My Lords, I am very pleased to have secured this important debate. It is important because I think it is beyond dispute that antisemitism has been rocketing in recent years, not just in this country but across many parts of the globe—but, pertinently to this debate, in this country and across certain educational institutions. Sadly, on a personal note, I will say that the situation was made infinitely worse by the former leadership of my own party, which effectively invited racists into the ranks of the Labour Party and then protected them.
Again on a personal note, I am very pleased to be here with my noble friend Lady Berger. She and I were Members of the other House for a long time, and I saw probably just a fraction of the titanic amount of abuse and threats that she received, very often from Labour Party members. I was born into the Labour Party and I will die in it—not just yet, but one day I will. I joined the party when Jim Callaghan was Prime Minister, which gives some idea of how long I have been in it, and the five-year period of escalating antisemitism in our ranks was far and away the worst I experienced as a Labour Party member.
I come from a very anti-racist background, but I grew up in a world, as many of us did, in which there was a general belief—this was in the 1960s and 1970s—that antisemitism had been dealt with when the guns fell silent in 1945. How wrong can you be?
If any noble Lords are not familiar with the work of the Community Security Trust, the CST, I suggest they read its reports and look at its website. It is one of the most important, if not the most important, anti-racist organisations in the country; it has maintained that position—a unique position, really—in anti-racist research for many decades. In December 2024, its latest report on campus antisemitism found that there had been a 117% increase in antisemitic incidents on campuses during the previous two academic years, from 2022 to 2024. The Union of Jewish Students, which also does much good research in this area, recorded a staggering 413% increase in antisemitic incidents from the academic year 2022-23 to 2023-24, with 53 incidents in the first year and 272 in the second. That is a staggering rise and gives some idea of the momentous challenge that we face in this country.
The StandWithUs report, with which my noble friend Lord Turnberg is intimately acquainted, was launched, I think, this morning. It was covered in the press, if anybody wants to read up on it, with various reports in this morning’s newspapers and media outlets. The report looks at individual Jewish student experiences and student voices. Page after page of the report is littered with examples of loud and virulent support for Hamas and Hezbollah. It is worth bearing in mind, because it often gets lost in the debate, that both Hamas and Hezbollah are proscribed terrorist organisations. Expressing support for proscribed terrorist organisations should be met with the full force of the law, because it constitutes a criminal action.
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Cryer, for instigating this debate and, in particular, congratulate him on that excellent opening speech. I pay tribute to all he has done in this area.
I refer your Lordships to various Jewish community organisations where I serve as a volunteer, which have contributed to my thoughts, in particular the Council of Christians and Jews.
Today, the StandWithUs report was issued, which confirms the terrible state we have come to, where high levels of antisemitic abuse seem now to be normal on campus. Antisemitism on campus is not new. It was there when I was a student in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but it has now grown to such a worrying level that Jewish students are actually frightened to go to a British university.
It is not just those who are perpetrating attacks. It is the level of ignorance and hate on campus which is so depressing. If only 33% of students describe the Hamas attack as terrorism, we know we are in trouble. The implication is that 67% do not see Hamas as terrorists. How is it that so many students are so misinformed such that, as the noble Lord, Lord Cryer, mentioned, CST antisemitic incident reports rose 413% from one year to another?
I appreciate that, with only some 250,000 Jewish people in a country of some 70 million, many, if not most, will never have met a Jewish person or heard their story. The roots of the problem, in my opinion, may well be found in schools, which most university students will have recently left. We have seen evidence of teachers in WhatsApp groups referring to ZioNazis, and National Education Union officials undertaking activities such as clearing Israeli-made food from supermarkets, filming themselves doing it and circulating those films. The NEU is preoccupied with anti-Israel resolutions. It is in schools where the prejudice can start and universities where it explodes. The Government have unparalleled relationships with the teaching unions. Are they talking to them about this?
My Lords, I first spoke on this topic in this House in 2007. Even more sadly, we have just marked 80 years since the liberation of Belsen and there have re-emerged some of the same hatreds and moral inversions. By that I mean that the victims have been painted as killers and the tragedy of the Shoah is downplayed.
