Holocaust Memorial Day

Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent Excerpts

Thursday 13th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent) (Lab)]

My Lords, we have had a powerful and moving debate. This debate, as ever, is your Lordships’ House at its best, and it is a privilege to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, who delivered an incredible speech. I wish him, and the trees, chag sameach.

Before I move on to the substantive part of my speech, I start by offering a huge mazeltov to my noble friends who have made such wonderful maiden speeches. There might be a little Yiddish and Hebrew in my speech today—good luck, Hansard.

I start with my good and noble friend Lord Katz, the chair of the JLM, who was its chair when I was its parliamentary chair. I think it would be fair to say that he was my partner in crime and my friend, as we fought for the heart and soul of our party. It was a rollercoaster, but, because of him and many Members of your Lordships’ House, we won. Today, I know that Chaim and Solomon would have been so proud to see him deliver his maiden speech.

I will follow, I think, by talking about my noble friend Lady Levitt, whose speech was spectacular. I love the idea of her as a 14 year-old getting expelled. I too was always naughty, but I was too scared of my teachers to be that naughty. She was quite clear about why she is here and about the rule of law—but I think all Members of your Lordships’ House will remember the jewellery. I do not know how the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, will ever match that with additional gifts to his wife. I am quite clear that, while he may be lucky to have her, we on our Benches are delighted to have her. That was an extraordinary and incredible speech.

I turn to the third maiden of today, from my noble friend Lord Evans of Sealand. We did not quite celebrate his role in defeating the evil of the politics of Jeremy Corbyn. My noble friend was the man who helped rescue my party from the brink and who suspended Jeremy Corbyn from the Labour Party. I will always be grateful for the work that he did. He delivered on the now Prime Minister’s commitment to rip out anti-Semitism from the Labour Party by its roots. Importantly for this side of the House, he was general secretary of my party when we won the general election—and for that we are grateful.

It is an honour to close this debate, which was so well opened by my noble friend Lord Khan. This House is very special, and the fact that this debate, of all debates, is being opened by a practising Muslim and closed by a practising Jew shows just how far our society has come.

As we have heard, this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. It is an especially poignant occasion: the last major anniversary when we can expect to have significant numbers of Holocaust survivors able to share their testimony. It was attended by His Majesty the King, a symbol, if ever there were one, to the Jewish community and the world of the importance of this date and the place that the Holocaust shares in our collective history. This is the last major anniversary where it is the words of survivors, not ours, that touch our hearts.

That is why, as ever, I am in awe of my noble friend Lord Dubs, who has once again reminded us of his modesty. It may have been just a train that he got on, but we are so grateful that he did and that his parents were brave enough to put him on it. As he reminded us, Nicky Winton gave us a blessing: he gave us my noble friend, an inspirational colleague. Nicky Winton also provided us with the clearest example of how one person truly can change the world.

It has been a privilege to hear so many noble Lords share their personal experiences and reflections during this debate. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield reminded us, for many of us, this is now our responsibility. If the words “never again” are to be made real, the onus is on us and on every generation going forward to tell the stories of our families. We heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, of her family’s heartbreaking stories. For me, her story will always be about “survival by silverware”; I will never forget it.

The personal testimony of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, about his family reminded us of the impact of the Holocaust on those who survived, and the impact of survivor guilt. This theme was also touched on by the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles.

It is also incredibly important on days like today to remember those who liberated us, because they too had to live with what they saw. I thank my noble friend Lady Ramsey not just for her speech but for highlighting the role her father played in the liberation.

My story, too, is a personal one. When I spoke in this debate last year, I spoke about my family arriving in the UK in the 1890s, having fled the pogroms of Tsarist Russia. As far as we know, not one of those who chose to remain in the shtetl survived the Shoah. I am proud to be British, but I also realise how lucky I am to be British. For my family, anti-Jewish hatred is not an academic exercise; it is formative to my understanding of my place in the world. The Shoah helped shape not just my existence, but my world view. My family knows only too well, as do the families of many in your Lordships’ House, where hate can lead and the importance of security and freedom—and the requirement, the duty, to fight for the core human rights we take for granted at our peril. That powerful point was made by the noble Lord, Lord Neuberger.

We are here today to remember those who were murdered because of who they were, not what they did. They were apparently easy targets for ideologues and dictators who sought to gain and abuse power by scapegoating communities, amplifying tropes and embracing hate and fear over hope, building on thousands of years of hatred towards my community. As my noble friend Lord Parekh reminded us, they also used the tools of the state to murder Jews.

At a time when my community and many others are once again scared, I want to find some hope in this horror—some light in the darkness. As we do this, I want to thank the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, for his work. His dedication to Holocaust memorial and the fight against anti-Semitism, both here and across the globe, are not just recognised but celebrated. I, for one, am grateful for his service. He is one of the lights in the darkness.

On Holocaust Memorial Day, people across the world came together and lit candles to remember the six million Jewish men, women and children murdered during the Holocaust and the hundreds of thousands of others killed for being gay, disabled, Roma and Sinti, black, trade unionist, a Jehovah’s Witness—anyone considered a threat to the Aryan people. As the noble Lord, Lord Weir of Ballyholme, reminded us, behind each of the statistics and the people we talk about there was a person, a family and a story. I want to reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, that this Government are clear on the unique evil that the Holocaust was and the specific, devastating impact on the Jewish community. In 1933, there were nine and a half million Jews living in Europe; in 1945, there were not.

