Holocaust Memorial Bill

Lord Pickles Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 4th March 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Finkelstein (Con)]

My Lords, I should say at the beginning that I am a patron of the Wiener Holocaust Library—my grandfather’s Holocaust library—that I was a member of David Cameron’s Holocaust Commission and that I take a long-standing interest in this as the son of a Holocaust survivor. Of course, not all Holocaust survivors agree about this memorial, but my mother certainly did, as did Ben Helfgott, who sat on the commission with me. Indeed, he regarded the issue of the location as central.

Although this is an amendment about costs, we have heard a number of what amount to Second Reading speeches, so I hope I can be indulged in responding to some of those points a little. Although the noble Viscount is correct that David Cameron resigned, I do not think that he resigned because he appointed my noble friend Lord Pickles to look after the Holocaust memorial. I would just say that it is possible to make an argument against any kind of construction of anything, anywhere. I think that probably the preponderance of people who have attended today have done so in order to be against it, because we tend to get very annoyed when we see points against something and we want to stop it happening.

Every single point that I have heard was also made against the erection of Nelson’s column. They did not have the money. The public subscriptions had fallen short of how much it would cost. The cost ballooned. It was too high. It had to be made shorter. People were not sure about the design and lots of people were not sure about Nelson either. They were furious that the Tsar had contributed. The economic strain was regarded as too great. These are points that are made about the construction of anything when it is first proposed and are later found to be entirely irrelevant to the impact that it will have.

This Holocaust memorial is a memorial to everything we fought the war for and that the young people who liberated Belsen liberated Belsen for. It is a reminder of why we have a Parliament and why we have a parliamentary democracy and therefore it is relevant that it be right next door to Parliament. There is not a single place you could ever put anything that does not disrupt anyone. If we put it somewhere where no one goes, we would have a committee full of people saying, “We cannot believe you are putting this thing in the middle of nowhere”. We have put it in the middle of somewhere where people might actually visit it, and people are worried that too many people will come to it. If we put it somewhere else, people will worry that no one will come to it. There is an argument against doing anything, ever. If we do not do this, we absolutely after 10 years will not have a Holocaust memorial. It was the dearest wish of Ben Helfgott and my mother also supported it. I am going to robustly support it because of that.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

My Lord, I am most grateful to noble Lords. Again, I would appreciate a degree of latitude. First, coming to the point that was made with regard to the advisory nature, it was always an advisory committee. When Bazalgette resigned to go on to other artistic projects, I was appointed, along with Ed Balls, as a co-chair to demonstrate the political unity of putting this together.

I was disturbed by what my noble friend Lord Blencathra —my dear friend—said. He seemed to be almost on the defensive to suggest that if you are opposed to this, somehow you are opposed to Jewish people or opposed to Israel. Nobody thinks that and no one has a greater, more distinguished record in their support of Jewish people than my noble friend Lord Blencathra. I want to make that absolutely clear.

I admire my noble friend Lord Blencathra. He was an amazing Chief Whip when we were in opposition, as indeed my noble friend opposite was an amazing Whip. He taught me many things, one of which was the kind of amendment to put down to embarrass the Government, to hold them down and to get them to say various things. He did it with great style.

But there is something that we need to be clear about. We saw a newspaper article yesterday. I do not blame the reporter—they are as good as the information they are given. I should be grateful if, when the Minister comes to reply, he can confirm that in all the briefings that he received, none suggested that this memorial would be about the glorification of the British Empire or the trivialisation of the Holocaust, or that the Holocaust would be diluted by references to other genocides.

A lot of the amendments before us might best be described as about planning. There is always a balance in planning. There is no absolute, and that is why we have such an elaborate system of planning to test the damages and balances. We are almost trying to set ourselves up as a planning authority to second-guess. This Committee, distinguished as it is, is not in a good position to do that because supporters and objectors do not have the same rights as they would have in a planning application, committee or appeal.

There is also an element in this of marking our own homework. If this went through a planning committee now—there is no criticism of anybody here—the fact that people who are expressing views live close by would be taken into account. If they were on a planning committee, they would have to recuse themselves. They would not be able to speak or vote. We cannot have a situation in this country where it is one rule for their Lordships and another rule for the rest of the country.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

Can I just finish this point? I am not criticising. It is within the rules. Nobody is doing anything wrong. But it does not look terribly good from the outside.

