Lord Dubs - Labour Peer and Kindertransport Refugee HARDtalk

Welcome to a special edition of Hardtalk

which is part of a day of

BBC programming devoted to the world on the move.

I am joined in this BBC

theatre by an audience and a special guest,

Lord Dubs, Alf Dubs, veteran

Labour politician, former head of the British review Council, and a

man whose life story illustrates what it means to flee for your life.

As a six-year old Jewish boy in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia, he was

saved from near certain death by a rescue mission

which became known as

77 years on, are humanitarian principles clearer

when it comes to migration? APPLAUSE.

Lord Dubs, Alf Dubs, welcome to Hardtalk.

Let me ask you a broad opening question.

Throughout your life, from being a boy in Nazi

occupied Czechoslovakia to today in your 80s,

refugee and migration issues, do you see a change amongst us humans?

Do you think we are more compassionate

or less compassionate today than we were in 1939

I would like to think we are more compassionate

because we see some of

the awful things happening on the world on our television

And so I think we are more aware of what has happened.

Equally we seem to have more concerned about migration.

A balance, and a delicate one, but do you see a shift in it

Do you fear that our compassion index is perhaps falling?

I think, in Britain, there is a not of compassion.

One has to tap into it and get it to express itself, but

I think that the British people are essentially very compassionate.

They care about the world, they want to do something

for the refugees that we see on our television screens and it is

difficult to know quite how to give effect to that.

When there is a way of doing it, British people

respond, as I have found in recent weeks.

Well, in recent weeks, you have been very involved in a push to

get children, minors into this country from camps, makeshift camps

Many of them Syrian, but Afghans and others as well.

And I want to talk in detail about that.

But to give people some context, I want to talk about your own

Tell me what you remember of being that little boy in

Czechoslovakia in 1939 and discovering that

I remember the day that the Germans occupied Prague,

several months before the war started, in March 19 39.

We had to tear a picture of President Benes

out of our schoolbooks and stick in a picture of Hitler.

And then came the day when my mother put me on a

I could see German soldiers with swastikas

standing in the background and the train went off

and took two days to get to Liverpool Street station.

A long journey, I didn't mind the hard wood seats.

When we got to the Dutch border, the older ones

cheered because they knew we were out of reach

Germany. I knew it was significant, but I did not fully understand why.

Do you remember your mother trying to

explain to you, while you were still in Prague, why she was actually

putting you on a train and you were being deprived of her presence?

My father, who is the Jewish side of my

family, my father left Prague within a day

And he came to Britain and my mother said, there's a chance I'll see him

That was the incentive for me to be happy on the train.

Equally, I said goodbye to my mother for what

So I was aware that this was all very momentous.

Do you remember anything of the troops on the streets, of any

I remember seeing massive German soldiers, marching about.

Schools were supposed to greet Hitler when he came to Prague

My mother said we were much too small and my class

I didn't see particularly any abuses of Jews

And it was only a few months before the war began.

And the real oppression was just beginning in Czechoslovakia.

But there is one twist to the story that is truly extraordinary and that

is the role of one British man whom I had the great privilege to meet

and have had on the heart programme myself,

-- and have on the Hardtalk programme myself,

I talked to him when he was 105 and he

was the inspiration for that Kindertransport movement to get more

than 600 Jewish children out of Prague along with you.

You came to know him quite well. I did.

I knew I had come on a Kindertransport, but

it was years later before there was a television

programme and it all came out that he will the person who

Of course, there were other Kindertransports

And I got to know him pretty well. Wonderful man.

He had a good sense of humour, didn't suffer falls gladly.

Loved talking politics, thought Tony Blair

You know, he had been a Labour candidate for

Mind you, Maidenhead was as Tory then as it is now, so he didn't win.

But I suppose what his life told us and still tells us today is that one

When faced with a humanitarian crisis

like this, one person can make adifference.

And almost by accident, Nicky Winterton with

a friend one up in Prague in the autumn of 1938.

He saw what was happening. Anybody else would have walked away.

He decided to help children, mainly Jewish children, get out.

He persuaded the British government to take them.

He worked with the Nazi authorities to allow the children to leave.

