Sir Tony Blair has admitted that an influx of migrants to Britain has caused “strain” on communities.

The former Labour prime minister defended his record on immigration in an interview with the BBC‘s Amol Rajan.

Asked whether he felt his handling of immigration was a mistake, Sir Tony said: “No.

“What I always say to people is this: I am very happy to take full responsibility for the more than 10 years that I was British prime min ister, and for the decisions I took.

“Well, what I won’t do is take responsibility for the time when I wasn’t prime minister.

“The truth is, we did need a lot of people for the British economy coming in from Europe.”

Sir Tony said had he still been in power he would have noticed the problems, saying that “in certain communities, there was a big influx of people, it was causing real strains in some of those communities”.

He added: “If I’d still been in power, I would have been all over it.”

He continued: “There were lots of things we could have done to narrow down freedom of movement within the existing European rules.

“So, as I say, I’m always happy to take responsibility for the time I was prime minister. But I’m not taking responsibility when I wasn’t because I wasn’t taking the decisions.”

Net migration to the UK began to increase during Sir Tony’s decade in power.

The figure – the difference between the number of people leaving and legally arriving – stood at 48,000 in 1997, but was 273,000 when he left office.