunity to go and help. 0:15:18.680 --> 0:15:22.040 That's Alexandra Anchor again. She wants to be involved because 0:15:22.040 --> 0:15:24.600 she knew someone wrongly caught up in the hostile environment 0:15:25.080 --> 0:15:27.920 and understood the price they paid. But as soon as 0:15:27.960 --> 0:15:30.360 the scheme was set up, it was plagued with difficulties. 0:15:30.720 --> 0:15:34.040 Payments were delayed and capped at a level that didn't 0:15:34.040 --> 0:15:37.080 even come close to compensating people who'd been unable to 0:15:37.120 --> 0:15:40.520 work for years. In fact, it was about a full 0:15:40.640 --> 0:15:43.880 year after Anthony applied for compensation that he got an offer. 0:15:44.560 --> 0:15:51.120 It was thousand seven d the synthetics power. That's a 0:15:51.240 --> 0:15:55.760 five years of misery, five years of lost employment, five 0:15:55.800 --> 0:15:58.640 of the years of loss of access to any kind 0:15:58.640 --> 0:16:01.720 of medical treatment. I started laughing at first. I thought 0:16:01.760 --> 0:16:06.120 they're winding me up. Just under nineteen pounds. It didn't 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:09.120 come close to compensating Anthony for the years he hadn't worked, 0:16:09.760 --> 0:16:13.440 and he wasn't alone. The project faced an absolute avalanche 0:16:13.480 --> 0:16:17.040 of criticism. Part of the payments focused on loss of employment, 0:16:17.360 --> 0:16:19.600 but they were kept at the loss of a year's salary. 0:16:20.400 --> 0:16:23.160 Many people, like Anthony had been out to work for 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:27.360 five times as long. For others, the compensation was so 0:16:27.480 --> 0:16:30.800 delayed that they died before receiving anything, and some people 0:16:30.880 --> 0:16:32.880 question why the Home Office was even running the scheme 0:16:32.920 --> 0:16:35.000 at all when the whole mess was their fault in 0:16:35.000 --> 0:16:37.920 the first place. There are a number of problems with 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:40.840 the compensation scheme, and it's the obvious one is that 0:16:40.840 --> 0:16:45.800 the scheme itself lacks independence. The Hostile Environment Policy was 0:16:45.840 --> 0:16:48.240 a policy that was implemented by the UK government, so 0:16:48.320 --> 0:16:50.840 there is a bit of a case of the government 0:16:50.880 --> 0:16:57.800 marking its own homework. He's a top London City lawyer 0:16:57.840 --> 0:17:01.200 who's worked on compensation schemes across Britain, including a case 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:03.480 of one of the country's biggest football clubs involving a 0:17:03.480 --> 0:17:07.320 sexual abuse scandal. He's also studied other cases from around 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.199 the world. He says that all the best attempts to 0:17:10.200 --> 0:17:15.199 write past wrongs have been efficient transparent, their timely and 0:17:15.320 --> 0:17:19.640 used experts. The win Dress compensation scheme hasn't always hit 0:17:19.680 --> 0:17:25.720 those markers. In October two hundred and twenty six individuals 0:17:25.880 --> 0:17:30.920 had been paid a total of two million, one hundred 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:35.480 and eighty five thousand pounds, give or take. I mean 0:17:35.880 --> 0:17:38.400 it doesn't take a great mathematician to work out that 0:17:38.400 --> 0:17:42.360 that means that each person received on average less than 0:17:42.400 --> 0:17:46.600 ten thousand pounds. Meanwhile, Alexandra, working with the team put 0:17:46.640 --> 0:17:49.840 together to get the compensation projects up and running, started 0:17:49.840 --> 0:17:52.680 seeing cracks appear in the whole process. There was kind 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:56.800 of chaos. It was a team that had been assembled 0:17:56.840 --> 0:18:01.240 that short notice, and it meant we had a mixture 0:18:01.280 --> 0:18:04.760 of people. We had people with good hearts and they 0:18:04.760 --> 0:18:08.200 were skilled and expert, but we also have people who 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:12.080 were actually part of the system and they were very 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:23.480 much part of the problem. A public debate emerged about 0:18:23.480 --> 0:18:25.879 the nature of the entire scandal and why it happens 0:18:25.880 --> 0:18:29.600 in the first place. Had the Winter Generation been mistreated 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:33.000 because they were black? Was it really just a mistake? 