Veerabudren v Secretary of State for the Home Department

Where an application under the immigration rules may raise an Article 8 claim based on exceptional circumstances, the Secretary of State must expressly record whether that issue has been considered and, if not considered, why. A decision letter need not contain detailed reasoning, but silence is insufficient and the applicant must be able to understand what was taken into account. A court should be cautious before finding that an unlawful omission was immaterial or that the outcome was inevitable where the decision-maker’s findings are unknown. Under paragraph 276ADE(vi), the Secretary of State must make a rounded assessment of the evidence concerning the applicant’s ties to the country of return. A bare assertion of having no connections, without supporting evidence, may be assessed against the applicant’s wider personal and immigration circumstances.

The claimant, a Mauritian national who had overstayed in the United Kingdom and married here, sought judicial review of the Secretary of State’s refusal of her application. She argued that the decision failed to address exceptional circumstances relevant to Article 8 and failed properly to assess the requirement in paragraph 276ADE(vi) concerning ties to Mauritius.

The Secretary of State accepted that the decision letter did not mention exceptional circumstances, but argued that the omission was immaterial because the claim was too weak to be arguable. The central issues were whether express consideration was required and whether the assessment of the claimant’s ties to Mauritius was legally adequate.

1. Article 8 exceptional circumstances. The Secretary of State was required to state expressly whether exceptional circumstances had been considered and rejected, or whether they had not been considered because there was no arguable case. Detailed reasons were unnecessary, but the decision had to identify that the issue had been taken into account. It was not appropriate to expect the claimant to infer consideration from silence. This approach was held to reflect Nagre v Secretary of State for the Home Department, [2013] EWHC 720 (Admin), and MM (Lebanon), [2014] EWCA Civ 985, and was adopted through Aliyu v Secretary of State for the Home Department, [2014] EWHC 3919 (Admin), and Ganesabalan v Secretary of State for the Home Department, [2014] EWHC 2712 (Admin).

2. The omission was material. The court was hesitant to find that the outcome would inevitably have been the same when it did not know what findings the Secretary of State would have made on the claimant’s evidence of compelling personal circumstances. The decision was therefore quashed and the matter required a fresh decision.

3. Paragraph 276ADE(vi). The Secretary of State had to undertake a rounded assessment of whether the claimant had lost ties to Mauritius. That assessment depended upon evidence enabling it to be carried out. The claimant’s bare statement that she had no connections in Mauritius was insufficient by itself. The Secretary of State was entitled to assess it against the length of the claimant’s residence in Mauritius, her formative years there, her period in the United Kingdom, her overstayer status, the parties’ employment and the absence of an obstacle to living in Mauritius. On the limited evidence, the assessment was adequate and the second ground failed.

4. The application was granted on the first ground and rejected on the second ground.

First-instance judicial review proceedings. No prior decision is stated in the judgment.