Politicians should slow down their responses to terror attacks

David Cameron has been chairing a Cobra meeting this morning to discuss the UK government’s response to yesterday’s terror attacks in Brussels.

Inevitably, the issue has become deeply partisan, with Ukip’s Mike Hookem managing to release a statement while the attacks were still taking place, arguing that ‘this horrific act of terrorism shows that Schengen free movement and lax border controls are a threat to our security’. Yesterday, too, Tory MPs attacked John McDonnell for calling into question the fitness of George Osborne for the job of Chancellor while a major terrorist attack was unfolding. What those Tory MPs didn’t acknowledge was that logically if it was wrong for a Shadow Chancellor to criticise a Chancellor in a Budget debate while a terrorist atrocity was unfolding, then surely the Budget debate itself should have been cancelled.

But the Brexiters argue that given David Cameron and George Osborne have explicitly linked security and EU membership, they have made it fair enough for those who disagree with them to point out events that undermine their narrative. Still, the most effective arguments are the ones posed sensitively, not bludgeoned into an unfolding event.

Politicians have become conditioned by the 24-hour news cycle and social media to respond to everything as quickly as they possibly can. But the response to the Brussels attacks shows that such haste isn’t always wise.