AAA AND OTHERS v SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT

In managing judicial review proceedings, the court must balance expedition and efficient case management against each party’s opportunity to present its case fairly. Where a defendant issues new or supplementary decisions shortly before the substantive hearing, fairness may require an adjournment so that the claimant can consider those decisions and amend the grounds if necessary. The court should focus on the latest operative decisions, while ensuring that doing so does not cause procedural unfairness. Case-management directions should also reflect changes in the issues, parties’ circumstances and the appropriate division of related claims.

The claimants sought permission to challenge decisions that their asylum claims would not be processed in the United Kingdom and that they might be removed to Rwanda. They also raised related issues concerning trafficking, detention, discrimination, data protection and the lawfulness of the removal arrangements.

Shortly before the listed substantive hearing, the Secretary of State issued fresh or supplementary decisions in some cases. The claimants sought an adjournment and revised directions. The court therefore considered the hearing date, scope, duration, evidence, possible amendments and the management of related claims.

1. Adjournment. The hearing listed for 19 July 2022 was adjourned because the fresh or supplementary decisions of 5 and 7 July required the claimants to have a fair opportunity to consider them and amend their grounds. The court had not considered the merits or expressed any view on the legality of removal to Rwanda.
2. Procedural balance. The court should focus on the latest decisions affecting individual claimants, rather than earlier decisions overtaken by events. That flexibility must be reconciled with fairness. The court applied the guidance in Caroopen v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2016] EWCA Civ 1307, [2017] 1 W.L.R. 2339, concerning the fair treatment of challenges to later decisions.
3. Scope and case management. Trafficking issues were excluded or deferred where the relevant process had not concluded. Claims for damages arising from alleged unlawful detention were stayed pending the substantive hearing and were to be listed subsequently for directions. The court refused to include material which constituted new representations to the Secretary of State as reply evidence, but permitted certain evidence to support existing claims that reasonable inquiries had not been made.
4. Directions. The substantive hearing for the remaining cases was fixed for 5 September 2022 for five days. Asylum Aid’s related but conceptually distinct case was fixed for 10 October 2022 for two days. The existing directions order was varied accordingly.