Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Numbers: OA145352014
OA145362014
OA145372014

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Field House
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 15 March 2016
On 15 June 2016

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE CLIVE LANE

Between

ENTRY CLEARANCE OFFICER
Appellant

and

[n f]
sebina [f]
[b f]
(anonymity direction not made)
Respondents

Representation:

For the Appellant: Mr Diwnycz, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer
For the Respondents: Mr Hussain, instructed by Harris and Green Solicitors

DECISION AND REASONS

1. The appellants were born in 2007, 1997 and 2011 respectively and are citizens of Nigeria. They appealed against a decision of the Entry Clearance Officer (ECO) who refused their applications for leave to enter as the children of a person present and settled in the United Kingdom (sponsor Flower [S]). The applications were refused on 15 September 2014. First-tier Tribunal (Judge Hindson), in a decision promulgated on 17 July 2015, allowed the appeals under the Immigration Rules. The Entry Clearance Officer now appeals, with permission, to the Upper Tribunal.
2. The appeals turned on the question of sole responsibility (see paragraph 297(i)(e) of HC 395 (as amended)). The judge found that the United Kingdom sponsor had sole responsibility for the appellants. The grounds of appeal challenge that finding. First, it is asserted that
"... the judge accepted the oral evidence of the sponsor and his wife finding them to be credible witnesses. This, despite the lack of documentary evidence which is vital to the core of the appellant's appeal. For example, there was no adequate evidence to show that the appellants' mother did not have any involvement with the appellants."
The appellants' case was that their father (the sponsor) sends money to the appellants' mother who, in turn, sends the money on to their grandmother. It was submitted in the grounds that this account was not "plausible and demonstrated an indication that the appellants' mother has some involvement in the appellants' lives."
3. In essence, the grounds raised questions of perversity. The judge found that the witnesses who appeared before him (the sponsor and his wife, who is the mother of the third appellant) gave credible evidence which withstood a detailed cross-examination by the Presenting Officer. The judge found that "the appellants' maternal grandmother has [the appellants'] day-to-day care and they are supported financially by their father." The judge found that the sponsor "funds their education and makes all important decisions relating to their upbringing". There appeared to be some discrepancies [20] as to the documentary evidence of payment made by the sponsor to the appellants. Whilst the judge acknowledged that this might "undermine the credibility of the sponsor" [21] he decided, in the context of all the evidence before him, that the sponsor had given truthful evidence and, in particular, the unusual arrangement whereby money was sent to the mother of the appellants to be sent on to the grandmother (who had day-to-day care of the appellants) was true. It was for the judge to act as a robust fact-finder, a task which he has plainly discharged. It cannot, in my opinion, be said that the evidence of the sponsor was such that no judge, directing him or herself correctly as to the law, could find the evidence credible. The arrangements were unusual, as the judge acknowledged, and it was open to the judge to find that, notwithstanding the fact that the arrangements were out of the ordinary, they were nonetheless true and provided evidence sufficient to prove to the required standard that the sponsor was exercising sole responsibility.
4. The grounds go on to complain that the judge accepted the appellants' mother's evidence that, "she had abdicated her parental responsibilities as confirmed in her letter." The Entry Clearance Officer challenges that evidence on the basis that there was no independent corroborative evidence to confirm that the letter from the mother upon which the judge relied had actually been written by her. With respect to the ECO, there was no requirement for the judge to seek such corroborative evidence. The judge had to make findings on the evidence which was put before him. That he has done. Another judge may have reached a completely different finding on the same evidence; however, that is not the point. The judge's train of thought can clearly be discerned in the decision and I reject the submission that the reasons given by the judge were not adequate (HS (Afghanistan) [2009] EWCA Civ 771.) The Upper Tribunal should hesitate before interfering with a decision of the First-tier Tribunal which has been achieved by a proper and thorough examination of the evidence and which is supported by cogent reasoning. It was open to the judge to accept the evidence given to him orally by the sponsor and his wife and to accept also written evidence of the mother of the appellants. Nothing which is said in the grounds undermines those findings.
Notice of Decision

5. This appeal is dismissed.

No anonymity direction is made.

Signed Date 9 June 2016

Upper Tribunal Judge Clive Lane