0:18:34.200 --> 0:18:37.560 The reality is complicated. It was easier for some people 0:18:37.680 --> 0:18:39.960 to see it as a bureaucratic error, and that was 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:41.919 a way to deal with the legacies of racism in 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:45.720 this country. There were some who refused to see this 0:18:46.040 --> 0:18:51.080 as an issue that engaged with race or race discrimination, 0:18:51.760 --> 0:18:56.520 and invariably, though those people who had been harmed were black, 0:18:57.000 --> 0:19:01.399 they refused to see this as anything other than as 0:19:01.800 --> 0:19:06.399 an error, a mistake that didn't engage race, and wanted 0:19:06.480 --> 0:19:10.240 to look at it with a color blindness. About a 0:19:10.320 --> 0:19:13.879 year after Alexandra joined the team, she found her situation untenable. 0:19:14.320 --> 0:19:20.679 Every aspect of it was wanting, from lack of communications, 0:19:21.720 --> 0:19:30.280 the very poor effort around outreach, the continual failure to 0:19:30.480 --> 0:19:36.280 respond to community concern and criticism, and it really also 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:43.800 reflects that the Home Office doesn't really employ that many 0:19:43.840 --> 0:19:48.199 senior black people. So you know, you have an organization 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:52.639 with thirty tho plus staff, but in senior leadership roles 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:58.560 you'll have less than ten black staff. The attitudes of 0:19:58.640 --> 0:20:03.800 some staff were within addictive and disgraceful, and so all 0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:06.720 of those things told me it was time to go. 0:20:07.280 --> 0:20:10.720 Alexandra resigned and ended up leaving the Home Office altogether 0:20:10.760 --> 0:20:13.680 in August last year. The scheme would go on to 0:20:13.720 --> 0:20:16.919 receive so much criticism that in December twenty twenty, just 0:20:17.000 --> 0:20:19.680 over a year after it launched, the Home Office announced 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:22.760 it was overhauling the payment, which included raising the maximum 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:25.280 payment anyone could receive for the impact on their life 0:20:25.280 --> 0:20:29.920 by ten times, and those changes were applied retrospectively. When 0:20:29.920 --> 0:20:32.720 we call in touch with the government, a spokesperson told 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:36.040 us we launched the win Dress compensation scheme to ensure 0:20:36.080 --> 0:20:38.719 those so badly let down get the compensation they deserve. 0:20:39.520 --> 0:20:42.520 They also said since April two nineteen, they've offered almost 0:20:42.520 --> 0:20:49.399 eighteen million pounds, but is it even possible to fairly 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:53.240 compensate someone for these past injustices. Anthony since been offered 0:20:53.240 --> 0:20:55.480 a substantially higher figure than the eighteen and a half 0:20:55.520 --> 0:20:57.560 thousand pounds than he was going to get the fulled 0:20:58.400 --> 0:21:00.639 but that doesn't change what's happened to him. I lost 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:03.320 lost of my confidence. Really, I'm not out going anymore. 