I give a university example: 18 student bodies have decided to support the legal action to decriminalise Hamas. St Antony’s College in Oxford chooses to host a Mr Mishra, whose theme is that the underlying problem of the West is its sanctification of the Holocaust at the expense of colonialism. The lecturers and their union, the UCU, which should be supporting affected students, are themselves the aggressors. The local branch in Oxford voted for a motion calling for a third intifada until victory. Israel is not the problem, it is the excuse to persecute Jewish students.
The situation is deteriorating, and no remedial action has been taken. I have little faith in inquiries. We know what the situation is; we know what the remedies might be, and we need implementation and enforcement. We need no more hand-wringing or robotic statements from vice-chancellors that
“there is no place for antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian discrimination, or hate directed towards any faith, race, nationality, or ethnic group”
at their universities.
Dehumanisation of Jewish students in many campuses has now become so deeply embedded that people feel no shame in excluding Jewish students from gatherings, mocking them by reverting to centuries-old slurs and turning the Holocaust against them. Students in London have seen swastikas carved in front of them. At UCL, Jewish students were told that Israel killed its own people: a widespread reference to the lie that the 7 October massacre was staged to provoke a war against Gaza—or just staged.
My Lords, I reference my registered interests, not least as the Government’s appointed adviser on antisemitism. I have met representatives of every single university in the UK in the last three years. I have met Jewish students from virtually all the 85 Jewish societies across our universities. I have been, with Jewish students, to a very significant number of universities. I have met, and had discussions with, pre-student applicants from a vast array of schools applying for universities.
There is a danger that Parliament and the Government do not do what the noble Lord, Lord Cryer, has asked in his debate—discuss the steps being taken and what should be done about antisemitism—but spend their time outlining the problem. I have spent the last 40 years dealing with antisemitism in universities, wearing one hat or another, and I could go through chapter and verse, including virtually every single incident in recent years, the most serious of which I have usually been involved in helping to sort out.
But we need to remember two things. First, what happens in the United States in one week is worse than what happens in one year in the UK in the universities. That is a factual statement; it is not an exaggeration. Therefore, there are many things and many problems. I get enough of this nonsense directed against myself, both criminally and non-criminally, day in, day out. I listen to, hear and feel what Jewish students in this country, and academics and other staff in universities, are saying.
But we are also getting a lot of things right. The biggest difference between the UK and the US is that we have one unified Jewish student body. The facts that I always rely on are the facts from the Union of Jewish Students, with its 85 Jewish societies. I can tell noble Lords that that organisation is dramatically stronger, braver, better organised and better trained than it was five, 10, 15, 20 or 40 years ago—far better. That is a huge success story for the Jewish community. In a terrible and traumatic two years in this country, the Union of Jewish Students is a beacon of what can be achieved. Of course there are difficulties, but its success in holding back in the universities and of getting its way in with every single university leadership —at the table, eloquently putting its case in detail, and often getting results—should not be overlooked in this.
My Lords, it is an honour to follow the noble Lord, Lord Mann, and such a powerful statement. With increased regularity, we are hearing many alarming accounts of antisemitic acts increasingly occurring at our universities. Often hidden behind apparent concern for what might be happening in Gaza, it does not take much analysis to realise that, in too many cases, this concern is just an excuse for outright antisemitism. It is old-fashioned Jew-hating of the worst kind, and it must be stopped. The key issue for me today is to understand what steps are being taken to eliminate antisemitism from university campuses. Freedom of speech is a cornerstone of academic life, but it must never serve as a shield for hatred. Universities must strike a careful balance, promoting free expression while standing firmly against antisemitism in all its forms.
When lecturers or students cross the line, there must be real consequences. Disciplinary action must not only be robust but must also send a clear message: antisemitism will not be tolerated. So suggesting, as happened in one university, that a swastika carved into a desk was “probably an ancient Hindu symbol”, or failing to take action when a Jewish student’s personal, cultural and spiritual possessions were thrown on to the floor in their apartment, as happened at St Andrews University, is wholly unacceptable. Universities have to step up to the plate and take action.
