Former home secretary Lord Blunkett has asked Sir Keir Starmer to deport foreign criminals and illegal immigrants through deals with designated “safe" countries. The move would override the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) which has been criticised for preventing effective border control.

The ex-Labour MP said the prime minister should consider adopting the approach used by Sir Tony Blair where countries were designated as safe in agreements that overrode the ECHR. Lord Blunkett said this would offer a way around human rights objections which could stand in the way of Labour’s attempts to return illegal immigrants and foreign criminals to their home countries.

The former cabinet minister told The Telegraph that ECHR was preventing effective border control due to “expansive, and sometimes inconsistent or incoherent interpretations” of its articles.

“The real issue is whether [the Government] designates safe countries, which is what we did back in the day. We had a list [of safe countries] that automatically superseded the ECHR because we had made a deliberate decision, a duty,” Lord Blunkett the newspaper.

He explained that, during his time in government, they had completed “proper background work” to determine whether the move was safe within the ECHR. Lord Blunkett said Labour needs to be “really precise” about which countries they deem to be safe, and why.

Many illegal immigrants have used certain articles of the ECHR, such as 3 and 8, as ways to exploit human rights laws and stay in the UK.

However, Labour MPs have recently urged the prime minister to set aside the ECHR and deport foreign criminals. Hartlepool MP Jonathan Brash said the government has a “perfectly legitimate” right to deport criminals, with Article 8 rights to a family life not applying in such cases.

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper is currently considering whether to restrict the exploitation of the ECHR, reviewing how Article 8 is being applied by immigration courts to ensure it is used appropriately.

In the UK there are a record number of outstanding immigration appeals, with a number of them based on human rights claims. Standing at a staggering 41,987, the backlog is up nearly 500% from the start of 2022.