Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Number: PA/00662/2016

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Glasgow
Determination issued
on 21 February 2016
on 01 March 2017

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE MACLEMAN

Between

SAN MUHAMMAD ALI
Appellant
and

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT

Respondent

For the Appellant: Mr A Caskie, Advocate, instructed by Maguire (Solicitors) Scotland Ltd
For the Respondent: Mrs M O’Brien, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

DETERMINATION AND REASONS
1. The appellant appeals against a determination by First-tier Tribunal Judge Blair, dismissing his appeal against refusal of protection.
2. The grounds run thus:
The judge… failed to consider the human rights claim … with specific reference… to paragraph 276 ADE [of the immigration rules] in that there are significant obstacles to integration in Iraq.
It is not enough to say that return there is not “feasible”, the word used by the UT in AA Iran CG [2015] UKUT 544. The judge should have borne in mind that what is meant is that even if a person says he cannot get documents, he has to try, which is not a bar to internal relocation.
The judge failed to address this specifically with (ii) failure to engage with apparent tension between (a) IR 276 ADE (vi) (where it discusses “insurmountable obstacles” and (b) last sentence in para E19 (headnote) in AA (where UT conclusions as to what might happen when person such as client’s permit runs out).
3. Permission was granted by a judge of the FtT on the view that the grounds were arguable because the judge had not addressed rule 276ADE “at all”.
4. In a rule 24 response to the grant of permission the respondent says that absence of specific reference is immaterial, given the judge’s unchallenged finding at paragraph 35, “no basis for an article 8 claim inside or outside the rules”.
5. Mr Caskie sought to file recent news excerpts about the situation in Iran, and the current battle for Mosul, which he said would be relevant of the decision were to be remade. He submitted along these lines. There was ample evidence of problems including lack of employment throughout Iraq. Findings that the appellant had agricultural skills, which were commonplace, and was capable of looking for work did not mean that he might find work. Country guidance had not considered 276ADE(vi) and findings could not be read directly across. Absence of general risk did not imply no very significant obstacles to the applicant’s integration. The appellant could stay no longer than 20 days in the IKR, unless he found work. Evidence of the scale of disruption in Iraq was in the FtT bundles, and submissions had been made thereon. Although not in the grounds, that went to integration, and was relevant in remaking the decision.
6. Mrs O’Brien submitted thus. There was no specific reference in the decision to paragraph 276ADE(vi) but none was needed. The grounds failed to explain how absence of reference constituted an error of law. The appellant had been found an entirely unreliable witness. He is from Kirkuk, no longer a contested area by the date of the FtT decision. He had established no case of missing documentation. He had no need to go to the IKR. Even if displaced, he was in the same position as many others, not in any difficulty which was really a difficulty of integration. There was no challenge to the decisive points in the decision. The appellant was now trying to re-run a case of general difficulties in Iraq which did not arise from the grounds.
7. Mr Caskie in response said that the respondent had betrayed her true position, which was that an appellant would have to show that it was impossible to integrate into Iraq, and that was not the correct test under paragraph 276ADE(vi).
8. I reserved my decision.
9. The grounds are unclearly expressed and hard to follow. As expanded upon in submissions, they do not disclose that the making of the decision by the FtT involved the making of any error on a point of law.
10. One of the requirements by which leave to remain in the UK on the grounds of private life may be granted is in paragraph 276ADE(vi) of the rules; “very significant obstacles to the applicant’s integration into the country to which he would have to go if required to leave the UK”. That is not a “stand alone” provision. The appellant has not sought to show that he meets the other requirements of the rules for leave to remain in the UK on the grounds of private life.
11. Paragraph 276ADE(vi) cannot be taken out of context or used as an easier alternative to a case based on general risk and hardship or under article 15 (c) of the Qualification Directive, which is in effect what the appellant sought to achieve under this guise
12. The appellant’s case on all available grounds, including article 8 and private life, was entirely answered by the FtT’s decision, giving sound reasons, against which the grounds direct no challenge.
13. The determination of the First-tier Tribunal shall stand.
14. No anonymity direction has been requested or made.

28 February 2017
Upper Tribunal Judge Macleman