First of all, I should say that generally I have always considered myself very supportive of asylum seekers or those who are simply in search of a better life. Asylum seekers in particular of course deserve our compassion and nobody fleeing war or persecution should be turned away. As always though, the situation is probably a lot more complex than we see in the media.

I think you are absolutely right to say that the government don't seem to know what to do about the situation. In fact, I don't think they truly want to solve it. For whatever reason, 'illegal migration has become a useful political football for the government, and even if they are failing to deal with it, they are still able to focus a lot of negative attention on a group of people who do not have the means to defend their position.

That being said, I think amongst all of the outrage and political fighting, there probably are some legitimate questions that need to be answered.

1) Like you say, how do we accommodate the current (and future) numbers of incoming asylum seekers and migrants? The UK is a rich, but small country, and is not without it's own set of problems. Housing is a major issue right now, with rents on the rise and a complete lack of decent social housing. Homelessness is on the rise and living standards are falling. Our current government seem incapable of looking after our own, so I have little confidence they can look after vulnerable migrants too.

Then there is the catch 22 situation in which more migrants may be attracted to the UK if all of the above problems are solved. I never really thought I would raise such a question, but is there a limit to how many people the UK can take?

2) What is the attraction to the UK in particular? I know many thousands (millions even) settle in Europe. But there is no denying that some pass straight through Europe and come to the UK. What do we have here in the UK that means vulnerable people are willing to risk their lives by leaving a safe country and set off across the extremely dangerous English Channel?

I understand that many may already have family or connections here, and without safe official routes, crossing the channel is their only option. Is this the case for all of them though? Without any official data it is hard to know.I think probably criminal gangs have a big role to play here. These are very vulnerable and desperate people who are probably being exploited and sold a lie. Are they being told the UK is much more attractive than it really is? Are they being told the crossing is much safer than reality?

I can understand crossing the sea from a war zone in Syria to the safety of Europe, but crossing from France to the UK is a little harder for me to process.

3) What does the future look like? If we think we got problems now, then I think the future is a whole lot bleaker. War is not going away. Today it might be Ukraine, but once the powers that be get bored with that, another conflict will begin. Unless rich countries stop using poor countries in far off places are a playground for war, the flow of refugees will keep coming. Climate change too. We haven't seen anything yet. In the coming years the Sahara will likely spread into Southern Europe and many parts of the Middle East with become uninhabitable. Those people will need to go somewhere, and they will head north.

I'm sorry if all of that seems pretty depressing. If I'm honest I have very mixed and conflicting views on the current situation. Like you though, I do not blame the people at all. I think what we are seeing is government failure at a mass scale.

As is often the case, the problems we face are often just the symptoms of a much wider social and political problem. Until we fix those, there is no reasonable way to deal with issues such as immigration.

This is a really interesting question Andrew and I have been meaning to reply to you all day. Time has run away from me though! I will reply properly as soon as I can.