There are no perfect solutions,here or in Syria. But compassion is necessary and there are tough decisions to be made about Europe’s place in the worldBritain cannot open its borders to everyone fleeing war anywhere in the world, but this does not excuse the government’s shameful determination to retain our borders closed to as many refugees as possible. Our international treaty obligations, and as well as the promptings of our collective conscience,entail a duty to offer meaningful sanctuary when a humanitarian catastrophe unfolds before our eyes.
The prime minister surely understands this. He is personally capable of compassion, but his political instincts enjoy been conditioned by defensive parochialism: terror of alienating those parts of the press and the electorate where hostility to foreigners is visceral. His reluctance to engage with pan-European efforts to accommodate refugees stems from a refusal to articulate any circumstances in which national questions should be answered at continental level.
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Source: theguardian.com