Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-001697

First-tier Tribunal Nos: PA/61789/2023
LP/11037/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:

23rd June 2025

Before

DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE HUTCHINSON

Between

SS
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr K Gayle, Counsel, instructed by Elder Rahimi Solicitors
For the Respondent: Ms L Clewley, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 11 June 2025

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, [the appellant] (and/or any member of his family, expert, witness or other person the Tribunal considers should not be identified) is granted anonymity.

No-one shall publish or reveal any information, including the name or address of the appellant, likely to lead members of the public to identify the appellant (and/or other person). Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS
1. The appellant is a citizen of Albania born on 21 March 1988. The appellant made a protection claim on 30 July 2019. The respondent refused that application on 9 November 2023. The appellant’s appeal against that decision was dismissed by First-tier Tribunal Judge Monson (“the judge”) on 25 January 2025, after a hearing on 15 January 2025.
2. Permission to appeal, on limited grounds, was granted by Judge of the First-tier Tribunal Buchanan, on 11 April 2025, on the basis that ground 1 only, was arguable. It was arguable that the judge had erred in law in his findings in relation to the appellant’s mental health. It was further arguable that the judge erred in concluding that the appellant was not mentally ill. Permission was not granted on ground 2, and it was agreed that ground 2 was not before the Upper Tribunal.
3. The matter came before me to determine whether the First-tier Tribunal had erred in law, and if so whether any such error was material and thus whether the decision should be set aside.
Background
4. The appellant claimed that her husband arranged for them both to travel to the UK to find work. In 2018 they made a first attempt to come to the UK with the assistance of a trafficking gang, led by a man called Festim. The couple were caught in France and removed back to Albania. The appellant claimed that Festim forced them both to make a second journey to the UK to repay the debt owed to the gang, with the couple leaving Albania in June 2018. In Belgium, Festim told her husband that they were going to take the appellant and use her, as he could not pay back the debt. This was the last time she saw her husband. The appellant was forced to work as a prostitute and to tell her family that she was doing this willingly. She was sent to the UK in about April 2019 and escaped. The appellant fears that if she was returned to Albania, Festim and his gang would enslave her again and/or kill her. The appellant has two illegitimate children and also claimed that there would be no support network on return. The respondent accepted the appellant is a victim of trafficking, but did not accept that her claim was otherwise credible or that she would be at risk on return to Albania.
5. The First-tier Tribunal did not accept the appellant’s claim as credible and found that she would not be at risk on return and dismissed the appellant’s appeal on all grounds.
Submissions – Error of Law
6. In the grounds of appeal and in oral submissions by Mr Gayle, it is argued in short summary for the appellant as follows.
7. The appeal skeleton argument (ASA) references the appellant’s ongoing mental health problems and the appellant cites a reference to an entry in her medical records which the appellant claims references the diagnosis in the past of mixed anxiety and depressive disorder (hearing bundle HB 729). It was argued therefore that the judge had materially erred in his assessment of the risk factors on return for the appellant, considered in line with protocol TD and AD (Trafficked women) CG [2016] UKUT 92 (IAC).
8. Mr Gayle submitted that the judge failed to consider the risk factors set out in the headnote of TD and AD and relate those to the appellant’s case. The third of those risk factors, relates to a victim’s health, particularly mental health. At paragraphs [34] and [35] of the decision, the judge considered the appellant’s mental health and accepted that she had a history of treatment and had received counselling for trauma in the past and was receiving medication. However, at [35], the judge found that the appellant “is not mentally ill”. Mr Gayle submitted that if this was the case, why would the appellant be on medication for a mental illness and that this was a material error which undermined the judge’s assessment. Also at [34], the judge stated that the appellant’s mental health crisis was caused by the refusal of her asylum claim and the general uncertainty surrounding her ability to remain in the UK and not the fear of returning to Albania. It was submitted that these were findings that were not open to the judge, as the appellant had consistently maintained that she was frightened of returning to Albania.
9. Mr Gayle also made submissions in relation to the appellant’s illegitimate children; TD and AD refers to one child whereas the appellant has two illegitimate children from different fathers. At paragraphs [40] and [41] the judge found that there were not substantial grounds for believing that the appellant’s family would continue to shun her and that she had not established that there was a real risk that her own family would not offer support. It was submitted that this finding was not open to the judge given what was said in TD and AD, with there being no evidence that the family were particularly tolerant or no evidence that she had had a good relationship. The appellant claims there is no relationship with her family and there is nothing to suggest that the family would be supportive.