We know that over 200 institutions have adopted the IHRA definition of antisemitism, but adoption alone is not enough. Too often it is symbolic, inconsistently applied or ignored when it truly matters. The CST has reported a disturbing 117% rise in antisemitic incidents on campuses over the last two academic years. These are not just numbers; they represent real Jewish students facing real fear and exclusion in what should be safe spaces for learning. The CST report found that these incidents occurred online and on campus, and in some cases were even perpetrated by staff or student union officers.
My Lords, I commend my noble friend Lord Cryer for securing this important debate and for his powerful and meaningful messages of solidarity and advocacy for the Jewish community.
I declare an interest as a member of the advisory council of the Union of Jewish Students—the UJS—the voice of nearly 10,000 Jewish students across the UK and a body that I proudly joined as a student. It is just over 20 years ago that I gave evidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee in the other place about my personal experiences of antisemitism as a student on campus, and here we are discussing these very same issues.
I shall not repeat the statistics. Jewish students across the country today are reporting sustained levels of abuse, intimidation and marginalisation on campus. We have also seen some violent attacks, and this we have never seen before. Since launching the service in October 2023, in just 19 months UJS’s 24/7 welfare support lines have received nearly 2,000 phone calls from Jewish students in need. We have not only seen an increase in incidents but are witnessing an atmosphere in which Jewish students feel the need to choose a different route through campus, to avoid specific spaces or even to miss certain lectures. A campus life where some students do not feel they can fully engage due to fear of hatred or attack is one we must urgently address.
Yet I am pleased to learn that Jewish student pride is at an all-time high. For the vast majority of Jewish students, Jewish life rather than Jewish strife is defining their campus experiences, with UJS engaging over 8,000 Jewish students over the past year. Interfaith events have taken place on numerous campuses, ensuring that collaboration is still able to prevail, and UJS has provided antisemitism awareness training to over 5,000 student leaders, university staff and students.
The resilience of Jewish students is born in part out of a necessity to create safe, supportive spaces in response to the exclusion and hostility they have faced elsewhere. These safe spaces are there thanks to the outstanding work of UJS students and the volunteer-led Jewish societies up and down the country.
My Lords, I declare my interests in the Union of Jewish Students, the Jewish Leadership Council and the Chief Rabbi’s advisory board. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Cryer, on this debate and on his excellent introduction.
The integrity and inclusivity of higher education in this country is under threat. UK universities no longer feel like safe places or inclusive spaces for the 9,000 Jewish students on our campuses. They are reporting sustained levels of abuse, intimidation and marginalisation. We have heard from the StandWithUs report, CST and many other organisations just how serious this issue is. Jewish students are continuously facing hostility and are being blamed for the Israeli Government’s actions, even when many of them do not necessarily support the Israeli Government. They have, it seems, no right to free speech and even, as the noble Lord, Lord Cryer, suggested, no right to silent protest either. They are facing the glorification of terrorism not just by student union officers or fellow students but by academic staff as well.
It feels as if Islamist groups have infiltrated our universities at all levels. They seem to be working to normalise support for terror. Does the Minister share my concerns at attempts, supported by British students at universities across the country, including those at leading Russell group universities such as UCL, Edinburgh and LSE, to de-proscribe Hamas? To Jewish students and most Jews, the suggestion that Hamas is not a terrorist group is truly frightening. After the actions that it perpetrated—beheading, rape, kidnapping and ongoing terror—it is, I believe, the duty of many of our universities to wake up to the threats that are all around them. Would the Minister consider fines for universities that tolerate antisemitism and removing student union funding from those that are peddling hate?
Rising antisemitism is rarely the lone or the last expression of intolerance in any society, but I am grateful to the many noble Lords who are supporting this debate tonight and who support the cause of fighting antisemitism on our campuses. I thank the noble Baroness and the Government for taking this issue seriously. As Lord Sacks said,
8:55 pm
Lord Turnberg (Lab)
My Lords, I too thank the noble Lord, Lord Cryer, for introducing this debate and giving us such a wonderful opening address. Conor Cruise O’Brien said that
“anti-Semitism is a light sleeper”.
