STUDENTS and councillors visited the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in Poland for the third consecutive year.

The trip which was supported by the Government’s Take Part programme and organised by the council’s diversity team — saw the group of 24 teenagers from Grays Media Arts College in Hathaway Road, Gable Hall School in Southend Road, Corringham, Ormiston Park School in Nethan Drive, Aveley, Chafford Hundred Campus in Mayflower Road, Gateway Academy in Marshfoot Road and William Edwards School and Sports College in Stifford Clays Road, Grays travel to Krakow for three days earlier this month.

Labour’s Thurrock council leader John Kent and Conservative cllr Phil Anderson joined the students, teachers and youth workers on the visit in the build-up to Holocaust Day on Thursday, January 27.

The visit will play a role in the Schools Diversity Project and help highlight the destructive nature of discrimination and prejudice.

Cllr Kent said afterwards: “We all know what went on at Auschwitz-Birkenau, or think we do. But it wasn’t until I saw the tons of human hair which was ready to be sold and made into fabrics when the Allies liberated the camp that it came home to me — they saw human beings as nothing more than commodities.

“Birkenau was specifically designed as a death camp, nothing more than a sophisticated production line of death.

“In three years over a million people were killed at those two camps; at that rate you would wipe Thurrock out by the end of June.”

He added: “It was a really amazing trip and the other thing which struck me what a fantastic bunch of young people we had with us.

“Considering we left Grays at 3am, nearly 20 hours later we were all still together and having a good time. They came from different schools, they all got on and they all threw themselves into the project. A great advert for Thurrock’s youth.”

A Holocaust Day service open to everyone is due to be held on Thursday, January 27 at the Memorial Gardens, at the junction of Palmer’s Avenue and High View Avenue, in Grays starting at 11am and running until 12.15pm.

It will include reflections from the Mayor of Thurrock, Anne Cheale and statements from councillors John Kent and Lynn Worrall as well as MPs Jackie Doyle-Price and Stephen Metcalfe.

There will also be prayers of faith from a Jewish representative, prayers from the Rev Edward Hanson and a pebble laying service.