Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Number: AA/06508/2014

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Newport
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 1 November 2016
On 11 November 2016

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE GRUBB

Between

B S M
(ANONYMITY DIRECTION made)
Appellant
and

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr M Puar instructed by Virgo Consultancy Services Ltd
For the Respondent: Mr I Richards, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

DECISION AND REASONS
1. Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008 (SI 2008/2698) I make an anonymity order. Unless the Upper Tribunal or court directs otherwise, no report of these proceedings shall directly or indirectly identify the appellant. This order is made to protect the identity of the appellant as he seeks asylum. This direction applies to both the appellant and to the respondent and a failure to comply with this direction could lead to contempt of court proceedings.

Background
2. The appellant claims to be a citizen of Iran born on 19 July 1990. He claims that he left Iran in April 2012 and travelled to Greece with the help of an agent where he lived for some ten or eleven months. Thereafter, he travelled to the United Kingdom, arriving on an unknown date. On 6 December 2013, he claimed asylum. The basis of his claim was that he had smuggled goods across the Iran/Iraq border to assist the PKK in Iraq and was wanted by the Iranian authorities.
3. On 7 August 2014, the Secretary of State refused the appellant's application for asylum, humanitarian protection and on the basis of his human rights, in particular Art 8 of the ECHR. On 8 August 2014, the Secretary of State made a decision to remove the appellant as an illegal entrant.
4. The appellant appealed against that decision to the First-tier Tribunal. Following a hearing on 9 March 2015, in a decision promulgated on 21 April 2015 the First-tier Tribunal allowed the appellant's appeal. However, the Secretary of State appealed that decision and, in a decision promulgated on 30 July 2015, the Upper Tribunal (UTJ Poole) allowed the Secretary of State's appeal and remitted the appeal to the First-tier Tribunal for a de novo re-hearing.
5. That appeal came before Judge A D Baker on 6 January 2016. In a decision promulgated on 25 February 2016, Judge Baker dismissed the appellant's appeal. She made an adverse credibility finding and did not accept the appellant's account including that he was an Iranian national and so at risk on return to Iran.
6. The appellant sought permission to appeal Judge Baker's decision on a number of grounds. The First-tier Tribunal initially refused permission to appeal but, in a decision dated 18 April 2016, the Upper Tribunal (UTJ Coker) granted the appellant permission to appeal.
7. On 16 May 2016, the Secretary of State filed a rule 24 response seeking to uphold Judge Baker's decision.
8. Thus, the appeal came before me.
The Appellant's Case
9. On behalf of the appellant, Mr Puar adopted the grounds of appeal which he developed in his oral submissions. In summary, his principal arguments were as follows.
10. First, he submitted that the judge had failed properly to engage with the evidence. He submitted that the judge had been wrong to rely upon the fact that the respondent had been unable to "verify" the names of a number of villages which the appellant claimed were in the vicinity of where he was born and lived near Sardasht in Iran. The judge, Mr Puar submitted, had fallen into error by taking the respondent's position - that they did not exist - as her starting point by treating the Secretary of State's evidence as reliable and in concluding that, therefore, the appellant's account was undermined. In support of this, Mr Puar drew my attention to internet printouts, one from the Ekurd Daily dated 3 November 2013 and a blog dated 21 September 2011 which mentioned a village, referred to by the appellant in his evidence, namely "Qalarash". Neither were made available to the judge.
11. Secondly, Mr Puar submitted that the judge had fallen into error when taking into account, as inconsistent with the appellant's claim, that he travelled to a place called "Ashkana" on the Iran border each day to smuggle goods over the border to Iraq. The judge had wrongly relied upon the evidence submitted by the respondent that "Ashkana" was a place in South Iran over twenty hours away from the appellant's claimed home such that it would not be possible, as the appellant claimed, to travel there each day to carry out the smuggling. Mr Puar submitted that the judge's reasoning was based upon a misunderstanding of the appellant's evidence given in his asylum interview at question 75. He submitted that the appellant's answer referred to a place "Ashkana on the border" but that was in Iraq and the place to which he smuggled the goods for the PKK.
