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British black national protestors sent a message to the murders of George Floyd that “Black lives matter”. We also saw demonstrations from the Windrush Campaigners in Parliament Square – London, sending a strong message to Downing Street,” our lives matter” on June 6 2020.
Glenda Andrew of the Preston Windrush Generation stated “I felt that people were shocked with what they have seen happen to George Floyd. The protest was for people to stand up in response to that and say that it was disgusting and that more justice is needed.”
The Immigration Act 1971, automatically gave settled rights to the Windrush Generation, terms “right of abode”, without any formal Home Office documentation, and the Home Office had failed to keep any records of settled statuses. Over the accessions of Governments, pledging to tighten immigration regulations the Windrush generation was forgotten, and thousands of rightful Windrush minorities began to feel that their lives, their rights were meaningless, in the UK. Â
In 2013 a number of warnings to the Home Office that many Windrush generation residents were being treated as illegal immigrants and that older Caribbean born people were being targeted.
In November 2017, the media started reporting that Theresa May’s government had disclosed that over 57,000 Commonwealth territories nationals who had arrived in the UK before 1973, faced deportation if they could not prove their right to remain in the UK. Coverage of these individuals’ stories began to break in several newspapers, and Caribbean leaders took the issue up with then-prime minister, Theresa May, which followed by the situation being called the Windrush scandal.
2018 April the Windrush Scheme Task Force was set up by Theresa May’s government, to provide helpful support and guidance for the Windrush Generation to prove their settled status, right of abode or an application for British Passports. Also, Commonwealth nationals living in the UK before 1988 have been allowed to apply.