Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER Case No: UI-2025-005603
First-tier Tribunal No: HU/00817/2025

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 3rd March 2026

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE BULPITT

Between

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Appellant
and

ISSAC AESECHIRE BRAMWEL
(NO ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr N Pugh, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer
For the Respondent: Not Represented

Heard at Field House on 23 February 2026

DECISION AND REASONS

1. The appellant appeals against the decision of First-tier Tribunal Judge Moon (the Judge) to allow the respondent’s human rights appeal. The context for that appeal is a deportation order made in May 2025 after the respondent was sentenced for the third time for possessing class A drugs with the intent to supply them to others. The appellant is currently serving a sentence of five years and seven months imprisonment for those offences.

2. The Judge allowed the respondent’s appeal having concluded that the respondent is a British citizens and in those circumstances there were “very compelling circumstances”.

3. The appellant appeals on the grounds that the Judge mis-applied the law when considering whether the respondent is British and that the Judge failed to give adequate reasons for the conclusion that there are very compelling circumstances.

4. I am satisfied that the Judge did err in law when making her decision to allow the appeal and that for that reason her decision must be set a-side and the appeal remitted to be reconsidered afresh in the First-tier Tribunal. My reasons for this conclusion follow.

Background

5. Mr Bramwell was born in South London in 1997. He has never left the United Kingdom. He went to school in London until he was excluded because of his disruptive behaviour at the age of 15. Since then he has not worked for any sustained period of time. He has a bad record of criminal offending being sentenced for criminal offences on 11 separate occasions. After Mr Bramwell was sentenced in June 2021 to serve 48 months imprisonment for possessing class A drugs with the intent to supply them to others, the Secretary of State for the Home Department (SSHD) wrote to him to inform him of a decision to pursue his deportation to Nigeria (the stage one notice).

6. In reply to the stage one notice Mr Bramwell wrote to the SSHD raising a human rights claim. He explained that his mother was adopted in Nigeria by parents who had settled status in the United Kingdom in 1987. The adoption was recognised in the United Kingdom in March 1991. Mr Bramwell said his mother and sister are now British citizens and the family have lived in the same residence in South London since 2001. Mr Bramwell argued that he has no connection to Nigeria, that the United Kingdom is the only place he knows and that he will not survive in Nigeria.

7. Before the SSHD had made a decision concerning his human rights claim, Mr Bramwel committed another offence of possessing class A drugs with the intent to supply them to others. On 20 December 2024 he was sentenced to serve a term of imprisonment of five years and seven months for that offence.

8. On 22 May 2025 the SSHD made the decision to refuse Mr Bramwel’s human rights claim and to issue a deportation order. In her decision the SSHD the SSHD said that when Mr Bramwel was born his mother was not a British citizen and did not have settled status in the United Kingdom and therefore, although Mr Bramwel was born in the United Kingdom and lived in the country all his life, there was no reason to believe he is a British citizen. Because she concluded that Mr Bramwel is a foreign criminal who had been sentenced to more than four years imprisonment, the SSHD stated that the public interest required his deportation and that there had to be very compelling circumstances before that public interest could be outweighed. The SSHD then concluded that there were no such very compelling circumstances and on that basis refused the human rights claim and issued the deportation order.

9. Mr Bramwel appealed against the refusal of his human rights claim to the First-tier Tribunal. His appeal was heard by the Judge on 3 October 2025. Mr Bramwel and his mother both gave oral evidence at that hearing and the Judge also heard submissions from a Home Office Presenting Officer.

The Judge’s decision

10. The Judge identified the legal framework that applied, referring to Part 5A of the Nationality Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 (the 2002 Act). Having set out the evidence about Mr Bramwel’s criminality, life in the United Kingdom and connections to Nigeria, the Judge turned to consider the immigration status of Mr Bramwel and his mother at [29] of her decision. The Judge identified the SSHD case at [30] namely that Mr Bramwel is not British because his mother was neither a British citizen nor had settled status when he was born. The SSHD’s stated position was that Mr Bramwel’s mother did not have settled status in the United Kingdom until 2010 and she was not naturalised as a British citizen until 2012.