A lesser man would have said, this is for somebody else.

The reason I want to talk about this at some

length is that I feel so many resonances with challenges the world

I think the assumption some make today is that somehow the

world was aware of what the Nazis, what Hitler intended to do with the

Jews, and therefore, there was a humanitarian

But if one looks at the time that what was being said, even

in the UK, about the arrival of hundreds, thousands of Jewish

refugees, there was not a warm welcome at all.

On the other hand, Britain was the only European

country that took in the Kindertransport children, 10,000 of

them altogether. Even America said no.

So I think, to this country's credit, the answer at the time was

Indeed, but I'm talking about the mood in the country.

The Daily Mail in 1939 quoted a leading London magistrate,

Herbert Metcalfe, from the old Street Magistrates' Court, saying,

"The way stateless Jews from Germany are pouring in from every port of

this country is becoming an outrage".

I wonder if, as a kid, did you feel welcome

Since then, I have felt enormously welcome.

I think this country has been terrific to me and I shall

There may have been some tension is there but I was a bit

young and I was not aware of all these things.

It's funny, because I think that some rose tinted specs

are applied sometimes when we think back to the way the Jewish migration

was treated for those Jews lucky enough to get out.

Whitehall And The Jews, Louise London's book.

She says the process was designed to keep out large

numbers of European Jews, perhaps ten times as many as they let in.

70,000 were admitted by the outbreak of war,

but Jewish associations in

Britain had half a million Case files of people who were never

And Britain was not perhaps as welcoming

as it might have been but

then other countries were not welcoming either.

And these were very difficult times and the Jews of

Europe fled in all directions, for safety.

Yes, I'd guess that is really bringing us to today, whether

My opening question was about whether there is any

Whether all these decades after that persecution of people in the 1930s,

whether we really have learned lessons?

I think there are many more lessons to

be learned and some people don't want to learn them, some people

would like to learn them and don't know how to give effect to them.

You, if I may say so, to a certain extent you use

your personal story in recent weeks and months.

Because you led a campaign a very high-profile

member of a campaign to persuade the David Cameron government

in the UK to let in thousands of children who

have found themselves unaccompanied, separated from mum and dad, living

in the makeshift camps, migrant refugee camps across Europe.

And you made a point of saying, "My life

story tells me that we must act to help these children."

Well, I did, and I didn't want to make too much

of that because I think the argument for bringing in unaccompanied child

refugees from Europe stood on its own merits.

It didn't depend upon my being the person who was putting

But clearly, it helped with the publicity, it helped with the

Yes, but it was plain wrong. It was deeply misleading.

Because as David Cameron said, with a degree of frustration,

it is simply not right to compare the children of the Kindertransport

in 1939 with children who are already in Europe.

They may be in the so-called jungle camp in Calais,

they may be in Slovenia, Slovakia or Hungary,

but the children are in Europe

and they are not facing a genocidal maniac.

And I have always said that there is a difference

because clearly, people like me were fleeing

The young people in Europe now are not fleeing

from the gas chambers, so there is a difference.

However, to have young people sleeping in the streets,

vulnerable to prostitution, vulnerable to drugs, vulnerable to

criminality, that is not a happy situation for young people.

So, to that extent, there is a parallel.

Tell me, because you did a lot of research in pushing this campaign

forward, how many unaccompanied children are there today in Europe?

Some of them have come from Syria, some from different situations.

For example, sub-Saharan Africa, from

Eritrea, from all sorts of different countries.

But how many unaccompanied kids are there?

I rely on Save the Children who did a lot of work on this.

Originally, we thought there were 26,000.

Later estimates suggest 95,000 all over Europe, recently.

And what is equally alarming is that 10,000 just disappeared

according to Interpol, the police authorities.

10,000 just disappeared in Europe, modern Europe.

So, whatever David Cameron says, these young people are not safe.

When you say "disappeared", what are the authorities suspect has

Well, they were registered of course in Italy and

elsewhere and they have just gone missing.

There was no accommodation for them...

There are allegations of organised crime,

Is there any evidence that you can provide that

the real and present danger for these kids go that far?

