03/09/2026
More bad behaviour from the Manchester Jewish Museum!
A Susan Kay from the Museum has recently gone public trying to put people off coming on my Jewish Manchester tour, even though my next Jewish Manchester tour is in association with the prestigious B’nai B’rith organisation.
What a surprise! Since I first did this tour in the spring of 2019, and I’ve conducted the tour more than a hundred times, I’ve had to put up with really bizarre behaviour from Museum staff.
• Museum staff Merton Paul and a woman called Alexandra asked me to take them on the tour, then stood there mute for 2 hours and didn’t even thank me at the end. No comeback.
• Long term director Gareth Redston came on the tour and when we got to the Museum, instead of announcing who he was to my group and inviting them inside, he simply vanished without word. So bloody rude and ignorant!
• When I finished the tour a few years ago, a volunteer came out the building and then very rudely dismissed me as if I was worthless. I put in a complaint, which still hasn’t been resolved. I wonder if this very ill-mannered individual is the same as this latest troll, Susan Kay?
The museum’s remit is to promote Manchester Jewish history, and nobody is doing this better than me.
I’ve constantly asked the Museum why they won’t support the tours. All they have to do is tell the public that though I don’t work for the Museum, I am an official Manchester guide and one of the country’s leading Jewish historians…But no. They treat me as if I’m worthless, despite the hundreds of Jewish tours I’ve conducted in Manchester and London, despite the voluminous works I’ve written promoting Jewish history, despite the talks I give around the world on Jewish history. They wouldn’t even let me give a talk on the 90th anniversary of the Battle of Cable Street. Basically, I’m not welcome there.
Predictably, at the same time, the other Manchester guiding groups and Visit Manchester have also refused to support my Jewish Manchester tours. The reason why is obvious: Jonathan Schofield, Jean Bailo and those who run local tours don’t want to work with a Jew. Even Nick Brook-Sykes at Visit Manchester supports such a stance. If they think this is going to stop me doing the tours, they’re deluded.
As I’ve had to endure 17 years of this nonsense, with no solution in sight, I will now will be going to the government’s Department of Culture and Tourism to inform them that the museum is not only contravening its remit of promoting Manchester’s Jewish history but is actively working against those who are.
