HL (Uganda) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

An appellate court exercising a supervisory jurisdiction over a tribunal does not rehear the case. Where the tribunal’s decision-making process contains an error of law, the proper remedy is to remit the matter so that it can make the findings of fact it failed to make. The appellate court may recommend that a further hearing be assigned to a senior judge where appropriate, but should not give a direction if its power to do so is unclear.

HL appealed from a decision of the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal (AIT No. AS/04231/2004). Permission to appeal had been granted because of concerns about the immigration judge’s credibility findings. The Secretary of State accepted that the reasoning on credibility was erroneous in law and agreed that the matter should be remitted.

The appellant nevertheless opposed remittal, believing that the Court of Appeal could determine the case itself. The central issue was therefore the scope of the court’s supervisory jurisdiction and the appropriate remedy for an error of law in the tribunal’s decision-making process.

1. Appeal allowed. The court allowed the appeal and remitted the matter to the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal for reconsideration.
2. The Court of Appeal’s jurisdiction was supervisory. It did not rehear the case or determine the underlying factual issues itself.
3. Where an error of law had occurred in the lower tribunal’s decision-making process, the proper remedy was to remit the matter to that tribunal. The tribunal could then make the appropriate findings of fact which it had failed to make on the earlier occasion.
4. The appellant’s concerns were understandable because the case had already been heard at the lower level twice. Those concerns did not enlarge the court’s jurisdiction or permit it to decide the merits.
5. The court recommended, without purporting to give a binding direction, that the reconsideration should if possible be assigned to a senior immigration judge. The court was uncertain whether it had power to direct that allocation.
6. Lord Justice Chadwick agreed with Lord Justice Scott Baker’s reasoning and recommendation. The formal order was: appeal allowed and matter remitted to the AIT.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division) — In [2007] EWCA Civ 137, the appeal from the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal was allowed and the matter was remitted to the AIT for reconsideration.