Well, the fact that 10,000 children have

disappeared, for heaven's sake, if one's own children

alarming enough, but 10,000 children have just disappeared in Europe.

We are an advanced continent, this should not happen.

You know, one of the fundamental distinctions made in

international law today across the world is that there

is a difference between refugees, those who are

forcibly displaced, who leave their countries of origin

because of conflict, and those who are defined

as migrants, economic migrants, who voluntarily left their homes

To you, doesn't matter whether these children are

from countries where there is war also be from countries where people

-- where there is war or simply from countries where people fled to make

a better life somewhere else. Well, I think at one level, no,

they are all children. To put it bluntly, do children

from Syria who have fled war have greater rights

to a haven in the UK war have greater rights to a haven

in the UK and children from I think in terms of

the United Nations, in terms of the Geneva Convention, then

people who have a well founded fear of persecution for race, or

religion, a fear of war, a fear of torture, they are the ones

who should be offered safety. I think the difficulty

with the present migrant crisis is that there

is a confusion between the two. And I think we have to say

to people, we are willing as a country to accept children, young

people, who are under the Geneva For others, it's bad luck, but we

can't take everybody. Yes.

The people... And this is primarily the government

and supporters of the government who were very suspicious of your

campaign to take thousands of unaccompanied children

into the UK, they said were going to make the problem worse

because you would encourage both children, their parents

and people traffickers by sending a signal

that if kids were sent on boats alone to

Europe, they would in the end find an open door to countries

they really wanted First of all, there is

no evidence that this The government has

said so, but there is Secondly, one has to set

the plight of the children, sleeping in the street,

in railway sections, against the possibility some

others might come here. And thirdly, the government,

in giving effect to the change in the law

which I helped to give effect to, the government has said

they will not take any young people who were not in Europe before

the 20th of March this year. Thereby stopping any

subsequently coming. Let me quote you the words

of Tory MP Roger Gale. He said to you, "I believe Lord Dubs

a good bloke and his heart is in the right place, but..."

Because he said it's possible that as a result of this initiative

that you pushed forward, people traffickers will bring more people

across the Aegean Sea, more people will die as a result.

And if that happens, some of the responsibility

for those deaths will have to be taken by those who have taken to

-- those who have chosen to pursue this course of action.

To which I say, that if people say no

to these young people, do we say we will leave them lying in the

streets, sleeping in gutters and so on?

Do we say we don't care at all

as a country, or do we say that at least some of them should be

Now, I have had enormous responses to my

efforts to change the immigration law and

Yes, but that's because you appeal to sentiment.

And we all can echo your sentiment and

your good instincts, but in the end, politics is about tough decisions.

It's not just about following your sentiment.

No, politics is about heart and head.

Not one, not the other, but the two together.

And I think the two should be operating jointly.

And I believe that what we are proposing, what is being

proposed, is logical, its humanitarian and I don't think it

will bring in a stream of other people anyway.

Do you never doubt that you have actually put your

heart into prominent a place and that you have not been as coldly

rational as leaders and politicians actually have a duty to be?

I have argued that it does not depend upon

me that the amendment is being moved, it does not depend on my

background, that helps emotionally, but it doesn't depend on it.

We are looking at the plight of young people.

Do we say we won't let these kids sleep in the streets, we won't

care what happens to them, whether they get into

criminality and prostitution? Do we say that?

Do we turn away from it or do we say as a

country, we have humanitarian instincts and a responsibility?

You have talked about 95,000 unaccompanied

kids really struggling to stay alive in the Europe of today.

You know as well as I do that Britain is

For example, the local councils who would have to look after

unaccompanied children if they came to this

country, one example, the

County of Norfolk, it has 1000 children it is struggling to find

foster carers for in Norfolk itself today.

So who do you think is going to take responsibility for looking

after the thousands of children that you want to bring in?

I have never said that they should all come to Britain.

The original amendment which would change later on was 3000.

It wasn't even our share of the total, it was less than that.

People have said to me, why couldn't you be more generous?

I have said, we are trying to win an argument here

Let's leave aside the specific issue of the children

which you have worked so hard on and think about the bigger

picture in Europe and thinking about people on the move.

