The Windrush Generation and subsequent Caribbean migrants made contributions to British society and the British economy that are now so thoroughly integrated into British life that many people do not think of them as contributions from elsewhere at all.
The National Health Service, established in 1948, was saved from early collapse in significant part by Caribbean workers who answered its recruitment call. Caribbean nurses, doctors, porters, cleaners, and administrators staffed the new health service at every level when domestic recruitment was insufficient. The NHS in the early decades of its existence was a genuinely Caribbean-British institution in ways that have never been adequately acknowledged.
Transport in British cities was similarly dependent on Caribbean labour. Bus drivers, train operators, and station staff from the Caribbean kept London and other major cities moving during the post-war decades. The infrastructure of British urban life was built and maintained in significant part by people who had come from the Caribbean in good faith and were rewarded with discrimination in housing, employment, and everyday life.
The cultural contributions are equally profound. Caribbean music, food, language, and community life have become part of the fabric of British culture. Notting Hill Carnival began as a Caribbean community event and became one of the largest street festivals in Europe. The influence of Caribbean music on British popular culture, from ska and reggae through jungle and grime to contemporary British pop, is pervasive and ongoing.
These contributions were made by people who believed they were coming home, to a country that had claimed them as its own. They deserve acknowledgement that goes beyond diplomatic expressions of regret.