12. Thirdly, Mr Puar submitted that the judge had been wrong to rely upon the Sprakab Report which identified the appellant as speaking a dialect of Kurdish Sorani originating from the Sulaymania area in Iraq with a "very high" degree of certainty. Mr Puar submitted that the judge had failed to take into account the appellant's evidence that the interpreter, in the course of the Sprakab interview, had shouted at him. The judge had wrongly understood the appellant's evidence on this to relate to the screening interview.
Discussion
13. I will take each of the principal points made on behalf of the appellant in turn.
14. The first concerns the judge's treatment of the respondent's evidence that she had been unable to verify the villages in the area where the appellant claimed to live in Iran. The judge dealt with this evidence at paras 20-22 as follows:
"20. .... He said he was born in Qalarash 30 minutes by car from the closest city, Sardasht but he did not ever learn to read and write and was not literate. He had not been to Sardasht many times, gave the names of Sewasal, Bewrah, Suratow, Darmanawa at question 17 as the closest village to Qalarash.
21. The appellant in explanation of the statement a paragraph 16 of the refusal letter that the information given of the names of villages by him near Qalarash could not be verified on the public domain is, in summary why would he provide names of villages that did not exist and asserts that they do. No evidence has been provided to identify those villages do exist near Qalarash. I find that his claims to live in a place all his life and to be able to identify villages which the respondent has not been able to verify and the appellant, in response to that challenge has not provided evidence of their existence undermines his claims to have lived in that area.
22. I also note that Qalarash village could not be traced on the public domain as stated in paragraph 14. The consistency of his answers has been undermined by the listed resources at paragraph 13 of the refusal letter. No evidence has been supplied by him or on his behalf to undermine the statements which I regard therefore as reliable from the respondent. Namely that the village he claims to come from in Sardasht, about 30 minutes away from the city of Sardasht itself, but in the province of Sardasht or the area known as Sardasht cannot be verified. I also conclude that the named villages he clearly stated were near that village are not verifiable also and so do not support his claims to be from Iran. He claims to be uneducated but he was able to identify these places by name. It was open to him to say in interview that he did not know of nearby villages but he did not do that. He said at the end of the interview he had understood the questions. I conclude that that is a fundamental aspect of his claim and that, whether or not educated, he could be expected to identify correctly by name and, given time, provide evidence of the existence of those villages in proximate distance to his claimed village. None of them have been verifiable. This undermines his claim to be an Iranian from the area he says."
15. It is clear that the respondent had raised the issue as to whether the named villages existed in the refusal letter. At para 16, having set out a number of internet sources concerning information about Iran, the respondent noted that the appellant's information "could not be verified on the public domain". One of the internet web pages referred to is Google Maps. Of course, the respondent's evidence did not establish that the villages did not exist. Nevertheless, the appellant was on notice that the respondent did not accept the appellant's claimed home area and an issue at the appeal hearing would be whether the appellant had established a fundamental part of his claim, namely that he came from Iran and the area near Sardasht as he claimed.
16. The appellant had ample opportunity to provide evidence to support his claim to come from the area he identified. For reasons which are not known, no supporting evidence was put before the judge. There is no doubt that such evidence could be obtained as, indeed to an extent, was obtained by the hearing before me showing, at least, that one village namely "Qalarash" did exist near Sardasht. The judge was, in my judgment, entitled to take into account that no documentary evidence had been submitted to support this aspect of his claim. In TK (Burundi) v SSHD [2009] EWCA Civ 40, Thomas LJ (as he then was) made the point at [21] as follows:
"The circumstances of this case in my view demonstrate that independent supporting evidence which is available from persons subject to this jurisdiction be provided wherever possible and the need for an Immigration Judge to adopt a cautious approach to the evidence of an appellant where independent supporting evidence, as it was in this case, is readily available within this jurisdiction, but not provided. It follows that where a Judge in assessing credibility relies on the fact that there is no independent supporting evidence where there should be supporting evidence and there is no credible account for its absence commits no error of law when he relies on that fact for rejecting the account of the appellant."
17. In my judgment, the judge did not fall into the error relied upon by Mr Paur. She did not simply accept that the villages did not exist. The evidence that was presented by the respondent did not support the existence of the villages. She was entitled to take that into account. The recent documents demonstrate beyond a peradventure that (at least some) independent supporting evidence could have been provided from within this jurisdiction but was not. The approach adopted by Judge Baker was, in my judgment, entirely consistent with the approach set out by Thomas LJ. It was not an error of law for Judge Baker to take into account, in assessing the appellant's credibility, that his claim was not supported by any independent evidence. Her reasoning in paras 20-22 of her determination reflect no more than that approach to the evidence.
