Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Numbers: OA/00532/2015
OA/00531/2015

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Field House
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 1 June 2016
On 3 August 2016

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE GOLDSTEIN

Between

AAO
OAO
(ANONYMITY DIRECTION PRESERVED)
Appellants
and

ENTRY CLEARANCE OFFICER
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr A Jaffar, Counsel
For the Respondent: Mr P Duffy, Home Office Presenting Officer

DECISION AND REASONS
1. The Appellants are citizens of Nigeria and are brothers born in December 2005 and September 2007 respectively. They have appealed the decision of First-tier Tribunal Judge Bird who, sitting at Taylor House on 21 October 2015 and in a decision subsequently promulgated on 16 November 2015 allowed their appeals under paragraph 297(i)(e) of the Immigration Rules but dismissed their appeals under paragraph 297(v). The Appellants had sought to appeal against decisions of an Entry Clearance Officer refusing to grant them entry clearance to come to the United Kingdom to join their father.
2. At the outset of the hearing before me, Mr Duffy for the Respondent informed me as follows:
"This is a case where the Appellants made an application under paragraph 297 of the Immigration Rules. The Appellants have been granted permission to appeal complaining that the judge's assessment of Article 8 outside the Rules was inadequate, more particularly there was inadequate reasoning in terms of the consideration of the best interests of these minor children. It does seem that the First-tier Judge has failed to engage with this matter and I therefore agree that the case needs to be listed and heard again in terms of Article 8 outside of the Rules."
3. In light of Mr Duffy's helpful and indeed realistic concession I did not trouble Mr Jaffar to address me.
4. However after further discussion with the parties and having regard to the error of law found, I agreed with them that there were highly compelling reasons falling within paragraph 7.2(b) of the Senior President's Practice Statement as to why the decision should not be remade by the Upper Tribunal. It was clearly in the interests of justice that the appeal on this issue be heard and considered afresh in the First-tier Tribunal.
5. For the reasons I have above given and by agreement with the parties I have concluded therefore that the appeal should be remitted to a First-tier Tribunal Judge at Taylor House Hearing Centre before a First-tier Tribunal Judge other than Judge Bird on the first available date. I was informed that for this purpose no interpreter was required. There was a suggested time estimate of one hour.
6. As was made clear at the hearing, the appeal is remitted solely in relation to a consideration of the Appellants' appeal under Article 8 of the ECHR outside of the Immigration Rules.
Decision
7. The making of the decision in the First-tier Tribunal insofar as it related to the Appellant's Article 8 ECHR appeal, involved an error on a point of law such that that this aspect of the First-tier Tribunal's decision has accordingly been set aside.
8. The anonymity direction of the First-tier Tribunal is preserved.

Signed Date 3 June 2016

Upper Tribunal Judge Goldstein