Well, it was woken with a bang on the morning after the devastating slaughter of men, women and children by Hamas on 7 October, when the blame for that act of terror was soon placed on the victims—Israel and the Jews. The marchers in London and even, I am afraid, Amnesty International, stated as much on 8 October, well before Israel reacted. It is no surprise then that university campuses across the country became hotbeds of antisemitism and anti-Zionism. The report published today by StandWithUs provides the verbal testimony of students from a wide range of universities and it makes devastating reading—I should declare an interest as a trustee of StandWithUs.
I will not repeat the many uncomfortable student statements that we have already heard, save for one:
“I was targeted not for what I said, but for who I am—a Jew”.
Another student had a swastika carved into her desk, as we have heard, and there are many more such descriptions from desperate students. Worst of all is the fact that, despite the complaints many students made to university authorities, they have, by and large, been ignored or worse. As one university said:
“There are no further steps or actions related to this matter”.
It is often said that criticism of Israel is valid; indeed, more than 50% of Israelis are vehemently critical of their Government, but that is not anti-Zionism. It becomes anti-Zionism only when it is taken to mean antipathy to the very existence of the State of Israel. The definition of Zionism is simply the desire to support the only Jewish state in the world, and it is far from implying approval of one or other of the Israeli Government’s actions. What Government in the world are immune to criticism, even our own? But no matter how badly behaved they are, we do not deny their existence. On campuses, just as the strong criticism of China’s treatment of the Uyghurs has not led to the persecution of Chinese students, and just as American students have not suffered a backlash from the behaviour of President Trump—unless they happen to be Jewish—so one may ask: why is it only Jewish students who suffer? It is hard to escape the conclusion that, as Jonathan Sacks said,
“Anti-Zionism is the new antisemitism”.
So, my question to my noble friend the Minister is: when will the promised meeting between Ministers and university vice-chancellors take place? What pressure will be brought to bear on them to support their Jewish students and stop their persecution? Will vice-chancellors be brought to recognise that calls for equity, diversity and inclusion should, in all fairness, be applied to all excluded groups, including Jewish students?
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I will give a few examples from the StandWithUs report. At Queen Mary University, which I mention because it happens to be about a mile from the boundary with my old constituency of Leyton and Wanstead, in east London, some students decided, quite reasonably, to hold a silent vigil on 7 October 2024 to mark the year’s anniversary since the massacres, mass rape, torture and abductions in southern Israel. What followed was that the silent vigil, which was quite a small group, was surrounded by hundreds of students—and probably people who were not students—screaming and shouting slogans, and engaging in threatening behaviour. The university security staff then removed not the aggressors but the students engaging in a silent protest to mark the anniversary. At Birmingham University, a similar vigil was planned, but the university authorities would not even give it permission to go ahead. It had to be moved to a local synagogue, where people were followed and, again, threatened in the street and outside the synagogue.
Many Jewish students bear witness in the report. A Jewish student at University College London, reported feeling unable to attend lectures and seminars due to threats and intimidation. That is a fairly extraordinary step in anybody’s university career. There is example after example, across many universities in this country, including threats, intimidation, physical attacks of Jewish students and Jewish students being ostracised by other students, while in many cases university authorities stand idly by or vaguely, tacitly side with the aggressors.
The rise in antisemitism on campuses did not occur out of a clear blue sky. There are certain malign organisations which encourage antisemitism, whipping it up, and prey on perhaps relatively young minds. I will give a couple of examples—just to get one or two things off my chest, I suppose.
