Holocaust Memorial Day

Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury Excerpts

Thursday 13th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury (CB)]

My Lords, when the Nazis came to power in 1933, my father was dismissed from his job as a medical researcher because he was a Jew, and he made his way to this country, where he was taken in, made his home, raised a family and became a distinguished scientist. Historically, this is a reminder that although—or perhaps because—the Holocaust originated in Germany, many German Jews had time to leave before the final solution was initiated, whereas the Jews in subsequently Nazi-occupied countries did not have that opportunity, with the disastrous consequences that we all know and that have been described in a number of speeches today.

Personally, my father’s reception in this country has made me for ever grateful to the United Kingdom and made me, for a while, very suspicious of Germany, a suspicion reinforced by the fact that a number of members of my mother’s family died in concentration camps. However, subsequent experiences, particularly my contact with German judges, have given me two insights.

The first is respect for the way in which Germans have come to terms with what happened and have tried to take steps to make sure it does not happen again. Let us hope that the rise of the AfD does not represent a signal of retreat from that.

The second is a realisation that while it was, as has been said more than once today, unique in history, the Holocaust could have happened anywhere. We delude ourselves if we think that lessons can be learned so that nothing like it will happen again. I am afraid that history shows us that racial prejudice, racially motivated violence and even—fortunately, only rarely—genocide have been features of human existence as far back as records go, and that anti-Semitism has been prevalent, sadly, for more than 2,000 years.

Of course, that is not to say that everyone is racially prejudiced or anti-Semitic, or has a predisposition to racial violence, let alone to committing genocide. But one has only to read about how many otherwise apparently decent German soldiers were prepared to massacre helpless Jewish women and children simply because they were ordered to do so by their officers to realise how skin-deep civilisation is, at least in extreme circumstances, a point eloquently made by my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Dubs.

An important component of combating such tendencies in any country is the rule of law, coupled with strong, democratic institutions—a point made by the most recent winners of the Nobel Prize for Economics, who showed that the quality of life in countries with those features significantly outperformed the quality of life in countries which lacked them. It is noteworthy how democracy, the constitution and the courts in Germany all crumbled very quickly in the face of ruthless Nazi aggression, thereby setting Germany on course for the Holocaust. The rise of Hitler shows that democracy is not enough: the Nazis came to power through the ballot box. Had there been humane laws enforced by an independent judiciary, I suggest that the story would have been very different.

Of course, the judges cannot stand on their own, even when supported by advocates as talented as the noble Baroness, Lady Levitt, whom I congratulate on her maiden speech. They need to have an embedded culture that genuinely believes in respect for all people and genuinely supports the rule of law. Without that, the road to perdition beckons.

As my noble friend Lady Ludford reminded us, the price of liberty—and, I would add, the price of a decent society—is eternal vigilance. On that score, we are in danger of drifting into choppy waters. I am struck by how ignorant and uncaring most people in this country are about our constitutional arrangements, the rule of law, the role of the courts and why it matters. Even those at the top of our constitutional tree, in what we coyly refer to as “the other place”, are often remarkably and insouciantly ignorant about such issues. Such ignorance helps breed prejudice, and prejudice, if unchallenged, metastasises into persecution, and sometimes something worse than persecution.

Education and research are therefore key. It is through education that we seek to ensure that future generations are encouraged and enabled to recognise and combat racism in general, and anti-Semitism in particular. It seems to me essential that young people are both taught to disavow racism, anti-Semitism and intolerance and educated about our constitutional system and the rule of law.

Some 10 years ago, I would have said that this country had, by international standards, a reasonably good record on anti-Semitism. Recent events, which were well described by the noble Lords, Lord Katz and Lord Evans of Sealand, in their excellent maiden speeches, show that things have deteriorated, but that people are doing their best to reverse this disturbing development. They deserve our support, both in words and actions.

When it comes to education, I would like to take the example of the work of the Weidenfeld Institute of Jewish Studies at the University of Sussex, home to the Centre for German-Jewish Studies, of which I am privileged to serve as president. For over two decades, the institute has been dedicated to scholarly inquiry into the history, culture and thought of Jewish refugees from German-speaking lands. This not only preserves the memory of those who fled persecution but, by actively engaging with students, school children and the wider academic community, helps to ensure that contemporary understanding is informed by past knowledge and experience. Anyone who has listened today to the recollections of the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, the noble Lords, Lord Dubs and Lord Carlile of Berriew, and, from a different perspective, of the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, will realise how important it is that these stories and experiences are relayed to the young.

As has been said, 6 million people killed is a shocking figure, but Stalin has already been cited, and there is something about figures that depersonalises it. To get the full horror, one just has to be told the stories that we heard today. If those can be got across to the young, we are on our way to achieving something.

I like to think we are still the same country that took in my father 90 years ago. He was then funded in his research by an organisation call Cara, the Council for At-Risk Academics, which was founded, as it happens, in the same year he came here. My wife is currently supporting a Ukrainian family, one of whom is a lawyer and whose research is now supported by Cara. That somehow epitomises how both the good and the wicked are always with us, and it reminds us how we must fight to promote the good and suppress the wicked.