But barrister who devised it says many of the concerns are based on misunderstanding

MPs have called on the government to review the Windrush compensation scheme, describing the sums to be paid for individual losses as “derisory” and “insultingly low” and requesting the caps on certain categories of loss be scrapped.

However, the barrister who devised it said many of the concerns were based on a misunderstanding of how compensation would be calculated, and urged those affected not to seek the advice of no-win no-fee lawyers.

David Lammy, the MP for Tottenham, said he was particularly concerned by the proposed payment of £10,000 to people who had been wrongly deported.

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“£10,000 is less than one secretary of state’s gross salary per month. Is this all that you’ve lost if you been locked up, if you’ve been deported? Is this all it costs someone if they’ve been denied access to their family, friends, for decades from their own country?” he asked the immigration minister, Caroline Nokes, in an urgent question about the scheme in the House of Commons.

“Is this the price that you put on my constituents being deported for no wrongdoing? Is this how this government values the lives of black Britons?

“You promised to do right by the Windrush generation, but quite rightly, many of them think they have been misled. Let this be the final betrayal of the Windrush generation. Scrap the caps and compensate them properly for the wrongs that have been done to them.”

His concerns were echoed by the shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, who said: “With this derisory compensation scheme, the Windrush generation has been let down again.”

She said the scheme “compares very unfavourably with the criminal injuries compensation scheme”. Abbott also expressed frustration that shadow ministers were not given sight of the detailed rules and tariffs before the scheme’s announcement last week, when the home secretary, Sajid Javid, told parliament there was to be no total cap.

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Describing the scheme as “shoddy, unfair and unjust”, she said a flat payment of £500 for people denied access to higher education was “pitiful” when research showed the value of higher education over a lifetime amounts to tens of thousands of pounds.

However, Martin Forde, the barrister who spent 11 months devising the scheme, said: “It is completely inaccurate to suggest that somebody who was wrongfully deported would only receive £10,000 – unless they were returned to the UK on the same day that they were deported.

“If they were in employment and the deportation caused them to lose access to employment, they would get their loss of earnings for the whole period that they were out of the country.”

If someone had been earning £15,000 a year, and they were out of the country for 10 years, they would be eligible for a payment of £150,000 for loss of earnings, £10,000 for the deportation and an uncapped figure for the impact on family life, he said.

If family members in the UK sent money to support them while they were away, this could also be reclaimed. Equally, if close family members experienced distress and anxiety, they would also have a claim for compensation, Forde added.

“I am anxious that people affected are not driven into the arms of lawyers who may wish to take advantage of their situation by offering their service for a percentage of the compensation awarded,” he said.

Nokes said it was important to see the individual sums cited in the rules as part of a package of compensation, and said they did not represent the total sum likely to be paid. The impact on people’s lives overall would also be taken into account and compensated for.

“It is really important that we see the impact on people’s daily life and their mental health reflected, and I believe that this scheme enables us to do that,” she said. “We are still ashamed of what happened and desperately trying to put things right by this scheme.”

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Nokes said a £10,000 payment for deportation was a higher and “more appropriate figure” than the £1,000 available under existing schemes for wrongful deportation. “The Home Office is determined to help claimants establish the actual level of loss,” she added.

She also said there was a misunderstanding about how the scheme worked, stressing there were two routes to getting compensation – those who were able to provide documentary evidence of a loss incurred would in some compensation categories be reimbursed the full amount spent. Those who no longer had the documentary evidence may be paid a flat fee.

Javid announced last week that there was a £200m fund to compensate an estimated 15,000 people affected by Home Office decisions to misclassify long-term British residents as illegal immigrants. But there was no reliable estimate of how many people were affected by the mistakes and the total amount paid out could exceed £570m, government documents revealed, if as many as 30,000 people apply.

• This article was amended on 16 April 2019. An earlier version suggested that the Home Office would pay legal fees in full if claimants had kept their receipts. The Home Office says that this is not the case and that compensation for legal fees will be capped at £500 per Home Office application made.