Prime Minister signs the Anne Frank Declaration at Chanukah reception

David Cameron signed the Anne Frank Declaration at Downing Street on Wednesday.

The Anne Frank Declaration was written by the Anne Frank Trust UK in 1998, citing Anne Frank’s life to demonstrate what can happen when prejudice and hatred go unchallenged, and it calls upon us all to strive for a world in which everyone is treated fairly and has an equal chance in life.

He signed as ‘Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party’,  and was praised by the Trust’s Executive Director Gillian Walnes for his personal commitment to Holocaust education as a way of combating prejudice and persecution.

Speaking at the annual Downing Street Chanukah reception the Prime Minister said: “We will go on doing everything we can, with the Anne Frank Trust and others, to fight prejudice and discrimination and persecution in our country”.

The Anne Frank Declaration has been signed up to since 1998 by world leaders such as the late South African President Nelson Mandela, former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and former US President Bill Clinton.  

Hundreds of British political and civic leaders, as well as over 10,000 school children, have signed up to the Declaration.

Notable recent signatories have included Angelina Jolie, who signed on behalf of the UNHCR, rock legend Nile Rodgers, actor Tim Robbins, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Home Secretary Theresa May and Communities Secretary Eric Pickles, CEOs of the NSPCC, Peter Wanless, and the anti-racism in football organisation Kick It Out, Roisin Wood.

The signers all receive a credit card size version of the Declaration to carry in their wallets as a reminder.

The signing ends a year in which the Anne Frank Trust have brought their educational programmes to combat prejudice and discrimination to over 28,000 young people in 68 schools, and into 16 prisons.

The Trust was awarded Gold Star status for its work by the Big Lottery Realising Ambition fund,  and has benefited from the Department for Communities and Local Government expanding their funding for its regional education programmes, currently in six UK regions.

Its recently published independent report into the impact of its work has proved that 92% of young people who go through its peer education training programme have a greater recognition of the dangers of prejudice and 88% strongly thought that students had become more respectful and more likely to challenge discriminatory behaviour.

 To visit annefrank.org.uk CLICK HERE