Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-002884

First-tier Tribunal No: PA/75824/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 18th November 2025

Before

DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE LAWRENCE

Between

EH (IRAN)
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: S Martin, Jain, Neil & Ruddy Solicitors
For the Respondent: E Blackburn, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 13 November 2025

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
Introduction
1. The Appellant appeals against a decision by Judge Gillespie of the First-tier Tribunal (“FtT”), dated 14 May 2025, to dismiss an appeal by the Appellant against a decision by the Secretary of State for the Home Department (“SSHD”), dated 31 October 2024, to refuse a protection claim that was made by the Appellant on 12 August 2023.
Anonymity
2. I maintain or make an order for anonymity because the Appellant continues to rely upon international protection grounds. The importance of facilitating the discharge of the obligations of the United Kingdom (“UK”) under the Refugee Convention and European Convention on Human Rights (“ECHR”) outweighs the principle of open justice.
Background
3. In the 31 October 2022 decision, the Respondent accepted the Appellant’s claimed identity including that he is a national of Iran, and that he had been born into the Islamic faith. The Respondent did not accept the Appellant’s claim that he was a genuine convert to Christianity, which was the reason the Appellant claimed to have a well-founded fear of persecution in Iran.
4. The Appellant’s appeal against the 31 October 2022 decision was heard on 7 May 2025 by Judge Gillespie, who found in their decision dated 14 May 2025 that the Appellant had not proved a genuine conversion to Christianity from Islam. Judge Gillespie also found there to be no evidence that the Appellant was of Kurdish ethnicity as he claimed to be.
The appeal to the Upper Tribunal
5. The Appellant applied to the FtT for permission to appeal to the Upper Tribunal (“UT”), which was granted by FtT Judge Seelhoff in a decision dated 1 July 2025. Judge Seelhoff’s reasons were as follows:
“1. The application is in time.
2. Paragraph 1 of the grounds complains that the judge erroneously proceeded on the basis that he believed it had been conceded that the Appellant's knowledge of Christianity as a whole was "untidy", whereas this was in fact a statement by the advocate that a single answer at interview about the immaculate conception was "untidy".
3. It is arguable that this could have tainted the credibility findings. I note the case of BW (witness statements by advocates) Afghanistan [2014] UKUT 00568 (IAC). It may be appropriate for Mr Martin to provide a statement in respect of this ground and to not be the advocate for the Upper Tribunal hearing.
4. Paragraph 2 of the grounds complains that adequate weight was not given to a supporting letter from a priest. Weight would normally be a matter for the Judge and he did note gaps in the letter and the problem of the witness not attending [42].
5. Paragraph 3 of the grounds complains that the judge appears to have treated a single reference to the Appellant being "illiterate" in his second substantive asylum interview as being inconsistent with evidence elsewhere that he could read and write.
6. It is arguable that as a whole across the screening interview, first full interview and witness statement the Appellant has consistently explained that he reads and writes at a basic level but is in effect not fully literate as he did not finish school. It is arguable that treating this evidence as inconsistent has tainted the credibility findings.
7. Permission to appeal is granted on all grounds.”
6. The SSHD made no reply under Rule 24 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008.
The hearing
7. At the start of the hearing, Ms Blackburn sought permission to provide a note of the 7 May 2025 hearing before Judge Gillespie that she described as having been made by the Home Office Presenting Officer who represented the SSHD at that hearing, and I note in passing and as alluded to by Judge Seelhoff when granting permission that Mr Martin had appeared for the Appellant at the 7 May 2025 hearing.
8. Ms Blackburn took the stance that the Presenting Officer’s note supported the assertion made in the Appellant’s grounds of appeal to the UT that Mr Martin had not conceded that the Appellant's knowledge of Christianity as a whole was "untidy" and that Mr Martin had in fact accepted during that hearing only that the Appellant’s explanation in the asylum interview of his understanding of the Immaculate Conception had been "untidy”. Ms Blackburn submitted that it did not follow from this that the SSHD conceded that the FtT’s decision was vitiated by any material error of law, and she stated that she intended to rely on other aspects of the Presenting Officer’s note as being undermining of the Appellant’s grounds of appeal. Having had sight of the Presenting Officer’s note and having heard Ms Blackburn’s explanation of the SSHD’s position, Mr Martin did not oppose the application to admit the note, stating that he did not consider it to be inaccurate in any way. I therefore decided to admit the item into evidence.
9. In submissions, Mr Martin adopted and expanded on the grounds for appeal on which permission had been granted, relied on Judge Seelhoff’s reasons for granting permission. Ms Blackburn then made oral submissions for the SSHD, after which Mr Martin made short submissions in reply.
