Help Refugees Ltd, R (on the application of) v The Secretary of State for the Home Department & Anor

A statutory consultation must be fair in its statutory context and linked to its purpose. For a consultation under Immigration Act 2016, s.67, the Secretary of State was entitled to seek a broad assessment of local-authority capacity, taking account of competing demands for care. She was not required to consult on alternative proposals, use a rolling process, or convert percentage-based commitments into places for the s.67 scheme. Minor errors and the exclusion of late or equivocal offers did not make the process unlawful where the responses were conscientiously considered.

The duty to act as soon as possible applied both to making relocation arrangements and to specifying the number of children. Section 67 created no entitlement to transfer, and its eligibility decisions did not require elaborate written reasons or a formal appeal mechanism.

Help Refugees Ltd sought judicial review of the Secretary of State’s implementation of s.67 of the Immigration Act 2016. The provision required arrangements to relocate and support a specified number of unaccompanied refugee children from other European countries, after consultation with local authorities.

The claim challenged the fairness of the consultation, the treatment of local-authority responses, the rationality and timing of the decision to specify 480 places, the speed of subsequent relocation arrangements, and the procedural safeguards used when children were assessed for transfer from France. The Aire Centre intervened.

1. Disposition. The claim for judicial review was dismissed.
2. The court adopted the approach in R (Moseley) v Haringey LBC [2014] 1 WLR 3947: fairness depends on the statutory purpose and context. The Sedley criteria require proposals to remain formative, sufficient reasons and information for intelligent response, adequate time, and conscientious consideration of the responses. The intervention threshold was whether the process was so unfair as to be unlawful, applying R (Baird) v Environment Agency and Arun District Council [2011] EWHC 939 (Admin).
3. The consultation had a narrow purpose: obtaining information to enable a national figure to be fixed. It was lawful to consult simultaneously on s.67, the National Transfer Scheme and the Vulnerable Children Resettlement Scheme. The Secretary of State could assess overall capacity, rather than capacity reserved exclusively for s.67 children, and could use a cut-off date and make a global allowance for children transferred under Dublin III.
4. The treatment of late, percentage-based, conditional, provisional or overlooked offers was not unlawful. The consultation necessarily produced a broad and changing snapshot. The errors identified were minor, and the responses were conscientiously considered. The decision to specify 480 places was not irrational.
5. The requirement to act as soon as possible applied to specifying the number as well as making relocation arrangements. The Secretary of State acted within that obligation. The practical need for the consent and co-operation of France, Greece and Italy justified the arrangements adopted.
6. Section 67 created no application process, right to transfer, or formal appeal. Eligibility did not guarantee relocation because the number of places was capped. In that statutory context, an oral decision that a child was ineligible, including a short explanation such as age or nationality, was legally sufficient. The more extensive safeguards considered in AM (a Child) v SSHD [2017] UKUT 262 (IAC) concerned different claimed rights and did not apply.