Holocaust Memorial Day

Debate between Andrew Percy and Daniel Kawczynski

Thursday 23rd January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I want to thank the Minister and the shadow Minister for their approach to today’s debate and what they said. I consider it an honour and privilege to take part in this debate every single year. It is sad that we have to continue to have it, but we absolutely must continue to do so. I am delighted to stand here as the newly elected co-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group against antisemitism and to continue with what I did before I came here, when I served as a history teacher, which is the necessary education on the holocaust and the hate that drove seemingly developed nations to do what they did. The theme for Holocaust Memorial Day this year is “stand together”, and our all-party parliamentary group plans to do exactly that, to ensure that our Parliament is a leader in tackling anti-Jewish racism and hate, as it has been in previous years.

I want to begin by paying tribute to our former colleague, the former Member for Bassetlaw, now Lord Mann, who helped to establish this Parliament’s reputation as a leader in the fight against antisemitism and all forms of hate. He used to go the extra mile in fighting against antisemitism, including the famous incident when he chased Ken Livingstone into a lavatory. As amusing as that incident was for many watching it, antisemitism is no laughing matter. Despite the reputation that John helped to establish for our Parliament, there are, sadly, a few former and current Members of this House who have, on occasion, brought us into disrepute.

Before I say more about that, I want to reflect on the title that John chose to take in the other place: Lord Mann of Holbeck Moor. He picked that because Holbeck Moor was the site in Leeds that Oswald Mosley turned up in, where he was roughly dealt with by the working-class people of Leeds. It has always been working-class people who have been at the centre of the fight against antisemitism. The same happened in my city—when Oswald Mosley came to Hull, it was working-class people who came out and kicked him out of our city and made his experience in our city a short and unpleasant one.

I am sad in one way, but proud in another, that when I knocked on the doors of working-class communities in my area at the election, people referenced the current rise in antisemitism as a concern. We do not have a big Jewish community. I think that I am one of three Jewish constituents. We may be heading for a minyan, but there are certainly not many of us. It was sad but also reassuring to hear people in my area reference the need to do more on this at the recent election. I am very proud of the people in my area for standing as resolutely as they have.

While I am on this subject, I want to pay tribute to Brigg Town Council in my constituency which last year instituted a new holocaust memorial in the town and also to North Lincolnshire Council, which is presently creating a new holocaust memorial in Scunthorpe. As I have said, we do not have a big Jewish community in our region, but we are absolutely steadfast in standing with the Jewish community in this country.

The principle we have set out for the all-party group is that we are going to take on the problems of antisemitism wherever it is found in this country—or indeed in this Chamber, in whichever party it exists. Some of the most successful cases are the quiet successes where we work with Members and candidates to put proper education in place to ensure that colleagues who have erred and said things that are silly, or in some cases offensive, are educated.

To those on my own side I want to say—I am sure that this does not apply to anybody present—that I have no truck with anybody engaging in Soros conspiracy theories, as some regrettably have done, including at the recent election. The Nazis treated Jews as vermin but also alleged that they had a plan for world domination. Sadly, the Soros conspiracy theories we see, which are prevalent on the far-right of politics, are simply an updated version of that disgusting ideology. Using George Soros’s Jewish heritage and puppet-master imagery is antisemitic, and if anyone shares any of these images—if anybody on any side of politics in this Chamber engages in that again—they will most certainly be hearing from me and our group.

[Daniel Kawczynski]

My hon. Friend uses the term “Nazis”. The problem with that term is that it is a firewall between the real perpetrators, the Germans. We are now seeing a revisionism as to who was to blame for the start of the second world war; we heard President Putin last week claim that Poland was somehow partly responsible for starting it. It is very important not to use third-term expressions such as “Nazis”, but to say exactly who started this and who is responsible, which is Germany and the German people.

[Andrew Percy]

I am not going to get into the debate that has been raging in Poland following what President Putin said. All I will say is that wherever the Germans occupied in world war two, there were very brave people who stood against them, and there were also, sadly, people who facilitated and aided their evil and vicious aims. That is true across every single country of Europe. There were people in this country in the 1930s who, as we know and as I have just referenced, gave succour to fascism and to that hateful ideology.