Seeing the family name of a leading British politician in memoirs of a hidden childhood brought home to me not only the importance of the courage shown by those righteous gentiles who risked their lives to save Jews but also the enormity of the loss of the Shoah. I was left to reflect on how many potential leaders - not just in politics but in science, art and every field of endeavour - were lost to the Jewish people and the world because of the tragedy of the Shoah.

Only by remembering can we give that loss any semblance of meaning. Today as we stand on the brink of that moment when the Holocaust will cease to be memory and will become history, remembrance and Holocaust education take on new and even greater importance. We welcome the launch of the Commission on the Holocaust by the Prime Minister, David Cameron, as an important statement of Britain's commitment to face up to that challenge. But at this crucial moment every one of us is called to listen and learn from those who survived the nightmare. For, as Elie Wiesel has written, "whoever listens to a witness becomes a witness."