0:21:03.320 --> 0:21:06.119 I'm not I don't trust I don't really trust people 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:09.440 that much anymore. And there are at some point now 0:21:09.560 --> 0:21:11.560 where I do regret to join in the army in 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:14.400 some ways, you know, because I gave them. I gave 0:21:14.440 --> 0:21:16.720 them thirteen years and they were thirty years with the 0:21:16.800 --> 0:21:19.159 best years of my life. And what they're doing to me. 0:21:19.240 --> 0:21:24.879 Now there are many others still fighting the payments they 0:21:24.880 --> 0:21:28.719 were offered or who haven't received anything, And all these 0:21:28.800 --> 0:21:30.800 years later, there are still people to stay waiting for 0:21:30.840 --> 0:21:34.880 their documents to be soughted out. When you ask Alexandra 0:21:34.960 --> 0:21:37.680 about her role in the program and her decision to leave, 0:21:38.680 --> 0:21:42.359 she looks back with mixed feelings. My father thought, in 0:21:42.400 --> 0:21:45.399 the war for this country. I've got a brother who's 0:21:45.400 --> 0:21:49.200 seen active service, but there were veterans who had got 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:53.080 caught up in wind rush as well. So how do 0:21:53.160 --> 0:21:56.840 I then look my children in the face and tell 0:21:56.920 --> 0:22:01.000 them be proud of your country. Your countries got you 0:22:02.400 --> 0:22:08.320 if we have wind rush. So until we resolve wind rush, 0:22:08.720 --> 0:22:13.720 until we resolve our nation's hurt, you know, we don't 0:22:13.760 --> 0:22:16.760 move forward together as a nation. So how did it 0:22:16.840 --> 0:22:19.840 make me feel? It made me feel wretched that I 0:22:19.880 --> 0:22:27.159 had failed, because the cost of failure in successive generations 0:22:27.440 --> 0:22:30.720 could be very great, and I don't want that on 0:22:30.840 --> 0:22:45.240 my conscience. Last month, the UK released a report it 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:49.520 commissioned on racial inequality. It tried to answer tough questions 0:22:49.600 --> 0:22:54.320 about why inequality between white people and ethnic minorities persist. 0:22:55.160 --> 0:22:57.800 It found that the UK has entered a new era 0:22:58.000 --> 0:23:02.280 of participation for ethnic minority who should, and I quote, 0:23:02.840 --> 0:23:07.439 examine the extent individuals and their communities could help themselves 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:12.040 through their own agency, rather than wait for invisible external 0:23:12.080 --> 0:23:17.439 forces to assemble to do the job. This week, a 0:23:17.440 --> 0:23:22.200 group of United Nations experts rejected and condemned that report, stating, 0:23:22.760 --> 0:23:26.000 and again this is verbatim, it is stunning to read 0:23:26.040 --> 0:23:31.000 a report on race and ethnicity that repackages racist tropes 0:23:31.040 --> 0:23:39.280 and stereotypes into fact, twisting data and missupplying statistics. Next week, 0:23:39.320 --> 0:23:42.520 on the season finale of The Paycheck, we explore what 0:23:42.640 --> 0:23:45.399 it might look like to really dig into America's racist 0:23:45.440 --> 0:23:49.960 past and a tone for it. Mississippi sent two people 0:23:50.040 --> 0:23:53.400 to the US capital. One is Jefferson Davis, who used 0:23:53.400 --> 0:23:56.240 to be the president of the Confederacy when it's seceeded 0:23:56.240 --> 0:23:59.720 from the Union. And then the second is James C. George, 0:24:00.280 --> 0:24:04.040 was a U. S Senator, colonel and the Confederate Army 0:24:04.080 --> 0:24:08.920 during the Civil War and also my great great great grandfather. 0:24:10.119 --> 0:24:18.400 Also he owned many slaves. Thanks for listening to The Paycheck. 0:24:19.000 --> 0:24:22.040 If you like the show, please rate, review, and subscribe 0:24:22.040 --> 0:24:25.480 wherever you get your podcasts. This episode was hosted by Me, 0:24:25.640 --> 0:24:30.520 Rebecca Greenfield, Amy Jackie Simmons. Today's episode was edited by 0:24:30.560 --> 0:24:35.240 Caroline Alexander and Rebecca Greenfield. It was reported by Olivia 0:24:35.320 --> 0:24:39.399 connote A Hulu and Brenton Mock. This episode was produced 0:24:39.400 --> 0:24:42.399 by Lindsay Cradowell. We also had production help from Magnus 0:24:42.440 --> 0:24:46.679 Hendrickson and editing help from Francesca Levi, Rakheeta Soluja, Janet Paskin, 0:24:46.800 --> 0:24:50.200 and Jackie Simmons. Our original music is by Leo Sidron. 0:24:50.640 --> 0:24:54.080 Francesca Levi is Bloomberg's head of Podcasts. We'll see you 0:24:54.119 --> 0:24:54.480 next time.