Holocaust Memorial Day
Baroness Merron Excerpts(2 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Baroness Merron (Lab)
My Lords, it is, as always, an honour to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, and her words of hope. I feel I should say that I feel reassured to be in the company of noble Lords present today, including my noble friend Lord Dubs, who epitomises so much of what and who we are speaking of in this Chamber. I thank the Minister for her sensitive and clear introduction to such an important debate today. I draw attention to my interests in the register in respect of the Jewish community.
It is a privilege to be taking part in this debate today, albeit humbling. Why do I say that? Some events are so devastating in their inhumanity and so instrumental in shaping the world in which we live that, even if we were not actually there, we have a duty not just to remember but to be a voice and a witness. I, too, want to speak today about the power of bearing witness, which is exactly what we are doing in this debate. I have felt this very strongly in meetings I have been at in Parliament in respect of the atrocities committed on 7 October in Israel by Hamas terrorists, who still hold hostages whose fate is unknown. I, like other noble Lords, have seen footage collected from body cameras and CCTV of the horrific massacre that killed more than 1,200 innocent Israeli citizens and foreign workers, the largest number of Jews killed since the Holocaust. The noble Lord, Lord Stevens, was right to talk about the glee with which the terrorists conducted themselves. It was that that shocked me the most, along with the images I saw, which I do not feel I want to speak about again.
I have heard the pain of families speaking of their loved ones among the 240 Jews who were kidnapped and taken to Gaza and of those who were attacked, murdered, raped or traumatised. The devastation continues to be felt by the Jewish community here, which remains in continuing shock while 130 hostages remain in Gaza. This week, I heard of the sexual violence perpetrated on Jewish women in the disturbing testimonies of those who rescued bodies or conducted forensics and prepared the mutilated bodies for burial. In all of this, I feel helpless, as so many of us do, but there is one thing I know I can do: I can be a witness, I can remember and I can speak up. I can speak up both for those who died and for those who are living. That is exactly what we are doing today when we remember the Holocaust and the genocides that have followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur. With the backdrop of the ongoing situation in Gaza and Israel, this debate is particularly pertinent while we are seeing division, tension and the proliferation of anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim hatred in our own country.
The theme for this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day is the fragility of freedom, focusing our attention on the precarious nature of freedoms that need to be protected, and remembering how the descent by Germany in the 1930s from democracy to tyranny shows just how fragile that freedom can be. Let us remember that the mass murder of 6 million Jewish men, women and children did not take place only in the darkness of the ghettos and the camps. Hundreds of thousands were murdered in the bright light of forests and woodlands surrounding well-populated towns and villages. Let us also remember that the Nazis also persecuted and murdered those whom they saw as different: the Roma, the Sinti, gay men, political opponents and disabled people.
As we have heard today, the oppression of Jews did not start with the outbreak of war in 1939. In the six preceding years, Jews were persecuted by more than 400 decrees and regulations at every level of government, including by officials, who took the initiative. In every genocide that has taken place, those who are targeted for persecution have had their freedom restricted and removed before many are murdered. Genocide is after all a subtle and slow process, as the right reverend prelate the Bishop of London reminded us.
There is always a set of circumstances that occur, or are created, to build the climate in which genocide can take place. In Amsterdam, for example, even before the murders and the deportations to concentration and work camps, Jews had to give up their bicycles. They were forbidden to use trams or cars and forbidden to go to theatres, swimming pools or tennis courts, or to visit Christians at home. They were allowed to shop only between 3 pm and 5pm, and not allowed on the streets between 8 pm and 6 am.
On that point, over the summer I had the honour of being asked to review a new book called Nobody Lives Here, which paints a vivid picture of occupied Amsterdam during Anne Frank’s time of hiding through the eyes of Lex Lesgever, a young Jewish boy, the only survivor of his large family and someone whom I have never met. I accepted the invitation because I felt I had a responsibility to bear witness to that young boy’s experience so that he might be heard and remembered, and it was an honour to do so.
We all know that anti-Semitism is the world’s oldest hatred. As soon as the events of 7 October unfolded, I knew it would unleash a hatred of Jews in our own country and, as sure as night follows day, it did. Within hours of the attack, the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas were lauded on social media as an act of resistance. Since then, the global number of anti-Semitic incidents has gone through the roof. Synagogues have been firebombed, the Star of David has been smeared on the doors of Jewish homes, Jewish cemeteries have been desecrated and there have been verbal and physical attacks on Jews. Week in, week out, we see protests on our streets, with anti-Semitic slogans and signs, including calls to globalise the intifada, destroy the Jewish State of Israel and disrespect the Star of David.