We do not like the design. We have become almost like Queen Anne. We kick over a stool and say, “Build it like that”. This design won an international competition among top international architects. Frankly, saying it looked like something that somebody in Canada objected to is wrong. That is the style of the architect, Ron Arad. It would be a bit like saying to Picasso, when he was going through his blue period, “That’s enough, Pablo. Too much blue.” That is the nature of Ron Arad’s work.

The trust that had been put together to raise the sums of money cannot start until we have proper planning permission. We cannot gather lots of money, although Sir Gerald Ronson is confident that we can do it. The state of the park is a disgrace. We have allowed it to get into such a situation.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords—

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[Lord Pickles (Con)]

Just give me one moment and then I will bring you in. This will improve the park. It will improve the park’s access for the disabled, for young people and for four month-old puppies.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

If we are talking about planning permission, the whole point about this design was it was turned down flat by Westminster City Council—by both Labour and Conservative councillors.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

That is why we have a planning system. When I was a Planning Minister, we often had situations where gaming was played.

[Lord Howard of Rising (Con)]

My Lords—

[Noble Lords]

Order!

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

Allow me to allow me to develop the point. We always have an independent inspector to look at these things. If the Secretary of State disagrees with the independent inspector, then there is generally a row. But we accepted the report.

[Lord Howard of Rising (Con)]

I appreciate that my noble friend had a lot to do with planning when he was a Minister. The point is that this is not planning. This is to try and overturn a legal dedication of this park to being a park. That is what it is about.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

With the greatest respect, my noble friend needs to look more carefully at what is being asked here. It is second-guessing the planning.

In terms of the size, it is the size of the Berlin Holocaust underground site. It is the size of the one in Jasenovac. It is the size of the large temporary exhibition in America. It is not particularly small art; it is adequate for its size. It will not have any exhibits. It will all be digital. That does seem reasonable. On the location, more than 50 different sites were looked at.

I apologise for going on for so long; I hope that I will have an opportunity to speak in further debates.

[Lord Lisvane (CB)]

My Lords, I cannot contribute with the degree of fluency and authority of those noble Lords who have spoken so far, but I have a question for the Minister and an observation.

The question stems from the Explanatory Notes. Years ago, I had the function in another place of looking at Explanatory Notes in draft—not taking responsibility for their contents but ensuring that they were not used by the Government of the day for the purposes of advocacy. I looked at these Explanatory Notes, and they were pretty much typical of the breed: they are certainly notes but they are by no means explanatory. Where I hoped that I would have their assistance was on Clause 1(3) of the Bill, which states:

“For the purposes of subsection (1)(a), ‘construction’ includes erection, extension, alteration and re-erection”.


I would dearly like to see the instructions that counsel was given before it drafted that particular provision. It sounds as though the memorial is going to be mobile, which I am sure is not the intention.

If I can move on to the observation, at the north end of the Victoria Tower Gardens is the education centre; I have a particular reason for remembering this because, as a corporate officer, I was the applicant for the planning permission when it was originally given in 2015. As noble Lords will know, the planning consent ran out on 22 August last year; it was renewed or extended to 2030. When that runs out—or in anticipation of it running out—there will be substantial works, but I have not seen any reference to those in any of the supporting papers that the Committee has before it today. There will be traffic of substantial character, such as heavy lorries moving kit to and fro. If that is going to happen, as is possible, as the memorial and learning centre is in the later stages of construction, whatever difficulties of security, access and safety that that is going to pose will be exacerbated by doing all this to the education centre at the same time.

I am not sure whether my observation should find a home in our discussion of security or in our discussion of planning, but it seems to me that the Clause 1 stand part debate is a pretty good place to put it to begin with. I would be very grateful for the Minister’s reaction to that simultaneity of works and to the additional element of complication and cost that is no doubt to be introduced.

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[Lord Pickles (Con)]

My Lords, I did not declare my interests. I also reference that I am a trustee of the fundraising committee. Given the enthusiasm, I shall certainly be coming round with my tin for a collection fairly soon.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I rise in support of the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, not because I have any involvement—I have no Jewish blood in me—but because we are looking at the project through rose-tinted spectacles, as the noble Lord, Lord King, has just said. I have in the last two or three years been personally involved in two significant big construction projects. The rate of inflation in the building industry has been going through the roof. The thing that he touched on will undoubtedly make this even more difficult to budget and then to carry through on budget.

