Temple Garden Chambers is a leading common law set based in London and The Hague.
With excellence from top to bottom Chambers provides a first class service in a number of different fields.
Temple Garden Chambers is a leading common law set based in London and The Hague.
With excellence from top to bottom Chambers provides a first class service in a number of different fields.
30/01/2025
| Sian Reeves (alongside Rajkiran Arhestey and led by Alan Payne KC) acted for the Home Secretary in R (ABW) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2024] EWHC 3205 (Admin). This is one of a number of claims for judicial review brought by a potential victim of modern slavery, challenging the Home Secretary’s decision to apply the Public Order Disqualification (“POD”) in s. 63 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022. Dove J had to determine, as a preliminary issue, whether, on either a mandatory or discretionary basis, an application for judicial review challenging a decision to apply the POD should be transferred from the High Court to the Upper Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber pursuant to s. 31A of the Senior Courts Act 1981. This required Dove J to interpret the Lord Chief Justice’s Direction made on 21 August 2013 and amended on 17 October 2014, which is entitled “Jurisdiction of the Upper Tribunal under section 18 of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 and Mandatory Transfer of Judicial Review applications to UTIAC under section 31A (2) of the Senior Courts Act 1981” (“the Direction”). The key question which arose for determination by Dove J was whether or not a claim for judicial review challenging a POD decision falls within a class specified under §1(i) of the Direction, and therefore Condition 3 from s. 31A of the Senior Courts Act 1981 was also satisfied, leading to the requirement that the case must be transferred to the Upper Tribunal. Dove J held that questions in relation to POD decisions do not fall within the scope of §1(i) of the Direction and as such, it was not a case which, pursuant to the Direction, was required to be mandatorily transferred to the Upper Tribunal (see §§19-22). Dove J also concluded that it was not appropriate to transfer to that case to the Upper Tribunal as an exercise of case management discretion. Dove J’s judgment provides helpful clarification on the meaning and scope of the Direction. The Home Secretary provided submissions to the Court acting as in effect, a “devil’s advocate”, to assist the Court on the difficult issues of interpretation that arose. A substantive hearing in respect of the Claimant’s challenge to the lawfulness of the POD decision and decision-making framework is listed next month. A link to the judgment can be found here. |
