International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance

Lord Finkelstein Excerpts

Thursday 27th February 2014 Grand Committee

[Lord Finkelstein (Con)]

My Lords, in 1985, Ronald Reagan’s visit to Bitburg became the subject of controversy. He had been visiting the graves of members of the SS and he decided that he would therefore also visit Bergen-Belsen. I remember hearing this on the radio in my bedroom and thinking that my mother would be interested because she was a survivor of Belsen. I went down to the kitchen where Mum was doing the washing up. “Mum”, I said, “Ronald Reagan is going to Belsen”. “So what?” she replied. “I’ve been”.

In my brief contribution to the debate that the wonderful as well as noble Baroness, Lady Deech, has secured, I want to make just three points. First, Holocaust remembrance is about to face its biggest challenge. We are going to need to think about how to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive when the distinct and irreplaceable voice of the survivors can be heard no more. I recall my mother preparing to speak at our synagogue and telling me for the first time that she and her sister had seen their family friends, Margot and Anne Frank, arrive in Belsen, and that her sister had recorded the event in a little pocket diary, the keeping of which was in itself a crime under the camp terms. She asked me if I thought the children would be interested. Yes, I thought they would be interested. My mum is still alive and continues to give talks about her experiences, but how do we replace that electrifying testimony? That is the job of the Prime Minister’s Holocaust Commission to consider and should also be a priority during our chairmanship of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.

My second purpose in speaking is to lend support to the campaign of the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, for compensation for Polish victims of the Holocaust. On the mantelpiece of my parents’ home is a clock embedded in a statue of Marshal Pilsudski, the leader of the Second Polish Republic. On the hour it plays Polish anthems, although generally we switch it off. My father was born in Lviv, which is now in Ukraine, but he was deeply proud of having been born a Pole. On his deathbed he told me that I should always honour the Polish people and never blame them for the crimes committed against them. So I do, and I am happy to do so. The revival of a free Polish nation and its emergence as a great European power is one of the happiest political events of my lifetime. It is why I can say with confidence and belief that I know that Poland will respond to the case the noble Baroness has made today.

Stalin’s Soviet Union stole my father’s house and the family business when it imprisoned and exiled my father’s family. In 2005, Poland made compensation available for this theft and we are pursuing the claim, although I have to confess that progress is slow. I am sure that as that claim has been recognised, so Poland will understand and respond to the noble Baroness. Poland is our friend, a friend of liberty and justice, and a great modern nation—and that is what great modern nations do. Helping our friends do the right thing should number among our priorities as chair of the alliance.

I have one other point to make. The alliance has 31 members and four observers. There are more than 190 countries in the world. Not to belong to this alliance and not to adhere to the Stockholm declaration is not just to show disrespect to those who died, it is the canary in the coal mine. It demonstrates that a country does not want to teach its children about hatred and genocide. We should make it our business to leave the alliance bigger than we found it.

In the 1920s my grandfather Alfred Wiener began collecting Nazi artefacts and literature. He believed in the power of truth to set people free. His library helped produce the evidence that tried the Nuremberg defendants and convicted Eichmann. It showed that truth will always have assailants and victims and will always retain enemies, but that truth can be victorious. Let us dedicate our chairmanship to that task.