On top of that, whatever it will ultimately cost depends upon the detailed design. It is clearly a difficult site, as the noble Lord, Lord Robathan, said. That is why the contingencies are on the high side, and what are we faced with from the Government? We do not have any realistic figures giving any worthwhile indication of the order of magnitude of the bill that we are likely to be paying at the end of this process. It is not a matter of arguing about the detail of the morality, ethics or desirability of the project. Anyone embarking on a big project of this kind, which will incur very substantial expenditure, particularly public expenditure, ought to have a proper budget in front of them so that they can then take an informed decision on where they want to go. We do not have it. It is as simple as that. It is irresponsible to talk in grandiose terms about all kinds of things when the boring, prosaic aspects of cost and delivery have not properly been considered.

For the avoidance of doubt, I am not an accountant.

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[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

Yes; all the costs associated with the operation of the memorial learning centre reflect the estimation I have just detailed, but further details of costs will be developed.

On the point from the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane, on the Explanatory Notes and re-erection, the purpose is to avoid having to come back to Parliament to change legislation in the event of damage and related issues. We have regular discussions with the Palace of Westminster on the issue of other works, including the restoration of Victoria Tower. These will continue to take place and we expect to manage logistics, deliveries, and so on, through sensible planning. The estimated cost of the UK Holocaust memorial and learning centre has been produced in line with the Treasury Green Book guidance. Taking all that into account, the last accounting officer assessment from June 2023 concludes that the project represents value for money. The ordinary mechanisms by which Parliament allocates public funding and holds Ministers to account can apply to this programme, just as with any other programme.

The further Amendment 27, proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, would introduce an additional step in the process of seeking planning consent for the proposed Holocaust memorial and learning centre. While the noble Lord is to be commended for his focus on cost control and value for money, the additional step he proposes is not necessary and would simply add still further delay to the decision-making process. Costs are regularly reviewed, and updated figures will be published in due course, in line with the Government’s major projects portfolio reporting process.

A range of options are being considered for operating the memorial and learning centre. As a significant public investment, responsibility for managing the centre will need to rest with a body that is ultimately accountable to Parliament. The Government will continue to be transparent about the costs and future arrangements for the Holocaust memorial and learning centre. This should, however, not delay the separate planning determination process.

The Holocaust memorial and learning centre will be a source of pride and an inspiration to the whole of society across boundaries of religion, class, geography or political party. I have only to quote the words of 94 year-old Holocaust survivor Mala Tribich, MBE, to underline why this is so vital:

“As the Holocaust moves further into history and we survivors become less able to share our testimonies this Memorial and Learning Centre will be a lasting legacy so that future generations will understand why it is important for people to remember the Holocaust, to learn from the past and stand up against injustice”.


I just want to echo—

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

I was going to echo the noble Lord’s points.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

I am sorry; I agree very much with the tenor of what the Minister is saying. He may recall that earlier I asked him to address a specific question. During his briefing, has he seen anything to suggest that the memorial centre will be about white- washing our history and praising the British Empire, and not about telling the whole truth, warts and all?

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

My Lords, I was literally going to come on to that particular point. There will be nothing at all like that. If I can further add to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, the memorial and learning centre will draw on the history of the Holocaust, and particularly the decisions made by the British Parliament, to stress the importance of tackling intolerance and hatred at all levels in our society. It will deliver this message for all the people across the UK and the rest of the world, regardless of faith and background.

I just want to remind noble Lords what we are debating. The Holocaust Memorial Bill includes measures essential for the Government to deliver the long- standing commitment to build the planned Holocaust memorial and learning centre. The Bill authorises expenditure on the construction, maintenance, operation and improvement of the Holocaust memorial and learning centre. Finally, the Bill also disapplies the relevant sections of the London County Council (Improvements) Act 1900, ensuring that this legislation does not block the building of a memorial in Victoria Tower Gardens.