11. At [31] – [33] the Judge considered the evidence before her about the adoption of Mr Bramwel’s mother in 1991. That evidence included an application for an adoption order made in September 1987, a statement of facts from a social worker dated 19 December 1990 an adoption order dated 14 March 1991 and a birth certificate based on that adoption order, dated 8 April 1991. At [34] the Judge further referred to oral evidence from Mr Bramwel’s mother who said that she had been issued with a British passport in 2007 but was subsequently asked to provide evidence of her naturalisation as British, and that when she could not do so she applied for indefinite leave to remain in the United Kingdom.

12. Having noted the submissions made by the Home Office Presenting Officer the Judge then expressed at [36] her conclusion that Mr Bramwel’s mother had automatically acquired British citizenship at the time of her adoption. The Judge explained that conclusion by reference to the adoption order and the evidence of Mr Bramwel’s mother. At [38] the Judge concluded that Mr Bramwel was consequently a British citizen from birth and at [39] the Judge announced her ultimate conclusion that:

The respondent does not currently recognise the appellant as a British Citizen and it may be that will have to be remedied in different proceedings but for the purpose of this appeal I find the Immigration status of the appellant’s mother and the appellant as I have found them to be combined with the lack of ties in Nigeria amount to very compelling circumstances.

13. The Judge therefore allowed the appeal.

The appeal to this Tribunal

14. The first ground of appeal argued by the appellant is that the Judge failed to take account of the relevant subsections of section 1 to the British Nationality Act 1981 (the 1981 Act) which state that the adoption of a minor who is not British will only result in the minor becoming British if the adopting parents are British. It is argued that this was material because there was no evidence that Mr Bramwel’s mother’s adoptive parents were British rather, the evidence before the Judge was that they were not British.

15. The second ground of appeal is that the Judge did not give adequate reasons for the conclusion that there were very compelling circumstances, that she failed to undertake a proportionality assessment before reaching that conclusion and that she did not factor the public interest in deportation into her considerations when reaching that conclusion.

16. The Judge granted permission to appeal herself noting that the relevant sections of the 1981 Act were not brought to her attention during the hearing.

Legal Framework
Deportation

17. Section 3(5) of the Immigration Act 1971(the 1971 Act) provides that a person who is not a British citizen is liable to deportation if the Secretary of State deems his deportation to be conducive to the public good. Section 32(1) of the UK Borders Act 2007 (the 2007 Act) defines a foreign criminal as a person who (a) is not a British or Irish citizen; (b) is convicted in the United Kingdom of an offence and (c) has been sentenced to a period of imprisonment for a period of at least 12 months. Section 32(4) and (5) of the 2007 Act provide that the deportation of a foreign criminal is conducive to the public good and that the Secretary of State must make a deportation order in respect of a foreign criminal. Sections 33(1) of the 2007 Act provides that s.32(4) and (5) do not apply where an exception is identified and section 33(2) provides that one exception is where removal in pursuance of a deportation order would breach a person’s Convention rights. (emphases added)

18. Part 5A of the 2002 Act applies where a tribunal is required to determine whether a decision made under the Immigration Acts breaches a person’s right to respect for private and family life under Article 8 of the Convention on Human Rights. Section 117D(2) of the 2002 Act defines a foreign criminal as a person (a) who is not British, (b) who has been convicted in the United Kingdom of an offence and (c) has been sentenced to a period of imprisonment of at least 12 months.

