This split, and all the anger and threatened retribution that followed, might have been avoided if the EU had not been so utterly incompetent in its handling of the migration crisis. Had there been sensible, controlled systems put in place as soon as the scale of the problem became apparent, and as soon as it was clear that Greece and southern Italy – among the poorest regions of the EU – were bearing the consequences, the provocative diktats from the Commission might never have been needed. If the EU really was the rational, co-operative, consensual federation that its documents proclaim, why didn’t it monitor its own borders, and establish orderly mechanisms for the efficient processing of migrants at the points of entry? Why didn’t it establish clear priorities from the start: genuine war refugees coming first, and economic migrants (temporarily, at least) pushed to the back of the queue? Why were months wasted doing nothing at all as one human tragedy after another hit the headlines?