Holocaust Memorial Day

Gordon Brown delivered a personal message to mark Holocaust Memorial Day in the UK, stating that the "unimaginable suffering" of the Holocaust must never be forgotten.

Read the transcript for the film below:

Gordon Brown:

Holocaust Memorial Day is of the greatest importance. It signifies our determination that the unimaginable suffering of the Holocaust will never be forgotten. It reflects our duty to remember those who endured the depths of human cruelty and degradation. It communicates our conviction that the politics of hate will never triumph, and it symbolises our resolve to safeguard the future by understanding the past.

As a boy, I was brought up learning about the struggle and sacrifices of the Jewish people. My father visited Israel twice a year for more than 20 years. He wanted me to understand the magnitude of the Holocaust, and yet some horrors are almost too great to comprehend. In today's fast-moving world, it's vital that young people from all backgrounds learn about the Holocaust. We need young and old to understand those horrifying events and to value the courage of those who stood against them. When I studied the history of the Holocaust, it taught me a most basic fact, prejudice leads to intolerance, which leads to victimisation, which leads to persecution. Learning about the Holocaust ingrained in me the conviction that discrimination in all its forms must be fought.

This year's theme for Holocaust Memorial Day is a most relevant one. Imagine, remember, reflect, react. I hope that one of our reactions will be to build strong and caring communities that reject hatred and enable individuals from every background and creed to realise their full potential. Teaching of the Holocaust is now compulsory in all British secondary schools between the ages of 11 and 14, and the government has invested £1.5 million in the Holocaust Educational Trust's Lessons From Auschwitz programme. We also fund research into anti-Semitic language so that we improve our ability to stamp it out. But let me be clear. Today is not about government funding, important though that is. It is about remembrance. It is about personal tragedies. It is about mass suffering. It is about mass denial. It is about humanity and man's inhumanity to man. Above all, it's about redoubling our efforts to ensure that "never again" is no longer just a slogan, it is a reality. Thank you.