I hope that I have been able to provide further clarity and assurance as to the purpose of this Bill to enable the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, to withdraw his amendment. I also hope that my explanation of Clause 1 will enable noble Lords, including the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, to agree that Clause 1 stand part of the Bill.

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[Baroness Blackstone (Lab)]

My Lords, I begin by correcting the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Bybrook. I think she suggested that I had my name down on the first group; I did not. I may have misheard her but I was not alone in hearing that. If she did not, that is fine.

I have a couple of other opening remarks. I really hope that the noble Lord, Lord Finkelstein, who is not in his place at the moment, and the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, will respect the views of those who are opposed to the Bill and not in any sense intimate or suggest that we are not in favour of a Holocaust memorial or indeed a learning centre. That is not the case as far as I am concerned and I do not believe that it is the case among any other members of the Committee who are speaking against the Bill.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

Can the noble Baroness point to a single sentence I have uttered over, say, the last 10 years where I have suggested that?

[Baroness Blackstone (Lab)]

I am not alone, because I have talked to one or two people in the intervening time, when we were taking part in the Division, who believed that that was what was intimated from what the noble Lord said.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

So is the answer to that no?

[Baroness Blackstone (Lab)]

I will reread what the noble Lord said and come back to him if in fact if what I understood does not seem to be held up in the Hansard report of what he said.

I also want to say that I think I am one of the few Labour members of this Committee who are speaking against the Bill. I know many Labour Members who are not taking part but who are very concerned, and I expressed my worries about this to the Minister. I do not like opposing the Government on any issue and I am not known to be serially disloyal. However, there are two particular things in my past that make me worried about the Bill.

The first is that I am a former Minister responsible for heritage, including heritage parks, and I think it is a great and grave mistake to change the 1900 Act that was set up to protect heritage parks in a way that will lead to great damage done to this park. I agree with the noble Lords, Lord Sterling and Lord Hamilton, that this is a beautiful, much used but small park which will not have the same role as it had in the past because of putting this very large—from the point of view of the size of the park—memorial and learning centre in it.

The second reason I am worried about this Bill as it is currently proposed is my interest in education. I do not think that the learning centre as currently proposed is fit for purpose. I do not want to make a Second Reading speech now but want to go straight in to my amendments in this group. I will speak to Amendments 2, 3, 4, 6 and 13, all of which concern the learning centre, which is at present an intrinsic part of the design of the Holocaust memorial as proposed by the sponsors.

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[Lord Carlile of Berriew (CB)]

I absolutely agree and I will try to finish within the 10 minutes, and I believe that there is going to be a vote in a moment anyway. I believe that if the Minister were to listen to the witnesses available in your Lordships’ House, we would have a different conclusion. I promise the Minister, not because I know it but because I know it in my bones, that if we were allowed to build a Holocaust learning centre elsewhere, with the subvention that is already promised by the Government, we would have no difficulty in raising the money for an establishment that would rival the great POLIN museum that the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, mentioned.

I finish by saying that if the noble Baroness will allow me to say so, and she knows that I love her dearly, I thought she was a little unkind to some members of the Committee. I do not believe that anybody is ill motivated about this in any way. I believe that, unfortunately, they are just wrong and should recognise it.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

My Lords, that is my cue. I was going to take the noble Lord up. He quoted me earlier as saying something I had not said, but I realised that it is the kind of thing I would have said, so I did not object to being misquoted.

[Lord Carlile of Berriew (CB)]

I did not quote the noble Lord.

[Lord Carlile of Berriew (CB)]

Oh, it was you.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

On the improvements to the park, the grass is not of very high quality, but it will be returfed. The paths will be redone. Those paths are important because, as they stand right now, they are strangling the roots of the trees and causing long-term problems. It will be possible to get water to the existing trees, there will be access to the Embankment for wheelchairs for the very first time and there will be extensive tree planting.

Some very interesting points were made about fire, flood, transport and, of course, planning matters. We will discuss any new planning application. I just want to address the questions of whether it is too small and what new things have been found. In terms of its size, it is by no means unusual among Holocaust museums. I talked about the Berlin museum, which is subterranean and roughly that size. Jasenovac is roughly that size. If we talk about museums in Warsaw, a short walk from the POLIN museum is a museum dedicated to the uprising, which is roughly the same size.

