Home Office spent £22,000 on failed attempt to stop Windrush report release

Hard-hitting internal investigation found roots of scandal lay in racist immigration legislation

At least 22,000 was spent by the Home Office on hiring lawyers in a failed attempt to prevent the release of a hard-hitting internal report that found that the roots of the Windrush scandal lay in 30 years of racist immigration legislation, officials have acknowledged this week.

The government spent three years attempting to bury a report written by a Home Office commissioned historian, which described how the British empire depended on a racist ideology in order to function" and noted that immigration laws in the postwar period were designed to reduce the UK's non-white population.