Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-002846

First-tier Tribunal No: PA/53841/2024
LP/13460/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 13th January 2026

Before

DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE GRAVES

Between

MM
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr Sheikh, Senior Presenting Officer
For the Respondent: Unrepresented

Heard at Field House on 5 January 2026

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the appellant 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. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS

1. The appellant appeals against the decision (“the decision”) of the First-tier Tribunal Judge (“the judge”), dated 10 April 2025, dismissing the appellant’s appeal against the decision of the respondent of 30 January 2024, refusing his asylum and human rights claim.

2. The appellant’s case at the screening interview was that he had hit someone with his car in Egypt on 10 August 2021 and they wanted compensation. He could not afford to pay and so instead made his way to the UK and claimed asylum. He was not married and had no children. He came to the UK via Libya, Italy and France. By the date of the substantive interview on 4 January 2024, some eighteen months later, he said the person he hit was a police officer. After his arrival in the UK his family had contacted him and told him that police had been to the family home looking for him and told them that the police officer had made false allegations to the extent that the appellant was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. He had been charged with collecting money for the Muslim Brotherhood and the court had issued judgement against him. He said he had the court documents and would provide them within five working days of the interview. He had never been politically active for the Muslim Brotherhood or anyone else, however, and this did not form part of his claim.

3. The appellant then submitted a letter from a lawyer in Egypt, dated 24 December 2023, with additional documents, which included a court summons for 9 August 2021, which would be the day before the incident he says gave rise to the court case, and another summons dated 15 September 2021, which was the same date the appellant says he left Egypt. There was also a court judgment against the appellant, dated 11 August 2022, finding him guilty, along with other defendants, of various crimes and support for the Muslim Brotherhood, and a travel ban document. I do not have the date these documents were submitted to the respondent, but the respondent did not raise any issue with them being produced late and so it may be they were submitted within the agreed five day deadline after the interview.

4. The respondent then refused the claim on the basis it was not consistent or credible and the documents attracted little weight. He had not submitted the originals, the person who was the subject of the court case had a different last name and the translations were not done in the UK.

5. The judge hearing the case dismissed the appellant’s appeal, largely on credibility grounds.

The grant of permission to appeal

6. The appellant was unrepresented and so submitted only the briefest of grounds. Permission was initially refused by the First-tier but granted by the Upper Tribunal, as follows, on the following grounds:

“As the appellant is acting in person, I have carefully considered the decision of the First-tier Tribunal to see if there are any “Robinson obvious” errors within it: see R v Secretary of State for the Home Department ex parte Robinson [1998] QB 929. Having done so, I am satisfied that it is arguable that the judge made material errors of law in the following respects:

a. At paragraphs 32 to 36 and 39, the judge focusses on the envelope said to contain the evidence of the arrest warrant and certificate of imprisonment. He appears to reject these on the basis that the appellant did not produce the documents before his asylum interview and there was no evidence from the sender. The appellant’s explanation as to why he did not produce the documents earlier is recorded at paragraph 23; however, the judge arguably does not appear to have considered the appellant’s explanation and given reasons for rejecting it.
b. In the “Evidence” section of the decision, at paragraph 25 the judge states that the appellant failed to give consistent evidence about how he came to learn about the court proceedings in Egypt. The judge does not return to this in the “Findings” section of his decision. It is therefore arguable that the judge did not give adequate reasons to support his statement that the appellant failed to give consistent evidence in relation to this aspect of his claim.
c. It is also arguable that the judge focussed on when and how the documents were received but fails to engage with the documents themselves as part of a holistic assessment of the evidence. It is therefore arguable that he has failed to give adequate reasons for rejecting the arrest warrant and certificate of imprisonment.
d. The judge speculates at paragraphs 41 and 43 about the motives of the Egyptian police officer and the agent who brought the appellant to the UK. It is arguable that such speculation was impermissible.”