The Stop the War Coalition is not called that anymore; I suspect that is because it put the word “coalition” in there as an act of irony and then took it out. Stop the War springs to mind because, on 9 October, within two days of the barbarous attacks on southern Israel on 7 October, it was outside the Israeli embassy in London, taking part in a protest. This is before the IDF was even really fully thinking about its response. It was hours after the massacre had stopped. Why would anybody engage in a protest outside the Israeli embassy after 1,200 Israelis had been murdered and Hamas had engaged in rape, torture and abduction? In my estimation, it was because it was engaging in the incitement of racial hatred against Jewish people. Stop the War, by the way, has strong links to Hezbollah and Hamas, and therefore, I feel fairly sure, Iran and the clerical fascists of Tehran. Stop the War was set up in 2003 in the run-up to the Iraq war. I was a Labour MP at the time, as I was until a short time ago, and I voted against the Iraq war probably seven times, as well as marching against it and speaking against it. I have never had any link with Stop the War and never will.
Not to be outdone, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign applied for a licence to have a march in London on 7 October. The attack on southern Israel started, I think, at about 6.30 am. Within a few hours, the PSC had applied to the Metropolitan Police for a licence so that it could have a march in central London. Again, why would you do that, unless you are intent on whipping up racial hatred against Jewish people?
My personal view is that membership of any democratic party, frankly, is incompatible with membership of Stop the War or the PSC. That may sound like it is largely directed at members of parties in the centre or centre-left, such as my own party, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens. However, when I marched in London against the Iraq war, all those years ago in 2003, I saw a banner—I thought at the time I might be imagining it—which honestly said, “Conservatives against the war”. It is not just the left who opposed the Iraq war. Underneath that banner there were some quite nervous looking people, but they were there to express their views, and I congratulate them on having the backbone to do that.
I have a couple of final points I want to make to my noble friend, because I am almost out of time. I have two requests which I hope the Minister can take on board. First, I am certainly convinced that the Government should look at the possibility of holding an inquiry into campus antisemitism. That would be an important step towards combating it. Secondly, perhaps we could examine the possibility of the Department for Education expanding the section of the national curriculum which covers the Holocaust. I say that because the Holocaust and the Second World War are now slipping out of memory and into history, and therefore it is all the more important that we stamp on the collective consciousness of future generations exactly what horror happened.
I finish with that, because I know I am out of time. We are certainly seeing a sharp and widespread increase in antisemitism. My fear is that, unless we take concrete steps to counter this on campuses and in institutions of education, some of those institutions could turn into incubators for virulent antisemitism.
We have seen tough action in the States. No one, including me, likes all of Trump’s actions, but he has showed a decisive determination to deal with antisemitism on campus. Over here, the Union of Jewish Students—UJS—points out that campuses have become an increasingly hostile and exclusionary environment for Jewish students. I visited Cambridge University last year to see the camp and tents outside King’s College where the cry for the elimination of the Jewish people in Israel was made repeatedly. The UJS tells us that repulsive Holocaust inversion takes place, where the roles of victims and perpetrators are reversed.
The Government know all this, but do they act? In September 2024, Keir Starmer gave a speech to the Holocaust Educational Trust—I was there—and acknowledged antisemitism on campus and promised to deal with it. In the very same month, the Minister made a seminal speech on education to the Universities UK conference in Reading. She covered nearly every aspect of education, including freedom of speech, but there was no mention of or reference to antisemitism on campus. Can we be assured that the Minister has read Sir Keir’s speech, which was delivered to a largely Jewish audience, and that there will be joined-up government action?
Universities all need to be reminded of their duty to adopt the IHRA definition and police it. They need to understand that undue hatred of Israel is antisemitic. We need to know that the OfS produces guidance which ensures that universities intervene so that they carry out their duty of care.
I know the Minister has great experience in the education sector and has done for many years. Will she commit personally to engage in this issue by talking to the universities in a clear and public way, which is disclosed to us all so that we can see what has been demanded? If they do not comply, appropriate penalties and actions have to be imposed, as Sir Keir Starmer promised he would do.
What is common is the universities’ failure to take action. They could rely on the Protection from Harassment Act, the Public Order Act, the Malicious Communications Act, the Terrorism Act and the Equality Act, remembering that freedom of speech ends where hate speech and incitement to violence start. The Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act would at least help Jewish student societies’ speakers be heard and would not open the door to Holocaust denial and so on, because other laws do that.