Language matters, but so do symbols. When we talk about lighting the darkness, the candle’s flame represents the human soul and serves as a reminder of the frailty and beauty of life. As we remember the appalling acts of the Holocaust, it has become so much more than that. This frailty and beauty are ever present at the children’s memorial in Yad Vashem, which represents one and a half million Jewish children murdered in the Holocaust. In the underground chamber, the flame of a single candle is reflected by countless mirrors, while the names, ages and home towns of children who were murdered are read out in Hebrew, English and Yiddish. Each reflection reminds us of a life not lived; a child who was murdered before they could make a mark on the world; a family that was never going to grow. The wrenching power of this sacred memorial to what was lost, for me, at least, allows us to see the totality of the Shoah—the true scale of the loss. I know that if I were to visit it a thousand times, each time my heart would break.

Yad Vashem allows us to see the depravity to which man can sink when we begin to see our fellow human beings as somehow less than us, less worthy of dignity and of life. We see how evil can triumph when good people do nothing; how silence led to one of the most appalling crimes in history; how people were targeted for who they were, how they prayed or who they loved. But Yad Vashem is more than just a memorial and museum to remind us of man’s capacity for evil: it also provides us with hope—the stories of the righteous among the nations who refused to be bystanders. It is here that we need to find our hope: a reminder that we are not impotent; that we can all stand up against the politics of hatred and that our actions can change someone’s world, can be a light in the darkness.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, reminded us, listening to first-hand witness is vital and provides a light in the darkness, a source of hope and inspiration. At a special ceremony held in Parliament to mark Holocaust Memorial Day earlier this year, we heard the testimony of Alfred Garwood, someone I had not heard before. He was born in a Nazi ghetto in 1942, imprisoned in Bergen-Belsen and liberated by the Red Army when he was being moved to another camp, all before his third birthday. He survived only because his father had been born in London and was considered valuable to the Nazis. Alfred spent the rest of his childhood in Britain and grew up in the centre of a community of Holocaust survivors. He has devoted his life to understanding the psychological impact of trauma related to the genocide. His words will stay with me for ever: “If you are consumed by hate, the only people you successfully hurt is yourself”. He is a light in the darkness.

As many Members of your Lordships’ House have said, we cannot ignore what is in front of us, and what is in front of us, as reported by the CST this week, is shocking levels of anti-Semitism on our streets, which are scarring our towns and cities. The report released by CST yesterday recorded 3,528 anti-Semitic incidents in 2024. There are only 250,000 Jews in the UK. There will not be a Jewish family who was not touched by an anti-Semitic incident in the last year. Ten are being reported every day. This is the second highest number on record, surpassed only by the appalling figures of 2023, when there were 4,296 incidents, the majority of which followed the pogroms of 7 October. As my community grieved about events abroad, where they were worried about their families in Israel, they were being targeted at home. Their only crime was to be Jewish. This is not acceptable in 21st-century Britain.

These rising numbers are a wake-up call for us all. How can it be that one of the smallest minority communities in the UK is facing such hatred? While the number of incidents is high, we must not lose sight of the fact that not all hate crimes are reported. How many Members of your Lordships’ House who are regularly targets of the racists report every incident? Even I do not. My life has to be more than their hatred, and sometimes I do not want to pick up the phone and say what happened to me in the street. But we must appreciate the scale of that challenge.

However, while it is easy to be disheartened, that is not the approach I am prepared to take. The work of the CST, the Anti-Semitism Policy Trust, the Holocaust Education Trust, the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust and the Association of Jewish Refugees ensures that they are all lights in the darkness; as is Generation 2 Generation, so strongly promoted by my noble friend Lady Brown of Silverton. She gave such powerful testimony, and I am delighted that she is working with them. All the groups and organisations that are working together demonstrate that we are never powerless in the face of hatred.

I, for one, am very aware that I owe my safety and security to the dedicated team of professional staff and volunteers at the CST, who have protected me when I have been in the middle of a racist storm. CST, HET, HMDT and AJR are out there every day, actively tackling anti-Jewish hatred, educating about the dangers of where hatred can lead and remembering that crime of crimes, the Holocaust. Their work also shows that we all have choices. We can choose to be the light; we can call out those who hide in dark places. We have the choice to ignore what happens to others or to act on behalf of others. It is much easier when someone stands in front of you if you are targeted than having to fight for yourself.

This is our obligation: not simply to bear witness but to act, as the noble Lord, Lord Shinkwin, made clear. What does this mean today? It means confronting bigotry and hatred in all its forms. It has no place in the classrooms of children, on the campuses of our universities, in our hospitals or in the corridors of power. Nor does it have any place on the streets of the United Kingdom.

We must never forget that our children are not born to hate; they are taught to hate. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester and the noble Lord, Lord Gold, made clear, they can also be taught about love and history.

This year, Holocaust Memorial Day has reminded us that our freedoms are all too fragile. There is a responsibility on all of us to do everything we can to protect and cherish them. The noble Lord, Lord Balfe, reminded us of both the international context and the scale of anti-Semitism. The noble Lord, Lord Sahota, spoke movingly about the banality of evil and how many other acts of violence there have been in our society.

Today, we reflect on where we are, where we were and where we are going. I will give the final word to a Holocaust survivor, the late Sir Ben Helfgott, who said:

“My Holocaust experiences may have hardened me, made me more realistic about human nature, but I was repelled by the evil I witnessed. I despaired, but I did not let cruelty and injustice break my spirit. I refused to poison my life with revenge and hatred for hatred is corrosive. Instead I was left with a dream—to live in a world of understanding, compassion, fraternity and love for my fellow man”.

Motion agreed.