{"id":882,"date":"2023-01-25T18:49:51","date_gmt":"2023-01-25T18:49:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jailingopinions.com\/realhistory\/?p=882"},"modified":"2023-01-31T17:01:54","modified_gmt":"2023-01-31T17:01:54","slug":"british-government-to-force-through-holocaust-memorial-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jailingopinions.com\/realhistory\/british-government-to-force-through-holocaust-memorial-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"British Government to force through ‘Holocaust Memorial’ plan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This afternoon Prime Minister Rishi Sunak \u2013 no doubt grateful for any distraction from his failing government’s record \u2013 announced that he would bring in legislation<\/a> to enforce the construction of a huge ‘Holocaust Memorial and Learning Centre’, obliterating Victoria Tower Gardens, a park adjacent to Parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This vastly expensive project has been controversial since it was first proposed during the summer of 2016. We have had four different Prime Ministers since that announcement, but all have remained committed to spending vast sums of public money on this ‘Memorial’. At first the bill to the public purse was said to be \u00a350 million. It has now risen to at least \u00a375 million, at a time of stringent cutbacks to essential public services. The overall cost (including private funding) will be more than \u00a3100 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The original proposal for a far more modest London Holocaust Memorial \u2013 first raised in 1979 \u2013 was strongly opposed by three senior Cabinet ministers and by Britain\u2019s leading diplomats. Foreign Secretary Lord Carrington wrote to colleagues: \u201cThe whole idea is preposterous\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2019 I submitted a detailed report to Westminster\u2019s planning committee<\/a>, revealing the full story behind the original memorial plans, and the reasons for senior ministers\u2019 objections, which are even more valid in relation to the vast project now under consideration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The planning committee went on to rule against the Memorial. Central government stepped in to overrule them, but ministers were themselves overruled in the courts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n