Europe has been on the front line of the particular

movement from Syria but other countries to, through Turkey,

Germany last year took more than 1 million people in an 500,000

of them pretty much sought asylum in Germany.

Britain, over the next five years, after 2020, has pledged to

You have spent your life in this country.

You said at the beginning of this interview you were

very proud of Britain's humanitarian record.

What do you make of the commitment Britain is making today?

We are taking 20,000 vulnerable Syrians

The government recently said they would take a few more,

including children, from the camps in the region.

I think it is still a small response.

It says something when Germany becomes the conscience

And Sweden, in particular, those two countries.

I'm not saying everybody should should come

I think there should be a measured response.

It should be done on the basis of being

And by the way, in relation to what you said a

minute ago, I have had people writing to me, e-mailing me,

I know there is a lot of pressure in Kent and possibly in one or two

other counties, but there are people in Britain who are willing to become

They would have to be monitored and vetted by the local

authorities are but I think people would respond if we ask them to.

You were a politician for years... I hope I still am!

The difference now from then is that you don't need votes any more

You used to need votes and I just wonder

whether Alf Dubs who needed votes might be different from the Alf Dubs

who sits in comfort in the House of Lords.

Because in the end, this is about politics.

You must look in the opinion polls as well as I do, and

I'm not just talking about the UK where scepticism about immigration,

the numbers of migrants in the country is on the rise, but you look

right across Europe from France to the eastern European countries

like Hungary and Poland and many others,

Europeans are becoming increasingly sceptical and actually I was a

-- and actually, I would say, Ilic a fearful about the levels of

immigration. And you have to, as a politician,

do you not, factor that First of all, I think

the House of Lords should be elected, but that argument

isfor another day. And the reason we should be elected

is that we should be And I still, I hope sincerely

that I still behave as if I was accountable to local

people in the local I hope I don't say anything

in politics against that. Be that as it may,

please address my point. Look at the rise of

the AFD party in Germany. Look at the fact that in Poland,

you have a government that is frankly very anti-immigrant,

even more so in Hungary. Look at the fact that fences,

razor wire fences, new walls are going up in this continent

that is supposedly committed in the Schengen area to

freedom of movement. And your approach to the refugee

and migrant problem does not Things are changing, but there

is still a strong humanitarian Yes, but look at

the polls in Germany. Many German thing that was the wrong

policy and far too many. But I think those of us who believe

in humanitarian traditions and It's our job to speak

out and say that But you just told me you also have

to listen to the people. So you can't be paternalistic

and tell the people that they have to keep

taking more and more. One has to listen to people

and also persuade them. All I can say to you is something I

said a few minutes ago. I'm delighted at the number

of positive responses I have I have had very few

and the few that they were very anonymous, I have

had very few critical letters and the ones

that were critical of those saying

we have a lot of pressure on local Of course we have, but we are a rich

country to deal with that. I just wonder, whether you fear, and

you as a Jewish boy, coming to the UK in 1939, have reason to reflect

on this. I wonder if you fear that because of the tensions around the

whole immigration debate in Europe today, that there is a new danger of

a surge of extreme sentiment. Nationalists, perhaps in a phobic

sentiment, taking root in today's Europe. We always have to be aware

of such dangers and we have seen some of it in some of the countries

that we have mentioned. We have to speak out against it. But as far as

refugee children are concerned, as far as I can tell from the messages

I have had, positively supportive of that. So it is not just the job of

politicians to listen, it is also to give a lead, to say this is the

right thing, will you support me in that? I want to finish off by going

into your experience. I can't think of many people who have watched this

debate about how to treat people on the move for longer than you. Today,

do you feel a pessimist or an optimist about human nature. As

Nicholas Winterton said to me the importance of ethics in human

society. I think I am more optimistic than pessimistic. I think

they reflect the instinct of many people in this country. Despite what

you said about Hungary and other countries. I think in Britain we

have a humanitarian tradition which is still alive today. Do you think

Nicholas Winton would be supportive today? I think you would be, he was

a great man and I owe my life to him. I think he would be saying this

is the way forward. Alf Dubs, thank you very much for being on Hardtalk.