10. Point 7 in TD and AD references support network. It was submitted the judge’s findings at [41] failed to take into account all of the evidence in relation to the appellant’s support network or the lack thereof. The first point to consider in the TD and AD risk matrix is the social status of the victim’s family and this was in dispute. However, the judge made no findings in relation to the status of her family which was a material error.
11. In the Rule 24 response and in oral submissions by Ms Clewley for the respondent it is argued in short summary as follows.
12. The judge provided adequate reasons for the findings. The judge correctly considered and applied the CPIN on Albania and TD and AD, including at [32] and [33]. The respondent relied on the CPIN which indicated that authorities are willing and able to provide effective protection from non-state agents. The judge correctly found at [42] that the appellant would have support available as a victim of trafficking/modern slavery, including shelters, financial assistance, as well as accommodation and employment assistance.
13. It was submitted the judge considered (including at [34]) the appellant’s mental health and the evidence in relation to her mental health. It was submitted the judge reached a reasonable conclusion at [35] and [43], that the appellant is not mentally ill. The judge took into account the appellant’s vulnerability in assessing credibility at [35] and had good reason to find that credibility was in issue [35] to [39]. The judge was provided contradictory evidence pertaining to communication with the appellant’s family, considered at paragraphs [37] to [39], and was entitled to make a finding that the appellant had not established to the lower standard that there is a real risk that her own family would not offer her and her two children protection and support.
Conclusions – Error of Law
14. It was contended that the judge failed to properly assess risk on return to Albania, in line with TD and AD. A careful and holistic reading of the decision and reasons, discloses that the judge’s finding on risk was based on his comprehensive consideration of all the available evidence, including the CPIN Albania: Actors of Protection, December 2022 as referenced at [32].
15. The judge considered all the circumstances including that although it was not accepted, as set out at [29], that the appellant’s husband genuinely objected to a second attempt they made to traffic them to the UK, in any event at paragraph [30] the judge found that even taking the husband’s account at face value, it was not established that the gang that trafficked the appellant was part of an OCN which had infiltrated the Albanian police at a national level. It was in this context that the judge proceeded to reach his findings, including on risk on return.
16. The judge properly directed himself in relation to the relevant factors as set out in the country guidance of TD and AD at [33] and considered the evidence before him of the appellant’s health issues. The judge took into account that there was no formal diagnosis of PTSD from the appellant’s traumatic experiences in Belgium. However, the judge noted that the medical records for the appellant went back to 2021 and showed the appellant received psychological support for trauma.
17. The judge further noted that the GP records showed that the appellant suffers from stress and anxiety for which she has been intermittently prescribed Sertraline. It was open to the judge therefore having considered all of this evidence in the round, to find as he did that this appeared to have been triggered by the refusal of her protection claim and the uncertainty in relation to whether she and her two children would be required to return to Albania, with the appellant’s medical records set out in the appeal bundle before the First-tier Tribunal at pages 727 - 790 which detailed recent matters relating to uncertainty and anxiety and specifically related that anxiety to uncertainty and stress around the appellant’s immigration status (at pages 729, 731 and 732).
18. It was open therefore to the judge to find that the appellant’s mental health issues in relation to her past experiences in Belgium had been treated with therapy and were well managed and that her more recent anxiety was due to the uncertainty in relation to her asylum claim.
19. The judge comprehensively reviewed the appellant’s circumstances in considering her mental health, with the judge referencing the appellant’s GP notes and records on a number of different occasions. The judge was clearly aware of the reference to the appellant’s anxiety and depressive disorder as noted in the grounds of appeal, with the judge referencing stress and anxiety. Those findings were open to the judge. Any error that the judge may have made therefore, in specifically categorising the appellant’s mental health issues as the appellant not being “mentally ill” is not material, as the judge had in mind the specific difficulties that the appellant had suffered.
20. The judge had taken into account in his findings that the appellant was a vulnerable witness by virtue of her traumatic experience being forced into prostitution in Belgium. The judge further referenced this finding specifically at [35], but made findings that were open to him and not specifically challenged that the appellant is coping well, and her children are well looked after by her.