In the 68 days following the Hamas terror attack on Israel, the Community Security Trust recorded at least 2,093 anti-Semitic incidents across the country. That is the highest ever total reported to the CST across a 68-day period, and the CST has been recording anti-Semitic incidents since 1984.
My Jewish friends feel the pain of explaining to their children that they must stop wearing their blazers which show that they attend a Jewish school. Colleagues are swamped with vile abuse and threats on social media for being Jewish, or for not being Jewish but speaking out against terrorism. It has left me and many others with an underlying anxiety about what might be said or done to us.
In the last year we sadly lost Sir Ben Helfgott MBE, Holocaust survivor, Olympic weightlifting champion, educator and honorary president of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust—may his memory be for a blessing. Sir Ben touched the lives and hearts of countless people, including me, and I am grateful to him and all those who educate and inform-who take on the scourge of anti-Semitism and those who protect us, including the CST, the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, The Holocaust Educational Trust, the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council. We are blessed to have them.
I am grateful to those who protect us, including the CST, the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, the Holocaust Educational Trust, the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council. We are blessed to have them.
Today we bear witness, and in so doing we honour those who survived and pay tribute to those who did not. It is a privilege to do so.
International Holocaust Memorial Day
Baroness Merron Excerpts(1 year, 3 months ago)
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Baroness Merron (Lab)
My Lords, there are some debates where it feels daunting to do justice to the enormity and significance of the subject. I feel that today, but I also feel among friends and colleagues. At the outset, I declare my interests in the register as a vice-president of Liberal Judaism and the European co-chair of the International Council of Jewish Parliamentarians. I have also been an adviser to the World Jewish Congress and am the former chief executive of the Board of Deputies of British Jews.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, for leading today’s debate in his characteristically powerful way. I continue to be grateful for the diligence and dignity with which he carries out his national and international responsibilities for Holocaust remembrance. I have been moved by the contributions from noble Lords across the House, whom I also thank. The sentiments expressed in this Chamber today will echo far beyond its walls.
I start by speaking fondly of Bob and Ann Kirk, who came to this country from Germany on the Kindertransport. As my noble friend Lord Anderson said, we should be grateful to the likes of Nicholas Winton, who did not stand by, for saving so many. Ann was an only child whereas Bob, whom she would later marry in 1950, was the youngest in his family. His parents perished in a concentration camp in Riga. Ann tells the story of her parents frantically waving as she left on the Kindertransport—the last time she ever saw them.
Many thousands of parents showed unimaginable courage in letting their beloved children go unaccompanied to England on the Kindertransport, with no idea what would lie before them. These were ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Bob and Ann cautioned me on the use of language, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann. As my noble friend Lord Cashman said, it all started with a whisper. They also talked about the value of Holocaust remembrance and what it meant to them, because it could prevent the same devaluing of humans being repeated and the brutal consequences that follow. My noble friend Lord Griffiths read a moving poem that repeatedly asks, “Where is God?” I say to him that Bob and Ann put it to me in a similar way, asking, “Where was humanity?”
Ordinary people just like Ann, Bob and their parents are the theme for this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day. I congratulate the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust on its organisation of remembrance through this fundamental truth. As it says:
“Genocide is facilitated by ordinary people. Ordinary people turn a blind eye, believe propaganda, join murderous regimes. And those who are persecuted, oppressed and murdered in genocide aren’t persecuted because of crimes they’ve committed—they are persecuted simply because they are ordinary people who belong to a particular group”.
The noble Baroness, Lady Greenfield, made an elegant scientific case for the ordinary and the extraordinary, while my noble friends Lady Whitaker and Lord Glasman talked about the relevance of hatred and standing by in our world today.
My noble friends Lady Thornton, Lord Liddle, Lord Watson and Lord Young all spoke of the pain of anti-Semitism that was a stain on the Labour Party. It was a stain not only on Labour but, we felt, on politics in our country. Like them, I acknowledge and appreciate the determination and action of Keir Starmer in rooting it out, which he has done and will continue to do. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, for her commendation of his actions.
This debate resonates deeply with me, reflecting on my visit to the Holocaust Galleries at the Imperial War Museum, no doubt in the same way as it does for the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst. The light and brightness of those galleries is a deliberate feature to highlight that 6 million people were not murdered in the dark, nor did they live in it.
