Britain must be part of migrant quota system, says Juncker

A Syrian refugee boy holds his teddy as he waits behind police barriers at the Greek border
A Syrian refugee boy holds his teddy as he waits behind police barriers at the Greek border
YANNIS BEHRAKIS

Britain will be asked to become part of a permanent system of European Union migrant quotas to replace existing asylum rules under proposals for a Europe-wide immigration system tabled by Jean-Claude Juncker today.

In a 90 minute “state of the union” speech to MEPs, the European commission president warned that Europe’s migration crisis threatened to unravel the EU as countries squabbled over who should take refugees

“We are not in a good place. There is a lack of Europe in the EU and there is a lack of union in the European Union. That has to change,” he said.

Mr Juncker today proposed that 160,000 asylum seekers from Hungary, Greece and Italy should be shared among EU countries, a measure that Britain is exempted from