Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Number: HU/14542/2016

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Field House
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 17th January 2018
On 19th January 2018

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE COKER

Between

MUHAMMAD FAIZAN
Appellant
And

ENTRY CLEARANCE OFFICER
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: no appearance
For the Respondent: Mr N Bramble, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

DETERMINATION AND REASONS

1. The appellant was not legally represented; his sponsor did not attend. There was no request for an adjournment and the notice of hearing had been sent to the last notified address. I proceeded in the absence of the sponsor.

2. The First-tier Tribunal judge dismissed the appellant's appeal against the refusal of his human rights claim which was based upon his marriage to Ms Dede Bohri Mista who is resident and settled in the UK. The application had been refused on the grounds that the marriage was not genuine and subsisting, they did not intend to live together permanently and they did not meet the financial requirements. The judge found that Ms Bohri Mista's evidence as to the commencement, continuance and nature of the relationship was not credible. He found that she was not employed as she claimed and the appellant did not meet the requirements of the Immigration Rules. He found that the decision to refuse entry clearance was not a disproportionate interference with the appellant's family life (which was non-existent) or his private life. He dismissed the appeal.

3. Permission was granted, surprisingly, on the grounds that it was arguable the judge had failed to give adequate reasons for his decision; that the judge had misconstrued the test for whether a marriage was genuine and subsisting by incorporating a test of whether it was a marriage of convenience and that the judge's approach to credibility infected the findings on financial means.

4. The decision of the judge was robust. He took account of the appellant's appalling immigration history and the variation in the sponsor's evidence when inconsistencies and contradictions were identified. Although the judge concluded the marriage was one of convenience he made findings, supported by reasons, that the couple had no intention of living together. His findings as to the sponsor's claimed second job, or rather the lack of it, were sustainable given the sponsor's lack of documentary evidence, her contradictory evidence as to when and where she worked and her lack of English.

5. There had been no challenge before the First-tier Tribunal to the appellant's immigration history which included a sham marriage to a Romanian, an unmeritorious asylum application which was subsequently withdrawn, that he had been working illegally, had failed to study during the currency of a student permit but worked, claimed falsely to be caring for an EEA national and that he had only told his sponsor of this when his application for entry clearance had been refused and he had appealed. He considered the sponsor's lack of English and that she did not speak Urdu or Arabic (his languages) and that the evidence on how the couple communicated was sparse in the extreme. The findings on finance were open to the judge on the evidence before him and he gave adequate reasons for rejecting the existence of the claimed second job.

6. The finding by the judge that the appellant does not meet the immigration rules and that his human rights claim fails is unassailable.

7. There is no identifiable error of law.

Conclusions:

The making of the decision of the First-tier Tribunal did not involve the making of an error on a point of law.

I do not set aside the decision; the decision of the First-tier Tribunal stands; the appeal is dismissed.

Date 17th January 2018

Upper Tribunal Judge Coker