Another Labour MP, Jake Richards, agreed, posting on X : “This government was elected on a promise to get a grip on immigration. We should not apologise for this. And if that means changing the operation of Article 8 of the ECHR then so be it.”
“As the prime minister has said, we are looking at the application of Article 8 of the ECHR to ensure our immigration rules work as intended,” the Home Office said in a statement to POLITICO. “We will set out plans to reform the immigration system in our upcoming White Paper, which will be published in due course.”
Déjà vu
The problem for Starmer is politicians have tried — and failed — to address politically unpalatable rulings made thanks to the European convention before. Starmer has long pitched himself as the antithesis of those Conservative politicians routinely suggesting Britain ignore ECHR rulings.
Rajiv Shah, a former Downing Street aide who advised former Conservative prime ministers Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson on ECHR policy, said Cooper ran the risk of “sounding like a poor Tory tribute act” in announcing the review, warning she was announcing “tough-sounding measures that won’t deliver tangible results.”
The 2014 Immigration Act set the domestic rules on Article 8 and deportations to be “as tough as possible within the confines of the ECHR,” he said, warning that “going significantly further would only be possible by breaching the ECHR, which the government is not willing to do.”
Attorney General Richard Hermer told the Parliamentary Assembly of the European Council in January that the U.K. government would “never withdraw” from the European Convention on Human Rights or “refuse to comply with judgments of the court, or requests for interim measures given in respect of the United Kingdom.”