18. I should add for completeness that the new documents, submitted for the first time in the Upper Tribunal, cannot, in themselves, assist to identify any error of law in Judge Baker's determination. The evidence was not placed before Judge Baker and I see no basis upon which they could be admissible under the Ladd v Marshal [1954] 1 WLR 1489 principles. Given that these documents could with reasonable diligence, in my judgment, have been obtained prior to the hearing before Judge Baker (which was, after all, the second hearing before the First-tier Tribunal), I see no conceivable basis upon which they can be prayed in aid to establish any material error of law in Judge Baker's decision.
19. A related issue concerns the evidence concerning the appellant's failure to provide his identity card. At para 19, Judge Baker said this:
"19. The appellant has been challenged since 2014 by the respondent's refusal letter as to his nationality. He stated that his identity card was at home with his family. He claimed his family were in Iran. He has not provided that identity card on the basis he fears that to contact his family he claims will bring them into danger. I reject that explanation. At the core of the Home Office case rejecting appellant's account is their belief that he comes from Iraq, not Iran. He claims to have an identity card. It is not credible that the appellant has made no attempt either through third parties or by writing himself to his family he claims to be in Iran to obtain that identity card to support his claims to be from Iran having lived in the place he claims, he says, all his life until he left in, variously 2012, 2013."
20. At para 26, Judge Baker dealt with the appellant's evidence concerning his contact with his family and his failure to obtain his identity card through his family:
"26. I also note that in the witness statement the appellant states he was called by telephone by his sister to be warned of the Pasdaran looking for him at his home where he lived with his family. It is not credible that given that he had a telephone and she had a telephone they have not had any contact on his account at the hearing with his family or they would get into trouble. Similarly he claimed he had been in hiding with his uncle and yet there is no evidence from him that he has made any attempt even for example with his uncle to obtain the identity card he claims he has which would demonstrate he was from Iran."
21. In his oral submissions, Mr Puar did not directly challenge the judge's reasoning in paras 19 and 26 but it is challenged in para 3 of the grounds. On the same basis that I have already identified, Judge Baker was properly entitled to take into account that the appellant had not produced his identity card which he claimed was "at home with his family". Judge Baker in paras 19-26 rejected the appellant's explanation that he had not been in contact with his family and that, therefore, it remained unexplained why he had not sought to obtain his identity card from his family. Given the evidence that the appellant had been in contact with his family, it was properly open to the judge to reject the appellant's explanation as to why he had not sought his identity card from his family where he claimed it was. In those circumstances, I am unable to see any error in the judge's approach to the evidence: the absence of the identity card was a matter that she could properly take into account in assessing the appellant's credibility, in particular that he came from Iran.
22. I now turn to the second point relied upon by Mr Puar. This relates to the judge's approach to the evidence concerning the place identified by the appellant ("Ashkana") as a place central to his smuggling activities across the Iran/Iraq border. The judge dealt with this at para 25 of her determination:
"25. The appellant does not address in his witness statement that he had claimed at asylum interview question 75 that he had travelled to Ashkana [other spelling found: Askanan] in order to smuggle goods to Iraq. The respondent's information, which I find is supported by background information and evidence, shows that Askanan is located over twenty hours from Sardasht where he claimed to have lived since birth. He also claimed in the interview to have travelled on a daily basis smuggling goods to Iraq. The refusal letter sets out the challenge paragraph C6 to 39 inclusive. Askanan does not share borders with Iraq it is claimed and yet he claims question 79-80 that he encountered the PKK on a daily basis and that they were charging him taxes, one day telling him to supply them with food from other cities in Iran. No evidence has been supplied by the appellant to undermine the assertions of the respondent as to the implausibility of his account of the geography and his claimed actions. I find the respondent's evidence undermines the credibility of the claims made by the appellant. This goes to the core of the appellant's account of his activity."
23. At question 75 of the appellant's asylum interview, he was asked: "I'm looking for the name of the place you went to in order to smuggle goods?" In answer to that the appellant said: "Ashkana on the border".