As for new things, we have discovered, hidden for 80 years, some tapes by Patrick Gordon Walker, who many here will remember. He went in the week after Dimbleby did his famous interviews and interviewed inmates of the camp as well as perpetrators. We also have the first recording of the singing of Hatikvah after liberation. As the Government took the decision to release all the documents relating to the Holocaust, we have lots of new material that has simply not been seen. It will certainly address what we knew and when we knew it.

In terms of getting an idea of what it would look like, if Members have visited Hut 27 at Auschwitz, which is an audio-visual experience of the book burning and the effect that it had on Jewish life and young people, they will know that that gives you an idea. You cannot say, “We need to embrace new technologies”, then criticise us for doing precisely that. It is not as though we are in a position where we are waiting for this to happen; the United Kingdom has already created a portal of evidence. Everyone here can now see the testimonies of Holocaust survivors going down the years, no matter where they were given. It is a big leap forward. Other countries are following suit because, to ensure that our stuff is worth while, it must be accessible.

My noble friend is right about TikTok and other social media, which is why we produced—it was just a tentative idea—80 Objects/80 Lives in which Holocaust survivors describe a particular object that kept them going through the Holocaust. That was repeated in 35 countries. It is not an answer in itself, but it is a fact that we are trying to lean out and to make a difference.

There will be natural light. There is going to be light; it is going to be used extraordinarily well with regard to a staircase.

I am very pleased that Members have gone to see the Imperial War Museum. It is a magnificent new exhibition, particularly about the use of the V-2 rocket, because it manages to bring the whole of the Second World War galleries together and demonstrates—better than the previous exhibition, I think—that the Second World War was a war of annihilation. I am pleased to say that that the past chairman of the Imperial War Museum is on the foundation’s board and that the Imperial War Museum is a key partner. I am also pleased to say that the former director of the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, which is apparently well disposed to here, is also on the board. In order to ensure that we never lose sight of the Jewish nature of the Holocaust, our director of the exhibition is a former deputy director of Yad Vashem. We work regularly with Yad Vashem on this, and there is a lot of interest.

I want to say something about numbers. I was quoted by the noble Baroness, Lady Deech. If she is going to quote me, let it be right. I do not take credit for that; it was from the widow of the great historian Martin Gilbert, who, in talking to her before his death, said that it should be about coming out of a building and recognising that democracy is there as a bastion against tyranny. It is not about the Jews to say that; it is a bastion against tyranny. However, it is also for the people in this building to look the other way and understand what happens when a compliant legislature passes various things.

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[Baroness Deech (CB)]

Can I just ask the noble Lord why he thinks that being a tourist attraction that attracts millions is compatible with commemoration, grief, prayer, remembrance and all the other things that the commission called for and that are normally associated with a Holocaust memorial? There is a little plaque to one of my grandmothers in Manchester; that brings me more solace than any number of millions of people tramping through the gardens then heading off to have an ice cream.

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

It is important not to conflate the solemn nature of the memorial with the learning centre; they are two distinct but integrated matters. The Committee will always go to museums and Holocaust sites. What we want are the uncommitted: we want people who go to the learning centre and come away having learned something. They will use it as a doorway to wider knowledge. It will not be in isolation. We are going to work closely with our American friends, our friends at Auschwitz and our friends in Yad Vashem because the Holocaust, anti-Semitism, Holocaust denial and distortion do not recognise national boundaries. We have a common purpose, and part of that common purpose will be to spread it out in different languages.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, as someone who is not Jewish, as I mentioned earlier, I have been very moved by the debate I have just heard about the learning centre. I subscribe to the perspective of the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, and the noble Lord, Lord Carlile. As I was sitting there, I thought to myself, “Actually, there’s something that has not been mentioned”. It is—speaking as a non-Jew—the fact that Victoria Tower Gardens is a remarkable park as it stands now; that is a relevant consideration in our consideration in this place of what the future should be.

I am reminded of a story that I was told about the time when T Dan Smith redeveloped Eldon Square in Newcastle. He called in, as one of his expert advisers, Arne Jacobsen, the famous Danish architect. After the competition for the redesign of Eldon Square had been completed, he turned to Jacobsen and said, “If you had been putting in for this competition, what would you have done?” Jacobsen replied, “I would have left it just as it was before”.