United Kingdom Immigration and Asylum (AIT/IAC) Unreported Judgments

 

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER		Case No: UI-2024-005084
	First-tier Tribunal No: [ EA/04741/2020]

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:

 

On 14 ^th of February 2025

 

Before

 

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE RUDDICK

 

Between

 

QASIM SHABBIR BUTT

Appellant

and

 

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT

Respondent

Appeal Determined without a hearing pursuant to Rule 34

of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008

DECISION AND REASONS

1.             The appellant appeals against the decision of First-tier Tribunal Judge Row ("the Judge") dismissing his appeal against the respondent's decision to refuse to issue him a family permit as a dependant relative under the Immigration (European Economic Area) Regulations 2016 ("the EEA Regulations").

2.             On 20 November 2024, I granted the appellant permission to appeal, noting in particular that it was arguable that the Judge erred in at least two ways:

(i)              by refusing to put any weight on the appellant's Pakistani tax returns because he had "no way of checking [their] authenticity": [39]; and

(ii)           by declining at [10-14] to identify the relevant date at which the appellant needed to establish his dependency as his sponsor (in spite of this having been determined by another judge of the First-tier Tribunal at an earlier stage in the appeal) and then making general findings about dependency without reference to any particular date: [42]. He also misdirected himself at [27] as to what the "specified date" is.

3.             Following the grant of permission, the appellant asked for the appeal to be determined on the papers, and the respondent submitted a Rule 24 reply conceding that the Judge had erred in his approach to the tax returns and suggesting that the appeal be remitted to the First-tier Tribunal for a fresh hearing.

4.             As both sides have agreed to the error of law question being determined without a further hearing before the Upper Tribunal, I now make a formal finding that the Judge did err in the ways identified in the grant of permission. As the first error has been conceded, I set out my reasons for finding that the second error is also made out.

5.             The application turned on the appellant's dependency on his sponsor, and it was necessary for the Judge to determine that question with regard to the relevant date. This was, as identified by another First-tier Tribunal Judge at an earlier stage in this appeal, the date of hearing [11]. However, the Judge was neither satisfied that this was correct nor persuaded by the respondent that the correct date was "the specified date". He decided that the issue must have been "overlooked", and announced a determination to decide the issue of dependency as of the date of application, the date of hearing and the "specified date" [10-14]. However, nowhere in the decision did he make the three separate findings he said he intended to make. He made a finding with regard to all three dates at once [42].

6.             Although the Judge was not required to set out all of his reasoning, I consider that the decision demonstrates that he did not in fact put his mind to the evidence of dependency as of the various discrete dates he had identified. With the exception of a reference to transfers into the one of appellant's account on three specific dates in 2024 [34], nowhere in his findings did he set out what point in time his various concerns relate to, in spite of having before him evidence that ran from October 2011 to some point in 2024. The clear inference is that the Judge ultimately decided the question of dependency with reference to the evidence as a whole. The Judge thus erred by misdirecting himself as to the question he had to answer. If I am wrong, and that is not what he did, then he erred by failing to set out his reasons for dismissing the appeal clearly enough for them to be understood.

7.             Nor did the Judge put his mind to what the "specified date" actually was; he remarked at [27] that none of the bank statements "is for the period before the specified date. They all begin in January 2020." This is in fact before the specified date of 31 December 2020. As the relevant date was not the specified date by the date of hearing, however, this last error was not material.

8.             For these reasons, the decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of material errors of law, requiring it to be set aside.

Notice of Decision

The decision of First-tier Tribunal Judge Row dated 21 June 2024 is set aside in its entirety and the appeal is remitted to the First-tier Tribunal for a fresh hearing on all issues before any judge other than Judge Row.

The appellant has requested a hearing on the papers. Whether that request is granted is a matter for the First-tier Tribunal.

 

 

E. Ruddick

 

Judge of the Upper Tribunal

Immigration and Asylum Chamber

 

4 February 2025