10. Mr Martin submitted that the appropriate disposal if a material error of law was found would be to remit the matter to the FtT to decide the appeal with no preserved findings for credibility to be decided afresh. Ms Blackburn took a neutral stance regarding disposal in those circumstances, but noted that delays in listing substantive appeals in the FtT might mean that it would be more appropriate for the UT to retain the appeal for remaking, because that might result in the appeal being decided more quickly.
11. I reserved my decision to follow in writing.
Error of law
12. In oral submissions, Mr Martin noted that it was not in dispute that the judge had erred in recording at paragraph 36 of the decision and reasons that Mr Martin had described the Appellant’s knowledge of the faith of Christianity as “untidy”. Mr Martin submitted that the judge had also erred in stating in that paragraph that there was “no real issue taken in regard to the SSHD’s assertion that the Appellant’s knowledge of the faith at interview was inadequate”. Mr Martin stated that the judge’s attention had been drawn to the Appellant’s responses to questions 38 to 41 in the (second) asylum interview which, Mr Martin submitted, demonstrated knowledge of Christianity. Mr Martin submitted that the judge had materially erred in law by failing to give positive weight to that evidence as part of an holistic assessment of the Appellant’s knowledge of Christianity. Mr Martin submitted that the error was material because the gaps in the Appellant’s knowledge regarding the Christian religion were commensurate with the Appellant’s account of relatively recent practice of Christianity in a jurisdiction where the right to do so was limited in the extreme and the difference in language in the UK.
13. Ms Blackburn’s response to those submissions was that, considering the rest of the decision and the Presenting Officer’s note, no material error of law was disclosed. Ms Blackburn noted the Appellant’s lack of knowledge about the Easter festival for example, and that the Appellant had never claimed that his answers about that festival were correct. Ms Blackburn submitted that what the judge was saying at paragraph 36 of the decision was that parts of the Appellant’s explanation did not match up to the expected level of knowledge of Christianity, even having regard to the Appellant’s explanation for his poor performance in the interview that had included worries his daughter was having at the time.
14. I am persuaded that the judge’s record of the factual matters at paragraph 36 of the decision and reasons that are referred to by Mr Martin are incompatible with the evidence of the Presenting Officer’s note, which is accepted as accurate by both parties and indeed was provided by the SSHD. Ms Blackburn accepted that the note showed that Mr Martin had described the Appellant’s explanation in the asylum interview of his understanding of the Immaculate Conception had been "untidy”, rather than describing his knowledge of the faith as such, as the judge recorded. I also find that the judge’s record that “no real issue taken in regard to the SSHD’s assertion that the Appellant’s knowledge of the faith at interview was inadequate” was factually erroneous, on the basis of the Presenting Officer’s uncontested note that Mr Martin made submissions during the 7 May 2025 hearing that the questions to which the Appellant’s responses were said to demonstrate a lack of knowledge of Christianity were “obtuse and lacking” and that while negative weight had been given to what the Appellant did not know, no positive weight had been given to what was within his knowledge such as his ability “to say why crucifixion, say who Joseph was, who John the Baptism etc”. The uncontested fact that those submissions were made is, I find, incompatible with the judge’s record that no real issue had been taken with the SSHD’s assertion that the Appellant’s knowledge of the faith at interview was inadequate.
15. I am moreover persuaded that the errors of fact that I have referred to were material to the judge’s decision that the Appellant had not proved a genuine conversion to Christianity from Islam, which was dispositive of the appeal on protection grounds. That is because I consider that it cannot reasonably be said that the judge could or would not have reached a different conclusion on the issue had they not been of the mistaken understanding that it was conceded by the Appellant that his knowledge of the faith at interview was inadequate. The identified error undermines the judge’s assessment of credibility in its entirety and therefore the decision must be set aside.
Disposal
16. The error of law in the FtT’s decision is such that none of the findings made by the judge can be preserved, and therefore I consider it is appropriate that the appeal to the FtT be remitted to the FtT for hearing afresh I am satisfied that the nature and extent of judicial fact finding that is necessary in order for the decision in the appeal to be re-made is such that, having regard to the overriding objective, it is appropriate to remit the case to the FtT.

Notice of Decision
The decision of the FtT involved the making of a material error on a point of law.
The decision of the FtT is set aside with no findings preserved.
The remaking of the decision in the appeal is remitted to the FtT, to be remade afresh by any judge other than Judge Gillespie.

T Lawrence
Judge Lawrence
Deputy Upper Tribunal Judge
Immigration and Asylum Chamber
14 November 2025