Yet another tragedy in the Mediterranean. Here’s an actual rescue plan

Another week, another appalling boat disaster in the Mediterranean, another round of the same tired row on migration. Yesterday a boat carrying 600 people sank off the coast of Libya; 400 people were rescued, the rest are feared dead, trapped in the belly of the boat.

This morning the same round of cliches are being trotted out. The pro-immigration lobby says our restrictive policies are cruel. The anti-immigration brigade say we must not encourage masses of people to come. But the migrant crisis is too great for such shallow responses. In this week’s Spectator, Paul Collier says that this ‘lazy thinking’ gets us nowhere. He has an alternative, and it involves more than just a few Royal Navy ships fishing people out of the water.

If we really want to help refugees, he says, look beyond the Mediterranean. There are ten million people displaced from Syria, and we have a duty to help more than just the ones who try to cross the sea illegally.