Compared to the ongoing diaspora of vast multitudes heading out of the Middle East and North Africa, the British Scheme to welcome up to 3000 unaccompanied children into the UK was a welcome, if tiny, contribution to the disastrous outcome of a string a failed foreign intervention initiatives by the West, in which Britain played a leading part. To announce today that the scheme would be halted at 350 arrivals has shocked parliament and the country.
No explanation is sufficient. The one given by the Home Secretary that French officials complained to her that giving these children sanctuary and a fresh start in a promising new life ‘encouraged people traffickers’ is patently absurd. Let us hope she will stop and think again. If not we must hope the Courts will order her to do so. Apparently legal proceedings begin tomorrow.