The discovery of 39 bodies of Chinese migrants in the back of a lorry in Essex was an avoidable tragedy, according to columnists. They just don’t agree how it should have been avoided.

The Daily Mail

Mark Almond, director of the Crisis Research Institute, Oxford, writes: “Tragically, this calamity is far from unique – indeed something like it was inevitable, given Britain’s and other European countries lackadaisical attitude to the relentless and tragic flow of migrants to Western shores.”

Almond, a lecturer in modern history, lists other similar incidents in the UK and abroad. Each leads to politicians and pundits expressing regret and promising to make sure it never happens again, he says. “Then, after a decent interval, the costs and complexity of doing anything to stop the trade in human cargo means a few cosmetic measures are adopted but things go on much as before.”

There is no simple solution he says. “The tenacity of the migrants will not evaporate with the platitudes of politicians... Nor will the geopolitical pressure behind mass migration vanish overnight.”

Almond points out that the one in 50 death rate for those crossing the Mediterranean means they haves a better chance of survival than that faced by Britons and Irish people who emigrated to America in the 19th Century. “Why wouldn’t today’s migrants.. take the same risk?”

But then he moves on to refer to the migrants in familiarly pejorative, dehumanising terms. Turkey’s President Erdogan is threatening to “open the floodgates” of Syrian refugees, “ he adds, warning: “letting a second human tsunami into the EU in this way would recreate the political chaos unleashed in Germany and its neighbours in 2015.”

Having suggested there are no easy answers, Almond concludes Westminster must ‘beef up’ border security, use thermal imaging and patrol boats to detect stowaways and people in dinghies. “Surely our island can get its own borders in order if it really wants to stop this criminal traffic in lives.”

The Guardian

More border control is not the answer, argues Daniel Trilling, author of a book about refugees and Europe. He has met people who have willingly adopted all kinds of risky methods of transport, he says. “A knee jerk response is to demand tougher controls: more security infrastructure at the borders; tougher punishments for those people who try to make these journeys and those who facilitate them. Yet such disasters do not happen because of a lack of border control - they are the price of it.” Politicians foster the illusion that migration can be switched on and off like a tap, Trilling says. But tough controls force people into ever more desperate measures.

“There is a series of other questions we should also be asking,” he argues. Why would people travel in this manner at all, what is pushing them from their homes? Why couldn’t they claim refugee status elsewhere in Europe? Would some have come here by legal routes if the system were not so slow? “By asking these questions we recognise that the people who suffer at our borders are not simply passive victims, but individuals making decisions and trying to take control of their lives.”

The Scotsman

For the paper the people smugglers are “pure evil” plying a lucrative business without scruples. “This is a globalised crime in a world that is, like it or not, an increasingly globalised place. And , as such, it demands a global response.”

No country can tackle people smuggling alone and searching every vehicle is impractical. “Instead an intelligence- led approach in which law enforcement agencies work together to catch those responsible is vital.”

We should reject the “hate-filled rhetoric of right-wing populists about ‘patriotism’ and building walls, physical or mental, against outsiders,” the paper adds, and promote liberal democracy. “for the most part the refugees are fleeing tyrants... because they want to live in a country like the UK. If Syria was a peaceful democracy, they would not need to.”

The Independent

Jo Wilding, a barrister specialising in immigration, also says the tragedy can come as little surprise. “Priti Patel, the home secretary, claims to be ‘shocked and saddened.’ On the contrary, it was entirely imaginable and predictable,” he says.

In fact, it never stopped happening. More than 18,000 people died or went missing in the Mediterranean between 2014 and 2018, he says, and two thirds were never found or identified.

“The EU’s desperation to keep migrants out has left it in a helpless position: keep quiet about Turkey’s behaviour towards our erstwhile allies, or to take the consequences of receiving 3.6 million refugees who have been stranded in Turkey,” he adds. “Perhaps we should be preparing for more bodies.”