It was a profoundly shaping experience for me, as an MP, to first go to Auschwitz-Birkenau with the Holocaust Educational Trust on its “Lessons from Auschwitz” project. I thank the Holocaust Educational Trust for its work and influence over many years. The project allows young people to pass through the infamous “Arbeit macht frei” gates and through the rooms filled with tonnes of human hair, prosthetic limbs and glasses seized from the victims, to walk along the train lines and to stand at the site of the former crematoria. It has an unparalleled impact on understanding the past, and through reflective assemblies on their return, it often ignites in them a determination to speak out against the anti-Semitism and hatred that allowed the Holocaust to happen.
For me, the most powerful impact of being immersed in this experience was when I saw a wall of black and white photos of ordinary people doing ordinary things: young women having a laugh with each other; families strolling on the beach; people getting married; or toddlers taking their first steps. These ordinary people were condemned to persecution, inhumane cruelty and extermination on an industrial scale just because they were Jews and were inferior and expendable in the eyes and minds of some—as were the Roma and Sinti people, gay men, disabled people, political opponents and others.
As these murderous events soon pass from living memory and leave us without the first-hand testimony of survivors, it is all the more necessary that we tell the individual stories of some of the 6 million Jewish people who were murdered. I want to pay tribute to the survivors, as many noble Lords have done—those ordinary people who have done and do the extraordinary without even seeing it as such. Their strength, testimonies and very existence present not just an inspiration but a reminder. As Lily Ebert said on her 99th birthday—which she marked with a family trip to the seaside—she was proof, in her own words, that the “Nazis did not win”.
I am immensely proud that the UK played such a pivotal role in the establishment of Holocaust Memorial Day as the International Day of Commemoration in 2000, but let us remind ourselves that the underlying issues have not gone away. The Community Security Trust recorded 786 anti-Semitic incidents across the UK in the first six months of 2022. As my noble friend Lady Anderson said, today’s CST report shows a 22% increase in anti-Jewish hatred. The world’s oldest hatred is alive and kicking, and this is shameful. This year, 2023, is a particularly poignant anniversary for genocide commemoration as we mark 20 years since the start of the genocide in Darfur, while also remembering those affected by genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda and Bosnia. With misinformation so often leading to hatred and prejudice, we all have a responsibility not just to remember but to act, and to identify the warning signs of genocide today.
The UK needs a national memorial to the Holocaust, and there is no site more appropriate than next to the mother of Parliaments—this Parliament. I hear that some noble Lords do not share this view, and I am sure we will continue to debate this. There has been a stalling in the progress of this important project, but I hope the Minister can commit today to a cross-party, all-community effort to revitalise it.
As my noble friend Lord Kestenbaum said, today we all carry the burden of history. It is a responsibility which we all share. There are many ordinary people who have done and will do extraordinary things—I hope we can be among them.
Smoke-free Pavements
Baroness Merron Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Merron
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to introduce rules on smoke-free pavements outside pubs and restaurants.
The Minister of State, Home Office and Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Lord Greenhalgh) (Con)
The temporary pavement licence provisions introduced in the Business and Planning Act 2020 and subsequently extended have a national smoke-free condition requiring businesses to provide seating where smoking is not permitted. In addition, local authorities can attach their own conditions, including those that prohibit smoking. The Government have committed in principle to making the pavement licensing permanent and will provide further details in due course.
Baroness Merron (Lab)
My Lords, the pandemic has of course seen a major expansion in the use of pavement space, alongside which the Government have committed to deliver a smoke-free nation by 2030 to improve our health. How is the Minister working with his Health colleagues to bring this all together for smoke-free pavement licences to play their part in the forthcoming tobacco control plan? Will the Government take the opportunity to adopt the tobacco amendments to the Health and Care Bill when they come before this House from the other place?
Lord Greenhalgh (Con)
My Lords, this Government can walk and chew gum at the same time. We are working closely with my noble friend the Minister and colleagues at the Department of Health. I should probably declare a personal interest as the son of a vascular surgeon who served on the Chief Medical Officer’s Scientific Committee on Tobacco and Health in the period when the noble Baroness was an esteemed Minister in the Administration in the first decade of this century. Of course we have not committed to how we will move forward with regard to the future of this legislation, but it is important to achieve the target of reducing smoking while reviving our economy.