Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-005291& UI-2025-005294

First-tier Tribunal No: PA/60790/2024 & PA/60782/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 5th February 2026

Before

DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE BARTLETT

Between

HAN
MHR
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr Slatter, of Counsel
For the Respondent: Ms Khan, Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 14 January 2026

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the appellants are granted anonymity because they are minors.

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 appellants. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS

1. The appellants made claims for asylum which were refused by the Secretary of State for the Home Department on 10 April 2024. The appellants appealed this decision to the First-tier Tribunal which rejected the appeals in a decision dated 9 October 2025. The appellants’ applications for permission to appeal were granted by Judge Dainty of the First-tier Tribunal. This granted permission to appeal on all grounds and set these out as:

a. A lack of proper, full and intelligible reasons for the findings that the witnesses were not credible;

b. A failure to take into account that the first appellant was a minor and consider this as part of the credibility assessment;

c. a failure to consider the objective bundle.

Grounds one and two

2. In submissions, Mr Slatter submitted that ground one overlaps with ground two of the appeal. It is based on the Judge not taking into account the minority of the first appellant in assessing the discrepancies in her evidence. Mr Slatter also submitted the following:

a. at paragraphs 31 and 32 the Judge identified discrepancies in the first appellant’s evidence but that discrepancy was not considered in light of the Presidential guidance on children and vulnerable people: Joint Presidential Guidance Note No 2 of 2010: Child, vulnerable adult and sensitive appellant guidance and the effect of the first appellant’s minority when assessing the evidence. Further, this did not support a finding that evidence had been fabricated;
b. the Judge failed to give adequate reasons why she did not believe the adult sister, Aleya’s (DOB 1997) evidence, that the mother did not see her when she visited Bangladesh in 2022 and she was not aware of the planned trip of the appellants and their mother;
c. the Judge did not provide reasons for stating that she did not find it credible that the uncle, who did not give evidence in this appeal, had not divorced himself from the appellants.

3. Ms Khan submissions in relation to ground 1 can be summarised as follows:

a. the Judge came to reasoned and balanced findings. At paragraphs 30 to 31 the Judge addressed the first appellant’s own evidence, at paragraph 31 she addressed the cross-examination and at paragraph 34 she considered the adult sister’s evidence and gave reasons for rejecting it;
b. it was reasonable for the judge to make the inference about fabrication of the claim;
c. even taking the ground at its highest, the Judge’s findings about fabrication is not material to the outcome of the decision because she made multiple adverse credibility findings against the appellants;
d. at paragraph 36 the Judge made reference to the appellant’s mother’s financial means. Paragraphs 36 to 38 contain relevant findings of the Judge about the evidence. Paragraph 43 sets out a full consideration of the uncle’s evidence.

4. In relation to ground two Ms Khan submitted that there are multiple references to the appellants being minors [12], [19], [56], [57] and [27]. Even though the appellants were minors the Judge was entitled to assess their credibility which is what she did.

5. It is not disputed that the Judge did not refer to the Presidential guidance on children and vulnerable people: Joint Presidential Guidance Note No 2 of 2010: Child, vulnerable adult and sensitive appellant guidance.

6. The Senior President of Tribunal’s Practice Direction on Written Reasons June 2024 sets out at paragraph 9 “As an expert tribunal, the First-tier Tribunal will generally be taken to be aware of the relevant authorities within the jurisdiction being exercised, and to be applying those cases without the need to refer to them specifically, unless it is clear from the language of the decision that they have failed to do so. The Upper Tribunal will not readily assume that a tribunal has misdirected itself merely because every step in its reasoning is not fully set out in its decision”. The Practice Direction does not refer directly to the Presidential Guidance on vulnerable appellants however the practice direction as a whole makes it clear that determinations do not need to recite and quote authorities, objective evidence or factual evidence.

7. The determination makes numerous references to the fact that both appellants were minors, [12], [19], [56], [57] and [27]. Beyond this, the entire basis of the claim was that the appellants were minors and this is why they were at risk in Bangladesh. The Judge was without doubt aware of the fact that the appellants were minors and assessed the appeal through this prism.