21. It was open to the judge to reference the degree and relatively low level of the difficulties experienced by the appellant on the available evidence, including in reaching findings, that given the lack of any cognitive impairment, that it would not be unreasonable or unduly harsh for the appellant to relocate in Albania.
22. Whilst it was argued that the judge made no finding in relation to the social status and economic standing of the appellant’s family, one of the risk factors in TD and AD, with the appellant claiming she was poor whilst the respondent maintained she was from a middle class family, the judge had regard to all the factors and properly directed himself in reaching the conclusion, contrary to the appellant’s claims, that there were no substantial grounds to believe that her family would shun her once she revealed the truth that her phone call in June 2018 was made under duress, paragraph [40].
23. At paragraphs [37] to [40] the judge considered the appellant’s claim that her family had rejected her in detail. The judge found the appellant’s evidence as to why they had rejected her to be contradictory and lacking in credibility and those findings were open to the judge. Contrary to Mr Gayle’s submissions that the judge did not take into account, for example, that some of the inconsistent evidence had been given in the context of an asylum interview by a vulnerable appellant who was the victim of trauma, the judge considered this in detail at [38] but was entitled to come to the conclusion he did, that the appellant was not so vulnerable that she could not reasonably have been expected to volunteer the critical phone call to her family which she said she made in June 2018, the judge having considered this in detail in the preceding paragraph at [37].
24. The judge went on to reach further unchallenged and sustainable negative credibility findings, in considering that it was difficult to see what advantage would accrue to the gang in forcing the appellant to make such a call and it was not credible that the appellant would have been able to convince her family that she meant what she said, rather than presenting as being made to say it under duress. Those were all reasoned, evidence based findings that were open to the judge and do not disclose a material error.
25. The judge also considered two alternative matrices: his primary finding being that the family had not rejected her, for the adequate reasons he gave, with the judge made alternative findings at [40], that in any event even if they had that they would not continue to do so once they knew the truth.
26. It was open to the judge to reach the findings he did in relation to the position of the family in relation to the appellant’s illegitimate children at [41]. The grounds of appeal argued that whether or not the children bear the same family name as the appellant would be relevant to the public perception of the appellant and her children but not the family’s perception. However, at [41] it is clear the judge was considering that this was relevant “both within her family and wider family” both in relation to being a potential source of shame and stigma but also in relation implicitly as to whether this would be less of an issue for the family, as it would be not as obvious.
27. Whilst the judge did not specifically make a finding that the appellant was middle class, any error is not material. The judge considered the TD and AD. The country guidance is not exhaustive and requires decision makers to consider factors “including the factors” set out in TD and AD. The judge properly considered the appellant’s support network which is a consideration set out in bold in TD and AD, reflecting its importance, and the judge reached findings on the point which were specifically relevant to the appellant in relation to her family, her past work experience and her mental health, as well as making detailed findings in relation to the support available to victims of trafficking.
28. The judge therefore reached conclusions which were open to him, having holistically reviewed and considered the appellant’s risk of being re-trafficked. Any error therefore in not making a specific finding in relation to the appellant’s economic and social status of her family was not material, as nothing would turn on this given the judge’s findings.
29. The judge had regard to all the factors in finding, contrary to the appellant’s claim, there were no substantial grounds to believe that her family would shun her once she revealed the truth that her phone call in June 2018 was made under duress, [40]. The judge clearly had in mind the factors in TD and AD, in reaching his findings at [41], that whilst taking into account her two illegitimate children, she had not established that her own family would not offer her and her children protection and support. As noted, the judge also took into account the assistance available in Albania, including from NGOs and state institutions, and that the appellant would be available for reintegration assistance from the Home Office. The judge also properly took into account the appellant’s previous work history in Albania.
30. The judge’s findings were open to him and the grounds disclose no more than a disagreement. The judge had regard to the whole “sea” of evidence before him whereas the appellant’s grounds of appeal seek to “island hop”. The judge’s findings were properly reasoned and evidence based. No material error is made out.
Decision
(1) The decision of the First-tier Tribunal did not involve the making of an error on a point of law. The appellant’s appeal is dismissed.
(2) I do not set aside the decision.

M M Hutchinson

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

20 June 2025