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

The Public Sector Equality Duty does not impose a free-standing requirement to collect and analyse statistical data. Whether monitoring is required depends on the function being exercised, the equality issues engaged and the evidence. Statistical monitoring may be essential where it is needed to identify systemic failure or disproportionate impact, particularly for groups with specific statutory accommodation needs. It is not required merely because it might improve policy, training or oversight. A case-by-case accommodation policy may satisfy the duty without statistical monitoring where the protected characteristic does not itself determine the accommodation allocation and statistical data would not inform individual suitability decisions. The claim was therefore dismissed.

The claimant, a bisexual asylum seeker from Cameroon, brought a systemic judicial review challenge concerning the defendant’s allocation of asylum accommodation. His amended Ground 3 alleged that the defendant had breached the Public Sector Equality Duty by failing to undertake statistical monitoring of the allocation of accommodation at large sites and in shared hotel rooms to asylum seekers with the protected characteristics of sexual orientation and gender reassignment.

The individual accommodation grounds became academic after the claimant was granted asylum. The agreed issues were whether statistical monitoring was required for compliance with the duty, whether adequate monitoring had been undertaken, and whether relief should be granted. The claim was not a challenge to the lawfulness of the allocation policy itself or to the information gathered for individual allocation decisions.

1. Claim dismissed. The Public Sector Equality Duty under Equality Act 2010, section 149, did not require the defendant to undertake statistical monitoring of the allocation of large-site or shared-room accommodation to LGBT+ asylum seekers.
2. The relevant function was the provision of asylum accommodation under sections 95–97 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999. The duty required due regard to the statutory equality objectives in the exercise of that function. It was procedural and did not mandate a particular outcome.
3. There was no free-standing duty under section 149 to collect statistical data. Whether monitoring was required was fact-sensitive. The authorities recognised a requirement to gather and monitor information where that was necessary to identify systemic failure, disproportionate impact or non-compliance with the underlying accommodation duty. They did not establish a general rule requiring statistical monitoring in every case.
4. The present case differed materially from R(DMA) v SSHD and R(DXK) v SSHD. Those cases concerned vulnerable groups with particular accommodation needs, evidence of disproportionate adverse effects and delays in providing accommodation. Here, LGBT+ status alone did not make an asylum seeker a vulnerable person under the Asylum Seekers (Reception Conditions) Regulations 2005. The policy applied a case-by-case suitability assessment and did not prescribe that LGBT+ asylum seekers receive, or be excluded from, any particular form of accommodation.
5. Statistical evidence showing how many LGBT+ asylum seekers felt unsafe or met vulnerability criteria would not inform the individual suitability decisions required by the policy, nor would it alter the policy’s operation. Evidence of individual distress, harassment or abuse did not establish that the policy or its implementation caused a disproportionate adverse impact or that statistical monitoring was necessary for due regard.
6. The judge added that, had a duty to undertake statistical monitoring been established, the defendant’s evidence did not demonstrate that monitoring covered all relevant large sites. Relief would not have been refused under section 31(2A) of the Senior Courts Act 1981.