19. Section 117C of the 2002 Act identifies considerations that must be taken into account in cases involving foreign criminals. It provides so far as is relevant:

(1) The deportation of foreign criminals is in the public interest.
(2) The more serious the offence committed by a foreign criminal, the greater is the public interest in deportation of the criminal.
(3) In the case of a foreign criminal (“C”) who has not been sentenced to a period of imprisonment of four years or more, the public interest requires C's deportation unless Exception 1 or Exception 2 applies.
(4) Exception 1 applies where—
(a) C has been lawfully resident in the United Kingdom for most of C's life,
(b) C is socially and culturally integrated in the United Kingdom, and
(c) there would be very significant obstacles to C's integration into the country to which C is proposed to be deported.
(5) Exception 2 applies where C has a genuine and subsisting relationship with a qualifying partner, or a genuine and subsisting parental relationship with a qualifying child, and the effect of C's deportation on the partner or child would be unduly harsh.
(6) In the case of a foreign criminal who has been sentenced to a period of imprisonment of at least four years, the public interest requires deportation unless there are very compelling circumstances, over and above those described in Exceptions 1 and 2.
British citizenship

20. So far as is relevant section 1 of the 1981 Act provides as follows:

(1) A person born in the United Kingdom after commencement….shall be a British citizen if at the time of the birth his father or mother is –
(a) A British citizen; or
(b) Settled in the United Kingdom
….
(4) A person born in the United Kingdom after commencement who is not a British citizen by virtue of subsection (1) … shall be entitled on an application for his registration as a British citizen made at any time after he has attained the age of ten years, to be registered as such a citizen if, as regards each of the first ten years of that person’s life, the number of days on which he was absent from the United Kingdom in that year does not exceed 90

(5) Where—

(a) any court in the United Kingdom … makes an order authorising the adoption of a minor who is not a British citizen; or

(b) a minor who is not a British citizen is adopted under a Convention adoption ,

that minor shall, if the requirements of subsection (5A) are met, be a British citizen as from the date on which the order is made or the Convention adoption is effected, as the case may be.

(5A) Those requirements are that on the date on which the order is made or the Convention adoption is effected (as the case may be)—

(a) the adopter or, in the case of a joint adoption, one of the adopters is a British citizen; and

(b) in a case within subsection (5)(b), the adopter or, in the case of a joint adoption, both of the adopters are habitually resident in the United Kingdom.

Analysis

21. As the above passages from the 1971 Act, the 2007 Act and the 2002 Act make clear, there is no power to deport a British citizen. The question of whether the appellant is a British citizen is therefore fundamental to whether the making of a deportation order and the refusal of the appellant’s human rights claim was in accordance with the law.

22. Although it is not stated explicitly, it is clear from the reference to s1(1) of the 1981 Act at [38] of her decision that the Judge’s conclusion that Mr Bramwel is a British citizen, was reached on the basis of her prior finding that his mother was a British citizen when Mr Bramwel was born. I agree with the SSHD that that prior finding that Mr Bramwel’s mother was a British citizen when she gave birth to Mr Bramwel involved an error of law.

23. At [37] the Judge said that Mr Bramwel’s mother “automatically became a British citizen” when the adoption order was made i.e. on 14 March 1991. The only explanation for that conclusion given by the Judge is her acceptance of the adoption order as genuine. This however is only part of the issue. As is apparent from s.1(5) of the 1981 Act, an order authorising the adoption of a minor who is not British will only have the effect of making that minor a British citizen if the requirements of s.1(5A) are met. It is clear to me, reading the Judge’s decision, that this was not something she considered.

24. It is significant that the Judge does not refer to subsections (5) and (5A) to section 1 of the 1981 Act at all in her decision. When granting permission the Judge noted that s.1(5) and (5A) were not raised during the hearing. There is every indication therefore that the Judge was simply unaware of these subsections and the requirement that one of the adoptive parents must be a British citizen that they identify. This is regrettable and the Judge was certainly not assisted by the failure to bring these provisions to her attention.

25. The Judge was not of course required to make explicit reference to the relevant provisions so long as she properly applied them. In my judgment however, it is clear from the Judge’s reasoning that she did not consider the requirement in s.1(5A) that at least one of the adoptive parents must be British for the effect of the adoption order to make the child British. The Judge makes no reference at all to the nationality of Mr Bramwel’s adoptive parents in her decision. I am satisfied that this is because she has not considered that issue. As the SSHD points out in the grounds of appeal, had there been consideration of the nationality of the adoptive parents it would have been apparent that all the evidence indicated they were not British. Ms Bramwel’s mother says in her witness statement that “I was adopted from Nigeria by parents that had settled status in United Kingdom ” and later that she came into the United Kingdom “under my adoptive mother’s Nigerian passport”.