The Hearing

7. Mr Sheikh made submissions, to which the appellant, who was a litigant in person, briefly responded. He said he did not know what he was supposed to say, but the name of the sender of the court documents was on the envelope provided to the FtT.

8. The court had prepared a bundle running to 124 digital pages containing the documents relevant to the appeal before me, including the appellant’s and respondent’s bundles before the First-tier Tribunal.

9. Following submissions from Mr Sheikh, I indicated that I would reserve my decision and now provide this below with reasons.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

Ground 1 or ‘a’

10. The judge relied [at 35, 36, 37] on the late production of the appellant’s documents from Egypt and the emergence only at hearing of the DHL envelope in which he claimed they had arrived. The judge found failure to present documents at an early stage, and before the date of the asylum interview, prevents ‘proper scrutiny’ of them, presumably by the respondent. I find the timing of the production of the documents was relied on as a central ground for placing no reliance upon them, but also in the assessment of credibility.

11. It is relevant, however, that there appears to have been no consideration of the appellant’s explanations in oral evidence, that he gave these documents to his solicitors and relied on them to produce them in a timely manner.

12. The chronology is additionally relevant, I find, and has not been considered either. This is that the cover letter from the lawyer is dated two days before Christmas. The envelope itself, was dated 2 January 2024, as the date given for when it was posted out of Egypt. The asylum interview took place on 4 January 2024, just two days after the documents were posted. The appellant told the respondent at the interview, which was also remote, that he did not have his documents that day to submit, but could do so imminently. He was given five working days to do so. It is not recorded anywhere that I can find, when the documents were actually submitted, but they are in the respondent’s bundle, and were considered in the decision and the review. I am therefore unable to find any basis in the evidence before the judge, to support the finding that the appellant failed to provide these documents at the earliest stage, or that the timing of the production of them prevented the respondent from having time to undertake proper scrutiny, given they were submitted before the decision, the review and the hearing before the judge. I also find the finding that the appellant should have submitted them before the interview, fails to engage with the fact he would not likely have received them himself any earlier than the interview date itself.

13. I also note that it was also recorded in the decision that the appellant only first produced the envelope at the hearing itself and this too was relevant to credibility. However, on the FtT court system, there is an image of that envelope having been uploaded on 28 October 2024 with the appellant’s appeal reasons. It was considered by the respondent in the review, and was therefore before the respondent a year before the hearing before the judge.

14. The decision also records, I note, the absence of sender’s details on the envelope, and states that the appellant’s name is given as the sender. I would not wish to make any findings, but there does appear to be a sender name on the envelope, that is not quite the same as the appellant’s name, albeit they share the same first name.

15. Accordingly, I find there is an error in the treatment of this evidence, which gave rise to a core adverse credibility point with regard to the appellant’s credibility overall, but also with regard to what weight could be placed on the documents themselves. As a result, it is a material error.

Ground 2 or ‘b’

16. As identified in the grant of permission to appeal, there is also an absence of any adequate reasons in the relevant section of the decision, to support the judge’s note that the appellant gave an inconsistent account of how he appellant learned of the court case against him. This absence of findings and reasons to address the record of what evidence was before the judge, is also not an isolated issue.

17. I will also note that having found an error of law in the decision, that I do have some other concerns about the section of the decision that addresses the record of evidence, albeit these concerns were not raised in the grant of permission. It is necessary to record them, as they do relate to the purported inconsistency in evidence about how the appellant came to know of the court case, and they lead me to have concerns about that record of oral evidence. Because of these concerns, I find it all the more important for the decision to contain clear reasons to support any findings about inconsistencies between the oral evidence and the interviews, but they are not contained in the decision. I am mindful too that the appellant is a litigant in person who does not speak English and who has struggled to engage with the appeal process. I have therefore set these issues out below.

