TM (Home office Conviction - Consideration of)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | John Freeman,Colin Thursby |
| Judgment Date | 11 October 2017 |
| Neutral Citation | [2004] UKIAT 25 |
| Court | Immigration Appeals Tribunal |
| Date | 11 October 2017 |
[2004] UKIAT 25
IN THE IMMIGRATION APPEAL TRIBUNAL
NATIONALITY, IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM ACTS 1971–2002
John Freeman (chairman)
and
Colin Thursby
Miss M Canavan (Refugee Legal Centre) for the appellant
Miss C Hanrahan for the respondent
TM (Home office Conviction — Consideration of) Congo — Democratic Republic of
. This is an appeal from a decision of an adjudicator (Ms PS Wellesley-Cole), sitting at Taylor House on 28 May 2003, dismissing an asylum and human rights appeal by a citizen of the DRC [Democratic Republic of the Congo]. Permission to appeal was given on the basis that the adjudicator's findings, or lack of them, on article 8 were open to challenge.
01.06.94 appellant arrives in this country
02.06.94 claims asylum
15.11.96 TC ? born to SC (British citizen) by appellant
03.02.97 asylum first refused
28.02.97 marries SC
early '99 separates from SC
06.05.99 first appeal hearing
27.05.99 Home Office decision treated as withdrawn by adjudicator
10.99 sent to prison for robbery
05.01 released and interviewed on asylum claim
summer takes up with PL (citizen of Angola)
26.10.01 representations on Human Rights Convention
15.12.02 fresh refusal
17.01.03 DL ? born to PL by appellant: PL later gets ILR
28.05.03 second appeal hearing
16.06.03 decision under appeal sent out
. The adjudicator took account of the situation, so far as the appellant's family life with his Angolan paramour PL was concerned, and there is no particular complaint about her finding that PL and their small child DL could perfectly well go and live with him in the DRC. However her elder child R does see his father here, so there would be some interference with family life there. What is more, though the appellant no longer has any family life to be interrupted with his British still-to-be- ex-wife SC, he not only sees the daughter (TC) he had with her, but gets a good report from SC (letter 16 April 2003) from the help he gives with TC. So interruption of that relationship would be a serious interference with family life.
. The adjudicator did not give any particular weight to these points, on the basis that the appellant has not been with PL very long (though she did note they had already had a child together); and there was no evidence of any financial support from him for either of his children. They are perfectly valid points; but not the whole story. On reflection, Miss Hanrahan did not feel able to argue that permanent return of this appellant to the DRC would be a proportionate response to the needs of immigration control; so the argument came down to whether it would now be reasonable to require the appellant to return to the DRC to apply for a visa to rejoin PL as his unmarried partner.
. Some considerations put forward against that can at once be excluded. No difficulties in the appellant getting DRC travel documents are relevant, even if those mentioned in Home Office bulletin 1/2003 apply to those returning voluntarily (at least to speed their reunion with their loved ones back here). That is because, as should have been obvious, removal was not likely to happen in the first place without those travel documents. Nor are any likely difficulties in getting a visa, once back in the DRC, of any particular relevance: see per Lord Phillips MR in Amjad Mahmood [2002] Imm AR 229.
. Others are slightly more ingenious. Various Home Office policies are relied on, from the one which it is said would normally have...
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