Britain cannot ignore foreign conflicts

Staff at Tilbury, who acted so promptly and professionally to deal with the incident, deserve our praise, as do those in our local Sikh community who gave their support.

For those who believe conflicts in the Middle East have nothing to do with us, they should think on. The Afghan Sikhs are treated appallingly by the regime in Kabul. We have been engaged in conflict in Afghanistan to defeat al- Qaeda, but we left the job unfinished and the forces of extremism are on the rise.

Can anyone really suggest it would be morally right to turn our backs on these people?

There is a view abroad that it is only the UK that is the destination for illegal migrants.

That is wrong. Every day Syrian refugees are making perilous journeys in anything that will float to get across to Italy. Many have perished making the journey.

Would so many be fleeing, if we had taken decisive action earlier? Can we really expect people to stay put when the risk of torture and death is constantly present? The world has now woken up to the fact that IS routinely beheads its enemies, a technique that has been put to considerable use during the Syrian conflict.

So, let us not pretend that things that happen elsewhere in the world have no effect on us. We are Great Britain, not Little England. The world’s problems will end up at our shores one way or another.

Refugees seeking asylum or being so desperate they are trafficked by gangmasters into certain slavery are a consequence of an unstable world. By working to establish a peaceful world we will reduce the desire on the part of migrants to come here. Aid is a much cheaper vehicle to achieve that than war.

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