18. In the judge’s decision it is said that the claim pre-dates the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 (‘NABA’) [at 9] but then says it was made on 16 September 2022 and so the provisions of NABA do apply to the claim. There are, therefore, two sentences which conflict with each other. This might be a minor drafting error, but there are other issues, set out below.

19. The judge set out some of the oral evidence [at 16 to 30] which is particularly important as the appellant was unrepresented at hearing and had not provided a witness statement or chronology of events. This record of oral evidence included the appellant having said he had learned of the court case because he was told by his daughter in Egypt, a week after the car accident, that he was facing charges for his role with the Muslim Brotherhood before he left the country [at 18] and to having been married and subsequently divorced [at 29]. However, the appellant was recorded to have told the respondent at both interviews that he was unmarried and had no children in any country. His family was comprised of his parents and siblings. He also gave an account at interview of only learning of the allegations once in the UK.

20. Again, this may be a minor issue, but it was also recorded that the appellant had provided photographic evidence as part of his claim of attendance at a Muslim Brotherhood demonstration in the UK in November 2022 [at 20 and 28] but no such evidence is in the court bundle and this was not referred to at interview, which would have come after that date. The appellant told the respondent at interview he was not politically active. It was also recorded that the appellant had been to the UK on a business visa [at 29]. All of this is obviously different to what was said in the screening and substantive interviews about the chronology, his immigration history and family circumstances.

21. In addition to the above, the travel history set out within the record of oral evidence is also different to that relied on in the screening interview, substantive interview and in the respondent’s decision, which is that the appellant went to the UAE, then to Saudi Arabia for six months, then having secured a passport, flew with a visa to Belgium, then crossed by foot to France [at 18 to 19]. Yet in the same summary of oral evidence at hearing, the judge recorded that the appellant travelled from Egypt to Libya, then by sea to Italy, from where he was deported, and only then to France [at 26 and 27].

22. In addition to that, the record of oral evidence also says the appellant was cross examined about his claims in his interview that he fled his home in May, to which the appellant apparently said was not possible, as the accident occurred in June [at 22]. However, [at 17], the judge recorded that the appellant’s oral evidence in cross examination was that the accident happened in August 2021. I can find no source for the May or June dates in either interview or the appellant’s appeal reasons.

23. My concern is that there is a record of oral evidence that is not consistent with the interviews, the chronology or the evidence in numerous respects, and is also internally inconsistent within the decision itself. It is unclear to me whether this originates from drafting issues, perhaps from another decision, or these are points relevant to the credibility assessment, but there are no findings to address them. This only supports the concern, raised in the grant of permission to appeal, about whether the reasons and findings are adequate and whether there has been a proper assessment of credibility.

24. I find this too is an error of law, and a material one, given the other cumulative concerns.

25. It is not necessary to make findings about the other grounds, given I find the core credibility assessment is infected by errors. However, all the grounds have force, given my concerns about the record of oral evidence.

Remaking

26. I have considered whether to retain the matter for remaking in the Upper Tribunal, in line with the general principle set out in statement 7 of the Senior President’s Practice Statement and further considered in AEB v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2022] EWCA Civ 1512 and Begum (Remaking or remittal) Bangladesh [2023] UKUT 00046 (IAC). Mr Sheikh said the respondent was neutral on whether the appeal should be retained in the Upper Tribunal or remitted to be heard afresh, but acknowledged the matter would need to be heard de novo and no findings could be preserved, and that the appellant is additionally unrepresented. I find in those circumstances, to retain the appeal would also deprive the appellant of the benefit of the two tier appellate system, and that it is appropriate to remit the appeal to be heard by a different judge of the First-tier Tribunal than made the decision under appeal.

Notice of Decision

27. The First-tier Tribunal decision involved the making of errors of law. Accordingly, the decision of the First-tier Tribunal dated 10 April 2025 is set aside, with no findings of fact preserved and the appeal is remitted to the First-tier Tribunal to be heard afresh.

H Graves

Deputy Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

6 January 2026