No 10 refuses Caribbean request to discuss children of Windrush

[Pan Times]

The Guardian - UK

British citizens threatened with deportation to countries they left as children and have not returned since

‘I’m here legally, but they’re asking me to prove I’m British’

 No 10 acknowledged that a request had been received from the Caribbean high commissioners and confirmed that a meeting had not been scheduled. Photograph: Vianney Le Caer/Rex/Shutterstock

Downing Street has rejected a formal diplomatic request to discuss the immigration problems being experienced by some Windrush-generation British citizens at this week’s meeting of the Commonwealth heads of government, rebuffing a request from representatives of 12 Caribbean countries for a meeting with the prime minister.

“We did make a request to the CHOGM summit team for a meeting to be held between the prime minister and the Commonwealth Caribbean heads of government who will be here for the CHOGM and regrettably they have advised us that that is not possible,” said Guy Hewitt, the Barbados high commissioner.

The refusal has given Caribbean diplomats the impression that the UK government is not taking a sufficiently serious approach to the problem that is affecting large numbers of long-term UK residents who came to Britain as children.

Some have been threatened with deportation to countries they left as children 50 years ago and have not returned to since. Others have been denied access to healthcare, lost jobs or been made homeless because they do not have sufficient paperwork to prove they have the right to be in the UK.