26. It was therefore an error of law for the Judge to conclude that the adoption order made in the British Court meant that Mr Bramwel’s mother automatically became a British Citizen in 1991. This has the consequent effect that the Judge’s material finding that Mr Bramwel is a British citizen because he was born in the United Kingdom to a British mother was equally flawed by legal error and cannot stand.

27. It is clear that the Judge’s conclusion that there are “very compelling circumstances” was primarily based on the erroneous finding about the nationality of Mr Bramwel and his mother. Although the Judge additionally refers to Mr Bramwel’s lack of ties in Nigeria when stating that there are very compelling circumstances, this finding alone does not adequately explain the very compelling circumstances conclusion. As the Supreme Court made clear at [46] – [52] of their Judgment in HA (Iraq) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2022] UKSC 22, the very compelling circumstances test established by s.117C(6) of the 2002 Act, requires a proportionality assessment weighing the article 8 rights of the potential deportee against the strong public interest in the deportation of serious offenders who have been sentenced to more than four years imprisonment. There is no indication that the Judge undertook such an assessment in this case. The only explanation for that is that the Judge considered her finding that Mr Bramwel was British to be determinative of the appeal, which of course it would have been albeit for different reasons than those expressed by the Judge.

28. Bringing this altogether it is apparent that the Judge made a material error of law by deciding that the adoption certificate issued in respect of Mr Bramwel’s mother in March 1991 meant that she automatically became a British citizen that day. The certificate would only have had that effect if one of the adoptive parents were British. There was no evidence before the Judge that either of the adoptive parents were British, instead the evidence adduced was that they were Nigerians living in the United Kingdom with settled status. As a consequence of that error the Judge fell into error when finding that Mr Bramwel is a British citizen. There was simply no evidence that could properly support that conclusion. Another consequence of that error of law was that the Judge did not to go on to conduct a proportionality assessment to determine the very compelling circumstances test. In these circumstances the Judge’s decision to allow Mr Bramwel’s appeal must be set aside.

Remaking
29. I have considered whether I should retain this appeal and remake the decision myself which is the general principle (see Begum (Remaking or remittal) Bangladesh [2023] UKUT 00046 (IAC)) but have concluded that it is appropriate to remit the matter to the First-tier Tribunal for a fresh hearing before a different Judge. As the decision in Begum (Remaking or remittal) Bangladesh makes clear, remittal will be the appropriate course where there is extensive fact finding required and where the nature of the error means the appellant has been deprived of an opportunity for their case to be put. Here, the appellant has been deprived of the opportunity to have the very compelling circumstances test considered by the First-tier Tribunal. It is also apparent that there will need to be findings of fact made about when the appellant’s mother acquired British citizenship and what was her immigration status when the appellant was born. There also needs to be an assessment of whether the appellant is socially and culturally integrated in the United Kingdom and whether he would face very significant obstacles to integration in Nigeria before the very compelling circumstances test can be properly evaluated.

Directions

30. To ensure that all relevant evidence is properly served and considered before the next hearing date I make the following directions:

A. By no later than 4pm on 23 March 2026, the SSHD is to provide a review dealing with the specific assertion that Mr Bramwel’s mother had settled status in the United Kingdom when she gave birth to Mr Bramwell and any connected supporting evidence. Such evidence should include evidence of applications for, and grants of, leave to remain made by / to Mr Bramwel or his mother.
B. By no later than 4pm on 13 April 2026, Mr Bramwel is to provide any further evidence he relies upon to support his assertion that his removal to Nigeria would be incompatible with his right to respect for his private and family life. Such evidence should include evidence of his and his mother’s immigration status while in the United Kingdom and relationships he has established while in the United Kingdom.

Notice of Decision

The decision of Judge Moon contained an error of law and is set aside.

The appeal is remitted to the First-tier Tribunal to be heard afresh by a different Judge on the first available date after 20 April 2026

Luke Bulpitt

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

23 February 2026