B, R (on the application of) v The Secretary of State for the Home Department

A date stamp may formally record a grant of immigration leave where it is used for that purpose in practice. If no such practice exists, it gives no material benefit, even to a blameless person. A person who has induced an immigration officer, by misrepresentation, to act on a fundamental mistake cannot rely on the formal recording of that mistaken decision.

The inquiry requires consideration of the person’s actions and understanding, and of what the immigration officer believed they were doing when affixing the stamp. A stamp made because the officer mistakenly believed that the person remained a returning resident does not establish a discretionary grant under paragraph 19 of the Immigration Rules.

The applicant had previously been granted indefinite leave to remain and held a Home Office travel document. After obtaining a Libyan passport, living outside the United Kingdom for about four and a half years and returning through Harwich, he presented the travel document but not his national passport. An immigration officer placed an open date stamp in the travel document.

He later sought transfer of a no-time-limit endorsement to his Libyan passport. The Secretary of State refused. By judicial review, he contended that the stamp had granted him indefinite leave to enter under paragraph 19 of the Immigration Rules, or preserved his prior leave.

The central issue was whether the date stamp gave the applicant indefinite leave despite the circumstances in which it was obtained.

1. The judicial review application was dismissed. The applicant’s indefinite leave to remain had lapsed when he remained outside the United Kingdom continuously for more than two years. Article 13(4)(a) of the Immigration (Leave to Enter and Remain) Order 2000 was clear on that point.
2. The applicant’s Home Office travel document was invalid once he obtained a national passport from Libya. By presenting the invalid travel document when asked for his passport, while leaving the Libyan passport under the driver’s seat, he represented that he had no relevant national passport. He thereby materially misrepresented his immigration position.
3. The officer believed, on the information presented, that she was admitting a returning resident under paragraph 18 of the Immigration Rules. She did not believe that she was reviving lapsed leave or exercising a discretion to admit the applicant under paragraph 19. Events later occurring in the vehicle examination area did not alter her state of mind or create valid leave.
4. R v Secretary of State for the Home Department, ex parte Bagga [1991] 1 QB 485 did not compel the absolute proposition that a date stamp could never record a grant of leave. Its reasoning allowed for a stamp to have that effect if it was used in practice for that purpose. But it established that, absent such a practice, the stamp confers no material benefit even on a blameless person.
5. The applicant could not rely on the more favourable circumstances in Ex parte Badaike and Ex parte Ram. His misrepresentation induced the officer’s fundamental mistake. The stamp was therefore immaterial, did not grant indefinite leave to enter or remain, and did not entitle him to a no-time-limit endorsement in his Libyan passport.

Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber): Judicial review of the Secretary of State’s refusal to transfer a no-time-limit endorsement from the applicant’s Home Office travel document to his Libyan passport. The application was dismissed. No lower judicial decision is stated in the judgment.