24. Mr Puar submitted that the judge had wrongly interpreted this answer as meaning that the appellant had smuggled the goods from a place in Iran called Ashkana when, in fact, his answer reflected the place in Iraq, called Ashkana, to where he had smuggled the goods. Mr Puar submitted that, therefore, the judge was wrong to rely upon the evidence of the respondent showing that Ashkana was over twenty hours away from the appellant's claimed home and therefore called into question the veracity of the appellant's claim that he smuggled goods on a daily basis travelling from his home area.
25. It is, perhaps, worth considering the preceding question which, in the context of a number of questions dealing with the appellant's claimed smuggling and activities, was: "Where did you go to?" (Q74) The appellant's answer was: "From the border we were taking the goods to somewhere and from where it was taken to the city. Because these goods are not allowed to pass the border legally so we bring them illegally and take them to the city."
26. The interviewer then asked at question 75, namely what was the name of "the place you went to in order to smuggle goods" to which the answer was given "Ashkana on the border".
27. It is, however, important to note that the respondent relied upon the points, set out by the judge in para 25 of her determination, in paras 37-38 of the decision letter as follows:
"37. The external information shows that Ashknan is located over 20 hours from Sardasht1, where you claim to have lived since birth. Furthermore, external information2 shows that "On the 1,458-kilometer (906-mile) Iraq-Iran border, the smuggling of weapons, drugs and people has always been major and unsolvable problem. Most smuggling takes place in the south: in Basra, Amarah - where there are large stretches of marshes and swamps on the border - and Wasit, and through some smuggling routes in the north".
39. Therefore, your claim to travel to Ashknan in order to smuggle goods through the Iraqi border is externally inconsistent. Given that external information shows that the smuggling of goods to the Iraqi border takes place in the South and also through some smuggling routes in the North of Iran and that the journey from Sardasht to Ashkanan is estimated to last over 20 hours, meaning that a round trip would last more than 40 hours, it is considered illogical and impossible that you would travel over 40 hours in one day, and on a daily basis, in order to smuggle goods to Iraq. In addition to this, it is also noted that Ashkanan does not share borders with Iraq. The inconsistency of your accounts cast doubt on the legitimacy of your claims."
28. The appellant and his representatives were well aware, therefore, at the hearing that the respondent's case, based upon the internet search, was that the place the appellant said was central to his smuggling activities was Ashkana and was claimed to be on the Iranian side of the border and over twenty hours away from his home area. Mr Puar, who did not represent the appellant at the First-tier Tribunal hearing, was unable to assist on what, if any, questions the appellant was asked about this aspect of his claim. I consulted the judge's Record of Proceedings and Mr Richards consulted the Presenting Officer's Record of the Proceedings. It does not appear that the matter was specifically raised by the appellant's (then) Counsel in the appellant's evidence-in-chief despite it being a significant point taken by the Secretary of State in the refusal letter to challenge the credibility of the appellant's claim. It is also not dealt with in the appellant's witness statement dated 20 October 2014 despite that statement taking issue with a number of other matters relied upon by the Secretary of State. Despite having the opportunity, therefore, the appellant led no evidence that the Secretary of State's understanding of the appellant's answer to question 75 in the asylum interview was incorrect and that the relevant place, to which the appellant was alluding called Ashkana, was not the one identified by the internet search on the Iranian side of the border.
29. In the light of this, even if there was an ambiguity in what the appellant was saying in answer to question 75, it was in my judgment open to Judge Baker properly to consider that the respondent's position was not effectively challenged in the evidence and, in assessing the veracity of the appellant's claim, to juxtapose the appellant's evidence concerning Ashkana with the documentary evidence and to find that the appellant's claim was inconsistent with the geography of Iran.
30. By way of footnote only, I note that there still has not been submitted any evidence that a place called Ashkana exists on the Iraqi side of the border and was, in fact, the place to which the appellant was referring in his answer in interview.
31. Turning now to the third point relied upon by Mr Puar, namely the judge's consideration of the Sprakab linguistic analysis report.
