MOST foreign students who overstay their visas are not being deported, it has emerged today.

The news that immigration officers have been told not to automatically kick out of the country students who are here illegally followed revelations that Britain's immigration chief had personally intervened when her officers began deportation proceedings against a Chinese student in Manchester for supplying the wrong credit card details on a visa renewal.

The student had submitted the form in good time - but her application was delayed by the wrong information.

Lin Homer, chief executive of the Border and Immigration Agency, said she had stepped in and called for `common sense' to prevail.

It has since emerged that the BIA's director of enforcement, Jonathan Lindley, has instructed all regional directors not to deport students who overstay their visa unless the case is deemed a priority.

Hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals come to study in Britain each year - 309,000 in 2006 - and there are persistent concerns that some may be using supposed courses as a smokescreen for working in the country, or may stay on after their visas run out.

Mr Lindley's memo describes a recent rule change making student overstayers automatically liable for refusal if they seek a visa extension, and remarks that Ms Homer made `critical comments' about the decision to enforce the removal of the student in whose case she intervened.

He added: "I am surprised that any of these cases have come sufficiently high within enforcement teams' priorities to merit such quick removal action."

Ms Homer said: "The case that prompted this was a Chinese student studying in Manchester.

"She applied in time but wrote her details down wrongly and so she was refused as an out-of-time applicant, because of effectively an administration error.

"The immigration team started important action against them and I intervened."

Shadow home secretary David Davis said: "It is astonishing that warped government priorities are dictating that our immigration authorities turn a blind eye to those with no right to stay in the UK.

"These revelations reflect the continued chaos at the BIA.

"In 2004 David Blunkett announced measures aimed at cracking down on bogus colleges used to allow students to stay in the country illegally. In 2008 it seems the Home Secretary cannot even be bothered to deport illegal overstayers even when they are caught."