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Holocaust (Return of Cultural Objects) Bill

My Lords, I am very glad to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Warnock. I am sure that we are all grateful to my noble friend Lord Janner for introducing this Bill, which, as he said, has already been passed by another place. The power that the Bill gives to national museums and galleries to return a cultural object taken by the Nazi regime from mainly Jewish collections in the occupied countries is long overdue. The confiscation of so many cultural treasures from private collectors by the Nazi leaders in order to line their own pockets was big business. During the Nazi occupation of Paris, so many paintings were taken that the authorities had to take over the Jeu de Paume in the Tuileries to house them. These were then sold through intermediaries, mainly to art dealers in Switzerland, which was a neutral country. The Swiss dealers would sell on the works of art either to other dealers or to private collectors in Switzerland and the United States, who bought them in good faith. Many, of course, must have changed hands several times during the past 60 years, when the original provenance was not known. Some must have arrived at our national museums and galleries through gifts and in lieu of inheritance tax. Most of the original owners died in the horrors of the Holocaust, when whole families were murdered in the extermination camps of Auschwitz and Treblinka. There are no heirs in many cases. But there are heirs in some cases, who are entitled to claim. The Bill allows the item to be returned if the advisory panel recommends it and this is approved by the Secretary of State. This is surely the least that we can do. I support the Bill wholeheartedly and hope that your Lordships will give it a Second Reading.