8. The grounds assert that the Judge relied on minor discrepancies to discredit the appellant’s account. The discrepancies the judge relies on include:

a. [27], [28] & [29] discrepancies about the presence of the first appellant’s father in Bangladesh;
b. [30] that the first appellant had a relationship with her father in Bangladesh;
c. [31] to [32] about her mother’s abusive behaviour to her;
d. [33] about the contact the first appellant had with her family in Bangladesh;
e. [40] discrepancies about the English level of their mother between the first appellant and the adult sister. However, what is relied on at [42] is that the adult sister changed her evidence when challenged

9. These are fundamental matters relating to the first appellant’s life. She was 16 at time of interview and 17 at the hearing and when cross-examined, her vulnerability arises from her age as an older teen and it is not material to the discrepancies recorded. Those matters identified by the Judge are about such fundamental issues to the first appellant’s life that even as a minor witness she would legitimately be expected to be able to provide accurate and consistent evidence about them.

10. Further, at paragraphs 25 to 38 the Judge considers a wide range of evidence from different sources, not simply the evidence of the first appellant, correctly weighs the evidence in the round and forms a fully reasoned decision that is open to her on the evidence. At paragraphs 41 to 46 the Judge considers and assesses evidence about the claim that the mother abandoned the appellants in the United Kingdom, the discrepant accounts of how the first appellant and Aleya found out the mother was in Bangladesh and the contact the adult sister had with the mother. The assessment of the evidence continues to paragraph 50. It is clear from the assessment of the evidence that the evidence of the adult sister and its discrepant nature were a substantial part of the reasoning in the decision.

11. The Determination sets out a careful, detailed and scrupulous assessment of the multifaceted and multi-source evidence that was available to the Judge.

12. Therefore, I conclude that the failure to refer to the presidential guidance is not an error of law and even if it was, it is not a material error of law.

13. I refer to paragraph 6 of the June 2024 Practice Direction from the Senior President of Tribunals which sets out “Providing adequate reasons does not usually require the First-tier Tribunal to identify all of the evidence relied upon in reaching its findings of fact, to elaborate at length its conclusions on any issue of law, or to express every step of its reasoning.” I find that the Judge provided proportionate and adequate reasons and that the grounds of appeal in relation to inadequacy of reasons are simply an attempt to re-argue the case.

14. I find the grounds one and two fail.

Ground three

15. Mr Slatter submitted that country evidence had not been taken into account at all by the Judge. I asked Mr Slatter if it was only paragraphs 19 and 20 of the skeleton argument that it was submitted the judge did not take into account and he confirmed that that was correct as all the rest related to risk if the material facts had been accepted.

16. Ms Khan submitted that this was an attempt to re-argue the decision and that the judge had referred to the relevant objective information at paragraph 51.

17. The Judge, at paragraph 51, refers to the Bangladesh CPIN dated December 2024. She does not cite extracts from this and I find that there is no requirement to do so as is made clear by the June 2024 Practice Direction from the Senior President of Tribunals.

18. Paragraph 19 of the skeleton argument relied on a UNICEF report, Street situations in Bangladesh. Paragraph 20 of the skeleton also relies on that report as demonstrating that “child abandonment is not a rare phenomenon and that it is consequently entirely plausible that the appellant’s mother has simply given up on them”.

19. The Judge found that the appellants were not at risk of being abandoned as they would be supported by their mother. Therefore, on the facts as the Judge found them this objective evidence was not relevant. It was open to the Judge to find that the appellants had not been abandoned. This ground is in reality a disagreement with the assessment made by the Judge.

20. I understand that the appellant’s argument is that this objective report helps to support their case that the appellants were abandoned however, given the extensive findings based on the evidence in the case, including that of the first appellant, her sister and all the evidence directly relevant to this case, this report takes their case little further forward. The Judge does not state that abandonment is rare instead she quite correctly assesses the individual circumstances of these appellants.

21. I find that there has not been a failure to consider objective evidence and the ground is simply a disagreement with the Judge’s findings and conclusion. There is no arguable error of law.

Notice of Decision

The Decision of the First-tier Tribunal dated 9 October 2025 did not contain a material error of law. The appeal is dismissed.

J Bartlett

Deputy Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

30 January 2026