JN Starmer interview: I will work with CST in ‘new effort’ to halt antisemitic hate
Speaking to Jewish News after visiting Berlin's Holocaust memorial, Starmer said if elected his party would 'support the CST in new efforts to tackle hate crime.'
Lee Harpin is the Jewish News's political editor
Sir Keir Starmer has pledged a future Labour government would work directly with the Community Security Trust (CST) in a concerted effort to “break the levels” of violent threats, antisemitism, and hate crime in the UK.
Speaking to Jewish News only minutes after he had visited Berlin’s Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe ahead of a meeting with Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, on Friday, Starmer heaped praise on the work carried out by CST in protecting the UK’s Jewish community from rising antisemitism.
Starmer said that Labour would continue the current government’s protective grant awarded to the CST for security provision outside schools, synagogues and other Jewish institutions.
He said:”Of course a Labour government would support the CST, not just financially either, but in new efforts to break the levels of violent threats and hate crime.”
Starmer said he had previously met with the CST regularly “to discuss their concerns” and said the communal charity “are always tracking and have a key line of sight to the level of threats.”
He added: “That is always disturbing.”
The Labour leader said: “Every time I walk past a synagogue, including in my constituency with security guards outside, it’s soul destroying.
“The idea that outside any religious centre you would need security guards, its very dispiriting.”
Starmer, on a two-day trip to Germany with shadow foreign secretary David Lammy, was holding meetings with Chancellor Scholz and with members of the Social Democratic Party government to discuss alliances post-Brexit and the war in Ukraine.
But he said it was “very important” that he scheduled time on Thursday afternoon to visit Berlin’s Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, with his shadow foreign secretary.
“It’s about reflecting, but also about learning and recommitting, to ensuring this never happens again,” he continued.
The atmospheric Berlin structure, which features thousands of concrete slabs arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping 200,000 sq ft site is built close to the city’s Reichstag building and the Brandenburg Gate.
Starmer said the memorial’s location, in such an official place in Berlin’s centre, had confirmed his belief that the UK Holocaust Memorial and Learning Centre should be built next to parliament in London.
“Ever since Ed Balls and Lord Pickles came to show me the detailed plans, I have been very supportive of it,” he said, recognising that there was now a legal challenge over planning permission for the Westminster memorial to overcome.
“Being at the Berlin memorial, I believe there was a dispute about whether it should be built in such an official spot in the centre, with its reminder of a shameful past.
“But I actually think that makes it more powerful.
“Our own memorial should be in Victoria Tower Gardens, next to parliament. It has a symbolism there, I think.`”
Gathering his thoughts on his time spent wondered through the Berlin memorial, where he was taken on a guided tour and signed a guest book, Starmer said:”I found it unsettling, and that’s a good thing. It was really thought provoking.
“The fact that there wasn’t a lot of memorial writing had the effect of making you reflect rather than read.
“Even the undulations of the ground were almost reflective of persecution being untackled and never quite in steady ground.”
The Labour leader said that while he did not want to “get dragged into the depths of the Tory leadership race” wondering around the memorial he had become angered by Attorney General and one-time Tory leadership hopeful Suella Braverman’s recent threat to human rights legislation.
Ousted as a candidate on Thursday, Braverman had earlier said she would “eliminate” human rights law designed to protect people from torture and inhumane treatment.
She said Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights was tying the government’s hands over deportation of asylum seekers.
Starmer said the law was one of the “enshrining documents” and “something I have believed in my entire life.”
He added:”You can’t possibly argue that we should pull out of the very instruments that were created, crafted on the back of the awful Holocaust.
“We must ensure this never happens again – that means alliances, universal rights whoever you are.
“Whether you are Jewish, homosexual or Roma, disabled. ”
Ahead of his and Lammy’s meeting with the German chancellor he said:”We are here with a very clear message about being a party ready for an election, ready to win an election, ready to govern.”
He added:”I felt it was more important to come now on this trip to show at a political level these things are our foundational values.
“Why we need to form alliances , we need close relations with Germany and other countries.”
The pair arrived at the German Chancellery on Thursday to meet Wolfgang Schmidt, Germany’s federal minister for special affairs, head of the chancellery and commissioner for the Federal Intelligence Service.
Sir Keir and Mr Lammy later visited a business start-up hub, meeting entrepreneurs and the chief executives of leading business support groups
Starmer will tell the German chancellor Britain and Germany can work closely together to help boost economic growth, harness the opportunities of a transition to greater environmental sustainability, and continue to stand united against Russian aggression.
They are also aiming to find out what Britain can learn from the best economic models around the world, and how a possible future Labour government could work with other European nations to navigate a post-Brexit world.
But Starmer also accepted there was still more work to do at home with his vow to “root out” antisemitism from Labour.
“I made a commitment two years ago, and most people objectively would I think say ‘he’s been good to his word’,” he said of the battle to rid the party of antisemitism, and other forms of racism and discriminatory behaviour.
“We will continue in that vain,” he added. “All antisemitism and all forms of racism will be rooted out and will be dealt with.”
Starmer added that after 12 years in government, in his view the Tory Party were “broken.”
He said:”The real question is why can’t Britain have the fresh start it needs.
“We are ready for a general election, we are ready to win that general election and we are ready to govern.”
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