Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER Case No: UI-2025-005006
UI-2025-005007
UI-2025-005008
UI-2025-005009
FtT No: HU/64927/2023, LH/01914/2024
HU/50057/2024, LH/01918/2024
HU/50060/2024, LH/01917/2024
HU/50063/2024, LH/01916/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 3 March 2026

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE LINDSLEY

Between

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Appellant
and

AQ (1)
JA (2)
MA (3)
MAA (4)
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Respondents

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr E Terrell, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer
For the Respondent: Mr E Banham, of Counsel, instructed by Allied Law Chambers Solicitors Ltd

Heard at Field House on 25 February 2026

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the respondents are granted anonymity.

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

DECISION AND REASONS
Introduction
1. The claimants are citizens of Syria who currently live in Lebanon. The first claimant is the mother of the second, third and fourth claimants. The applied to come to the UK on the basis of family reunion to join the sponsor SG who is the father of the first claimant and grandfather of the other claimants and has refugee status in the UK. The applications were made on 15th April 2022 and refused on 29th November 2023. The claimants’ appeals against the decisions were allowed by the First-tier Tribunal Judge after a hearing on the 25th September 2024.
2. Permission to appeal was granted to the Secretary of State by Upper Tribunal Judge Norton-Taylor on 1st December 2025 on the basis that it was arguable that the First-tier judge had erred in law when concluding that the claimants were provided with real and effective support by the sponsor and thus that there is a family life relationship between them in light of the decision of the Court of Appeal in IA & Ors v SSHD [2025] EWCA Civ 1516. In light of this arguable error outlined in the first ground grounds two to five are also found to be arguable.
3. The matter now comes before me to determine whether the First-tier Tribunal had erred in law, and if so whether any such error was material and whether the decision of the First-tier Tribunal should be set aside. It was agreed by the parties that if an error was established on the basis of the first ground with respect to Article 8(1) ECHR then the decision would need to be set aside along with all of the findings and so the hearing should focus initially on this point, and in the event it was not necessary to go further.
Submissions – Error of Law
4. In the first ground of appeal and in oral submissions from Mr Terrell on this ground it is argued by the Secretary of State, in short summary, that the First-tier Tribunal erred in law as follows. The First-tier Tribunal erred by making a material misdirection in law in relation to the issue of whether an Article 8(1) ECHR family life relationship exists between the claimants and their sponsor by failing to apply the test set out in IA & Ors, which in turn relies upon the ECtHR case of Kumari v The Netherlands, which requires dependency going beyond support constituting more than normal emotional ties between non-nuclear family adult relations; and clearly states that real, committed and effective support does not suffice alone to show family life. Whilst there are references to dependency in the decision of the First-tier Tribunal what is said at paragraph 24 shows that dependency was reduced by the First-tier Tribunal to real and effective support. It is argued that it is not clearly found that the first claimant was significantly financially or emotionally dependent on the sponsor given that it was found she had more income from other sources than she received from the sponsor, and Kumari found that financial support is not enough to show dependency in any case, and the first claimant has the support of a psychiatrist in the Lebanon on whom she relies , and so therefore has emotional support other than from the sponsor. There was therefore a wrong legal direction and it could not be said that the outcome of the appeal would inevitably be the same if a proper legal direction had been given so the decision ought to be found to materially err in law.
5. There was no Rule 24 notice from the claimants but with respect to the first ground Mr Banham provided a skeleton argument and oral submissions in which he argued that the First-tier Tribunal did consider and find dependency, and not just real and effective support, was provided by the sponsor to the claimants and so there was no material error of law as whilst the First-tier Tribunal was understandably guided by the Court of Appeal decision in Kugathas v SSHD [2003] EWCA Civ 31, which had seen a change of emphasis in the decision of IA & Ors, ultimately findings in line with the test for family life as set out in IA & Ors were made, for instances as set out at paragraphs 23 and 34 of the decision. Further it is clear from IA & Ors that support remains relevant to the issues of dependency, and may or may not be sufficient to establish the additional elements of dependency to show family life, and complete dependency is not required to show family life.
6. At the end of submissions on the first ground I informed the parties that I found there was a material error of law for the reasons I now set out in writing below. Mr Banham argued that due to the extent of remaking the appeal should return to the First-tier Tribunal, and Mr Terrell said he was neutral on the matter. I found that the appeal should return to the First-tier Tribunal given that it would be a matter of remaking all of the findings, given ten months had elapsed since it was last heard, and that different evidence might be sought by the claimants in light of the test for family life and with respect to the consideration of proportionality in entry clearance matters as set out in IA & Ors.

Conclusions – Error of Law
7. In the decision of the Court of Appeal in IA & Ors the Court of Appeal clarified the law with respect to Article 8 ECHR and family life beyond nuclear family members living abroad. It found, in short summary, that family life only existed between adult family members, or those going beyond the nuclear family, if there were additional elements of dependency providing more than normal emotional ties. Dependency is found not to be coterminous with real, committed and effective support, and the provision of effective, real of committed support is found not necessarily to amount to dependency. Dependency is instead a significant relationship, and an exacting standard, which will be harder to demonstrate outside the core cohabiting family. It may include elements of financial, physical and mental/emotional dependency and is a fact sensitive exercise to be decided on a case-by-case basis.
8. The Secretary of State argued in the refusal decision that the claimants should entry clearance should not be granted because they had not shown dependency or family life with the sponsor. It was clearly a live issue in this appeal to be determined. The test applied by the First-tier Tribunal was, understandably, given that the appeal was heard in September 2024 and determined in May 2025, that set out in Kugathas as the judgement in IA & Ors was not handed down until November 2025. This has however led the First-tier Tribunal to make a material misdirection in law. As point out by Mr Terrell the First-tier Tribunal states, at paragraph 24 of the decision when commencing its discussion and conclusions on whether there is an Article 8 (1) family life: “To show dependency the test is whether he provides real and effective support”. The First-tier Tribunal therefore treats dependency as being synonymous with real and effective support whereas the Court of Appeal has now clearly decided that in some cases real and effective support will not amount to dependency, and thus no Article 8(1) family life will be found to exist.
9. So, whilst there are findings of dependency between the claimants and sponsor in the decision, for instance at paragraph 34 where it is said that the first claimant is “financially and emotionally dependent” on the sponsor, these are not based on the understanding of dependency as clarified by the Court of Appeal in the decision in IA& Ors. In these circumstances I find that an incorrect legal test has been applied, and that it is not possible to say that if the correct test had been applied the same conclusion, that family life exists between sponsor and claimants, would have been reached.
10. As the First-tier Tribunal has therefore materially erred at this first stage it follows that the decision and all of the findings must be set aside and the appeal remade in its entirety.

Decision:

1. The making of the decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of an error on a point of law.

2. I set aside the decision of the First-tier Tribunal and all of the findings.

3. I remit the remaking of this appeal to the First-tier Tribunal, the decision to be remade de novo by a different judge of the First-tier Tribunal.

Fiona Lindsley

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

25th February 2026