32. The judge dealt with that report at paras 28-36. In particular, the report concluded that there was a "very high" degree of certainty that the appellant's spoken Sorani was that of a person from the Sulaymania area in Iraq rather than of a person who claimed to come from Iran. The judge said this:
"28. A Sprakab Report dated 28 March 2014 concludes at 1.3 that the appellant who stated he came from Sardasht in Iran did not speak any variety of Sorani found in Iran. "He spoke a variety of Sorani found in the Sulaymania area in Iraq". It was assessed that it was "very unlikely" that his linguistic background is Sardasht in Iran. That was against criteria running from very unlikely, unlikely, even chance, likely and very likely. The specific headings of assessment are set out as including phonology and prosody; morphology and syntax; lexica; concluding that the appellant pronounced words in a manner typical of Sorani spoken in the Sulaymania area in Iraq and used grammatical constructions typical of Sorani spoken in Iraq and used words typical of Sorani spoken in Iraq. In each of the above cases at 2.2 to 2.4 inclusive specific comparators were given the same phrases or words used in Iran.
29. The submissions for the appellant are, in summary, this Sprakab Report cannot be relied upon having regard to SSHD v MN and KY (Scotland) [2014] UKSC 30; and M.AB.N. & Anor v Advocate General for Scotland Representing the Secretary of State for the Home Department & Anor [2013] Scot CS CSIH 68. I note also that particular care should be had to the strength of the reasoning and the expertise used to support the conclusion and to the need for consideration of how the basis for the geographical attribution of particular dialects or usages can be better explained, not left implicit, so as to be satisfied as to the date by reference to which analysts make judgements on the geographical range of a particular dialect or usage.
30. The appellant submits that neither of the analysts is a qualified linguist; neither has a degree in linguistics and it is submitted neither has any knowledge or qualifications in the languages or dialects spoken in Iran or Iraq. Fundamentally, it is also said it was not possible to understand how there could be useful collaboration between the analyst and the linguist or how they could have worked together to ascertain that degree of certainty, when the linguist had no knowledge of the languages or dialect under consideration.
31. It is submitted that since the appellant claimed to have lived all his life prior to leaving Iran in Qalarash village near Sardasht the town, West Azerbaijan province in Iran, near he Iraqi border, and regularly smuggled goods across the border into Iraq, given that Sulaymania (Iraq) is approximately three hours' drive away (177.5 km) from Sardasht there was no explanation as to why the Kurdish Sorani dialect would be different in those two locations, geographically submitted to be so near to each other.
32. Furthermore no consideration of the fact that having regularly crossed the border smuggling goods a person may very well encounter and pick up different phrases, phraseology, etc. and it was submitted may usefully need to speak the local dialect to assist with smuggling activities. Similarly it was also submitted that under the "knowledge assessment" not addressed above by me, the individuals did not claim expertise in the assessment of a person's knowledge of country and culture and that the analyst and the linguist had failed to demonstrate a suitable or sufficient level of expertise. I reject this. No evidence to undermine the reasoned conclusions of the authors of the report has been provided by the appellant's representatives.
33. I note that on page 2 of the Sprakab Report did not include "language analyst - regional and local linguistic features". It did include the "knowledge assessment - the speaker's displayed knowledge of stated area of origin" and "direct analysis - analysis of a recorded conversation between Sprakab and the speaker." The appellant's linguistic background was assessed to be the Sulaymania area in Iraq with a degree of certainty of "very high".
34. Contrary to the case for the appellant and points made on his behalf I find there are numerous reasons and evidence set out, in the report, which fully support the reliability of the conclusions they have reached. I note that each has certified independence and that they are aware that the material will be used or may be used by the Tribunal. I am satisfied from the detailed content of the comparison between the pronunciation in Iran and in Iraq that the conclusions of the Sprakab Report does not support the appellant's claim to be from Iran.
35. I find that the reasons advanced are based on the comparison of differences between Sorani as spoken in Iran. For example, the use of the word in Iraq could be different to that in Iranian in respect of "uneducated; refrigerator, information, animal handling and agriculture." There are striking differences between these words as recorded. In addition in respect of phonology and prosody, the pronunciation of the words of "minute; like that; how much, Azerbaijan and mountainous" are clearly demonstrated in the report to be different. Further as to the morphology and syntax, the phrases "it is located in a mountainous area; I have also told it in what its name; and I don't know exactly" which they are specifically identified as typical of Sorani spoken in Iraq spoken in, the Sulaymania area of Iraq.