It is impossible to imagine that sanctions would not be imposed were the targets of these hateful actions black or other ethnic minorities. The Government and the Office for Students should not hesitate to fine universities that tolerate this hatred and break the law. Staff and students who behave like this should be expelled or suspended. Universities’ funding of student unions should be leveraged to ensure legal behaviour.
The root of the behaviour is religious teaching that Jews are inferior. It demonstrates the failure of Holocaust education, which focuses on dead Jews as a feature of the past and has nothing to say about the long history of antisemitism and the focus of antisemitism today; namely, the State of Israel. As the late and much-missed Lord Sacks pointed out, hatred of Israel is today’s variant of antisemitism. That is what the students have not realised. They need education from school up and they need to know national and government disapproval.
What should be done? We do not need any more reports—I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Deech. I have a detailed report that has been with the Government for two years, much of it not yet actioned. There is a lot in there. We have money waiting to be spent on antisemitism training in universities, which is desperately needed—but it should be good-quality training. The Government should do what is needed: give a lead and empower Jewish students but also recognise that the biggest single factor this academic year has been what has been happening to Jewish academic staff, who have been isolated and ostracised. That is hardly ever talked about because they do not have an organisation to go to and to represent them. That is the biggest single danger at the current time, and we are getting nowhere near it. Give the money and the backing to those doing the work. Listen to them, go through them and, when they do well, as well as saying, “This is terrible”, say to them, “Well done, well done, well done. We are with you Jewish students. We are with you, the Union of Jewish Students”.
Jewish students deserve better. Universities must implement the IHRA definition meaningfully, with proper training, swift disciplinary processes and independent complaint procedures. They must ensure that Jewish students feel seen, supported and safe. His Majesty’s Government have rightly taken some action, writing to universities and stressing the use of police referrals, disciplinary measures and even visa suspensions when necessary. The five-point plan and the proposed “tackling antisemitism quality seal” are welcome initiatives. However, as my noble friend Lord Leigh has said, it is not enough.
It is to be applauded that the Government have recognised that leadership must also come from the top of every university. The Prime Minister has said that vice-chancellors must take personal responsibility for protecting Jewish students. What steps are the Government taking to ensure meaningful implementation of the IHRA definition? What assessment has been made of the increase in incidents since October 2023? Will the Government consider linking higher education funding to concrete action against antisemitism? Finally, will the Government withdraw visas from international students who incite racial hatred? We must ensure that our universities are places of light, not hate. Jewish students should never be left to walk alone.
Since 7 October, UJS has been living up to the mantra of my dear friend, the late former president Alan Senitt:
“More Jewish students doing more Jewish things”.
This is how the history books will remember this period of campus life, not as one framed by the hatred that Jewish students are experiencing but as one framed in the pride that they have shown for their Judaism, no matter how they choose to live and express it.
It is unacceptable to expect Jewish students to be constantly vigilant and to report incidents of anti-Jewish hatred while institutions continuously fail to act. Universities, colleges and student unions must take proactive steps to meet their duty of care. If universities continue to be slow to act—or, in some cases, refuse to act—the consequence will be that those campuses will become Jewish free. I have already heard parents in this country talking about a number of “no go” university campuses for their children. This is a reality that I think we can all agree is abhorrent.
It is commendable that the Government committed £7 million to fighting antisemitism in our schools and at universities. However, other than a small percentage, this funding is still yet to be allocated to those on the front lines fighting antisemitism and representing the interests of Jewish students. Can my noble friend confirm when this support will be made available?
University leaders must not be allowed to sit idly by while this, the oldest form of hatred, is allowed to continue in their institutions. I ask my noble friend: when will the Government convene university leaders, together with the UJS, to compel them to act decisively and proactively against anti-Jewish racism on their campuses? This is not just a matter of security. Jewish students being able to enjoy the student experience just the same as all their peers is a matter of justice, equality and the fundamental right to feel safe and to flourish in higher and further education.
“Jews cannot fight antisemitism alone. The victim cannot cure the crime”.