MK & Ors (Siera Leone) v Secretary of state for the Home Department

Reasons are adequate where, read as a whole, they make the decision intelligible and explain the findings reached. A tribunal which accepts a witness’s evidence on a disputed fact is not generally required to explain why it believed that evidence, particularly where there is no contrary evidence or competing factual testimony. The absence of independent corroboration does not itself make reasons inadequate. Where reconsideration is ordered on a specific reasons challenge, its scope should ordinarily remain limited to that issue. A wider reconsideration requiring favourable credibility findings to be reopened requires an exceptional justification.

Three Sierra Leonean appellants appealed against an Asylum and Immigration Tribunal determination dated 8 June 2009, which dismissed their appeals against refusals of their claims under the Refugee Convention and the European Convention on Human Rights.

An Immigration Judge had originally allowed the appeals, accepting that the appellants faced risk from the Kebbay family because of its relationship with the former President of Sierra Leone. The Secretary of State obtained reconsideration on limited grounds alleging inadequate reasoning. A first-stage reconsideration decision later treated all issues as open, and the subsequent panel rejected the appellants’ credibility despite accepting the claimed family relationship. The central questions were whether the original reasoning was defective and, if so, whether reconsideration could properly extend to all findings.

1. Appeal allowed unanimously. Lord Justice Sullivan delivered the principal judgment. Lord Justice Lloyd and Lord Justice Ward agreed.
2. The original Immigration Judge’s determination was lengthy, thorough and coherent when read as a whole. It recorded the appellants’ evidence, the Secretary of State’s submission that there was no independent evidence of the claimed relationship, and the appellants’ case that their accounts were true. The Judge’s conclusion that the relationship existed therefore made his reasoning intelligible.
3. A fact-finder is entitled to accept oral evidence on the applicable standard of proof. The Judge was not required to give a further explanation of why he believed the appellants on this particular point. More detailed reasons might be necessary where there are competing expert or factual witnesses, but that circumstance did not arise here. The absence of independent evidence did not make the reasoning defective.
4. The issue of the proper scope of reconsideration was academic because the Court held that there was no error of law in the original determination. Nevertheless, applying the approach in DK (Serbia) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2006] EWCA Civ 1747, a reconsideration ordered on a specific reasons challenge should not ordinarily be widened so as to reopen favourable credibility findings without an exceptional reason.
5. Where a particular reasoning defect is alleged, reconsideration may initially be confined to resolving that defect. If the issue is resolved in the appellants’ favour, there is no basis for reversing their credibility findings. If it is resolved against them and strikes at the heart of their accounts, a wider reconsideration may then be justified.

• Asylum and Immigration Tribunal: An Immigration Judge allowed the three appeals in determinations dated 1 June 2007. Following an application for reconsideration, the Tribunal later ordered reconsideration on limited issues, but a first-stage reconsideration decision directed that all issues be considered afresh.
• Asylum and Immigration Tribunal: A panel’s determination signed on 8 June 2009 dismissed the appeals, despite accepting that the Kebbay family were related to former President Kabbah.
• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): The appeals were allowed. The Court held that the original reasoning was legally adequate.