36. I find that the Sprakab Report is reliable. It undermines the appellant's claims to be an Iranian national. It supports the conclusion by the Respondent he is from Iraq an Iraqi. It is not, however, in my view conclusive. It is a matter that needs to be considered in the round with all other evidence."
33. The grounds of appeal argue that in para 32 the judge failed to provide adequate reasons for rejecting the appellant's argument regarding the reliability of the report. Mr Puar, in his oral submissions, relied upon that point but also that the judge had failed to take into account in assessing the report's reliability the appellant's claim that the interviewer had shouted at him in the course of the telephone interview. This was dealt with by the judge at para 27 of her determination as follows:
"27. I reject his account that he was being shouted at by the interviewer in a telephone interview. It was clear in his oral evidence that whilst the screening interview was not gone through with him specifically he did not have the benefit of advice from representatives after the substantive interview. Were it the case that there had been misconduct on the part of the Home Office interviewer or interpreter there was no such allegation made on his behalf by representatives acting for him. I reject his assertions. I find his assertions are made as an attempt to justify answers which; correctly recorded and signed, fatally undermine his claims to be from Iran."
34. As regards the first point, neither the grounds nor Mr Puar in his submissions elaborated on why the judge's reasons for accepting the reliability of the Sprakab Report were inadequate. The judge noted the submissions made on behalf of the appellant. The analysts had expertise and experience in analysing the Sorani language which is, of course, the language spoken by the appellant. Their experience ranged across, for example, Iraq and Iran. Whilst the two linguists do not state, in the report, that they have qualifications or linguistic ability in the language of Sorani and its dialects, I see nothing in their stated respective skill sets which should have led the judge to conclude that the clear findings in section 1 that there was a "very high" certainty that the appellant's linguistic background was from Sulaymania in Iraq and that it was "very unlikely" that his linguistic background was from Sardasht in Iran was not properly and fully supported by the analysis in section 2 of the report under the headings "phonology and prosody", "morphology and syntax" and "lexica". The judge did not rely upon the "knowledge assessment" in section 3.
35. As regards the second point, and the one relied upon most forcefully by Mr Puar in his submissions, does not, in my judgment, lead me to conclude that the judge's reliance on the report was not justified. It may well be that the judge could have expressed herself a little more clearly in para 27 of her determination. However, she clearly had in mind the appellant's challenge to a "telephone interview". It is inconceivable that this experienced judge of the First-tier Tribunal could have understood that challenge to be to anything other than the Sprakab Report. Mr Puar's suggestion that she wrongly had in mind that the appellant's challenge was to the screening interview could only stand up if it is assumed that the judge believed that a screening interview was a "telephone interview". It is clearly not: that is conducted face-to-face. I am in no doubt that in para 27 the judge was considering whether there was any substance in the appellant's claim that the Sprakab Report was unreliable.
36. Even if the judge were (wrongly) considering the reliability of the screening interview, the point that she makes (and reasoning) in para 27 is equally apposite as a reason for not accepting that the Sprakab Report is unreliable because of the conduct of the interviewer. No objection was made to the Sprakab interview by the appellant's representatives prior to the appeal proceedings. Indeed, although the point was pursued before Judge Baker, her reasoning in para 27 on this matter was not challenged in the grounds seeking permission to appeal to the Upper Tribunal. It was first raised by Mr Puar in his oral submissions. In my judgment, neither this point (nor the reasons challenge) succeeds in establishing that the judge was not entitled to rely upon the Sprakab Report as being inconsistent with the appellant's claim. Judge Baker approached the Sprakab report in a manner wholly consistent with the Supreme Court's decision in SSHD v MN and KY [2014] UKSC 30. Importantly, Judge Baker did not rely on any points taken in the report about the appellant's 'country or cultural' knowledge and she did not treat the Sprakab Report as determinative but rather as one aspect of the entirety of the evidence which had to be considered in the round (see paras 36 and 37 of the determination).
37. In my judgment, the judge gave adequate and sustainable reasons for rejecting the appellant's account including that he was a national of Iran and for dismissing his appeal on all grounds.
Decision
38. For these reasons, the First-tier Tribunal's decision to dismiss the appellant's appeal on all grounds did not involve the making of an error of law. That decision stands.
39. Accordingly, the appellant's appeal to the Upper Tribunal is dismissed.

Signed

A Grubb
Judge of the Upper Tribunal