UK Housing Minister to Run Interior as Immigration Scandal Grows

Britain’s Housing Minister Sajid Javid, the son of Pakistani immigrants, was named Monday to take over the portfolio of the Home Office (interior ministry), which oversees  law enforcement, immigration, and counter-terrorism activities.

Interior minister Amber Rudd resigned Sunday amid a growing scandal over the harsh treatment of elderly immigrants who were brought to the country from the Caribbean seven decades ago.

Rudd told lawmakers last week that the government had not set targets to deport people considered illegal immigrants. But documents have since emerged contradicting her testimony.

She said in her resignation letter to Prime Minister Theresa May Sunday she “inadvertently misled” Parliament about the deportation targets.

Housing Minister Sajid Javid, the son of Pakistani immigrants, was named Monday to take over the portfolio of the Home Office (interior ministry),

May and Rudd have been under increasing fire since the so-called Windrush scandal first emerged several months ago. The scandal gets its name from the ship Empire Windrush, which in 1948 brought the first wave of immigrants from the Caribbean to Britain to help rebuild the country in the aftermath of World War II.

News reports have revealed that many of these immigrants have lost jobs, housing, access to medical care and threatened with deportation because they could not produce documents proving their right to reside in Britain, which was granted by a law passed in 1971.

The harsh treatment of the “Windrush generation” apparently stems from a policy introduced by May during her tenure as interior minister between 2010 and 2016, which called for creating a “hostile environment” for illegal immigrants.

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