[Osem]

This really is only the start of a huge problem. For those who manage to get to where they want to be it's great and many of them deserve our help and support but for there's millions left behind, the vast majority of whom will have reasons for wanting to come to the EU which are entirely understandable but don't amount to refugee status.

What's needed is a serious plan to cope with refugees closer to home and some of our generous aid budget should be allocated to doing that. What's also needed is a credible system to define and separate refugees from economic migrants in order to stem the flow of the latter.

The deaths of men, women and children won't stop because the EU takes a 1,000, a 100,000 or 1,000,000 Syrians because the world is full of poor, desperate people and they too will feel they have a right to come here too. They'll see what's going on, they'll see large numbers of people getting through and they too will decide to take their chances. Unless we do something about that they will come in ever increasing numbers. and we have to have a plan for dealing with them. That is undeniable and I have yet to hear the likes of Merkel and Junker explain what they propose we do. They haven't because they've got no idea what to do and that just about sums up the EU for me.