'It still hurts' - British post-war child migrant to NZ weeps as abuse inquiry recommends compensation

Pat Brown never saw her parents again after leaving for New Zealand, and says Britain's apology in 2010 was emotionally draining.

Around 2000 survivors of a post-war child migration scheme should receive compensation from the British government, the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) has found.

One-hundred-and fifty-thousand of 'Britain's lost children' were sent abroad to Commonwealth countries after WWII, with many enduring horrific abuse in their adopted countries.

An inquiry has recommended all survivors receive compensation within 12 months.

While the British government issued a formal apology in 2010, the IICSA has recommended that the surviving victims receive compensation within a year.

The child migrants came from under-privileged families and between 1947 and 1967 there were 549 children sent to New Zealand.

Nelson woman Pat Brown was one of them.

"It should never have happened," she told 1 NEWS.

She was placed with a "fanatical religious" family when she was 11.

"The foster parents we had, they treated us very well. They looked after us well, we were clothed and fed, we had a nice house. But there was no love," she said.

Mrs Brown was in Britain when Gordon Brown delivered an apology in 2010.

"That was the most emotionally draining time I've ever had," she said.

"It was lovely, but the stories I heard from other ones who never had good lives - Australians, Canadians, South Africans who were abused."

While she has now been married for 60 years, with three children and seven grandchildren, she says the pain of being separated from her father still lives on.

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