Tribunal decisions

The decision

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:

On 3rd of September 2026

Before

DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE ANZANI

Between

GB
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr M. Swabey, Counsel instructed by ABN Solicitors
For the Respondent: Mr J. Nappey, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 25 August 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
Introduction
1. The Appellant appeals against the decision of First-tier Tribunal Judge J G Raymond (‘the Judge’), promulgated on 15 March 2026, dismissing his appeal against the Respondent’s decision dated 8 April 2024 refusing his protection and human rights claims.
Background
2. The Appellant is a national of Albania. He claimed to have left Albania in December 2002, when aged 16, and to have entered the United Kingdom in January 2003. He claimed asylum on 29 December 2022.
3. The protection claim had two principal elements. First, the Appellant claimed that he had been assaulted and stabbed by two men in Albania in 2002 and threatened by them approximately two months later. Secondly, he claimed that, after travelling through Italy and France, he met an Albanian man known as MX, who assisted him to reach and establish himself in the United Kingdom. The Appellant claimed that he incurred a gambling debt of £40,000 to MX and was subsequently compelled to work to repay the debt, before escaping in or around 2018. He feared serious harm from MX or his associates if returned to Albania.
4. The Respondent did not accept the material facts of the claim and considered that, in any event, the Appellant could obtain sufficient protection in Albania or internally relocate. The Appellant also relied upon his private life and asserted that he had lived continuously in the United Kingdom for more than 20 years, such that he met paragraph PL 5.1(a) of Appendix Private Life.
Decision of the First-tier Tribunal
5. The Judge treated the Appellant as a vulnerable witness after counsel raised his mental health and memory difficulties. The Judge questioned the Appellant about, among other matters, why he had not disclosed the alleged exploitation by MX to friends and how he had obtained private dental and hair treatment during the period in which he claimed to have been under MX’s control. A record of the hearing prepared by counsel who represented the Appellant before the First-tier Tribunal records that counsel objected that the Judge had descended into the arena. Counsel subsequently elected not to call two witnesses who had attended to give evidence.
6. At paragraph 25 of the determination, the Judge itemises the issues in the appeal, said to have been distilled from the appellant’s Appeal Skeleton Argument (‘ASA’) and Respondent’s Review, as being:
(i) Whether the Appellant faces a real risk of serious harm from the non-state actors he states he fears after significant passage of time; and
(ii) Whether the Appellant would have a sufficiency of protection from the Albanian authorities and whether it would be reasonable for him to internally relocate.
7. At paragraphs 55–69 of the determination, the Judge rejected the trafficking account and the claimed events in Albania as ‘sheer fabrication’. The Judge relied upon the Appellant’s ability to obtain hair and dental treatment, the apparent lack of knowledge among his friends and colleagues, the absence of any reference to the claimed exploitation in the medical records, and the absence of a clear account of the reduction of the alleged debt.
8. At paragraph 65, the Judge stated that there was no positive Conclusive Grounds decision under the National Referral Mechanism (‘NRM’), although he observed that the Tribunal would not necessarily have been bound by such a decision. At paragraph 70, the Judge found that the Appellant had not established a well-founded fear of persecution. The Judge also rejected the humanitarian protection and human rights claims.
9. At paragraph 72, the Judge stated that no argument had been made that the Appellant had lived in the United Kingdom for more than 20 years. The Judge considered that the evidence of his presence before 2008 or 2009 was sparse and speculated that, even if the Appellant had entered illegally in 2002 or 2003, he might subsequently have left the United Kingdom and returned by similarly unlawful means. The Judge concluded that the Appellant would not face very significant obstacles to reintegration and that his removal would be proportionate.
10. The Judge dismissed the appeal on all grounds.
Grounds of appeal
11. The grounds of appeal were advanced under the heading of procedural irregularity but included complaints of inadequate reasoning, irrationality and mistake of fact. In summary, it was contended that the Judge descended into the arena; that the adverse credibility findings were inadequately reasoned and improperly founded upon plausibility; and that the Judge proceeded on the incorrect basis that no positive Conclusive Grounds decision had been made.
12. Permission to appeal was granted by First-tier Tribunal Judge Ritchie on 1 June 2026. Judge Ritchie did not consider the complaint about the Judge’s questioning to be arguable, but considered it arguable that the adverse credibility findings were substantially based upon inherent probability without adequate consideration of the Appellant’s circumstances. She also noted that the Judge had been given inaccurate information about the NRM referral and that there was an arguable lack of engagement with the claimed fear in Albania.
13. Although Judge Ritchie stated in her reasons that she did not consider the procedural irregularity ground to be arguable, the operative heading of the permission decision granted permission to appeal without any express limitation. I raised the scope of the grant as a preliminary issue with the representatives and referred them to the guidance in Safi and others (permission to appeal decisions) [2018] UKUT 00388 (IAC). Both representatives agreed that, read as a whole, the grant had not been limited and that all the grounds were therefore before the Upper Tribunal for determination. I agreed and proceeded on that basis.
14. Mr Swabey thereafter applied to amend the grounds to include a challenge to the Judge’s failure to determine the Appellant’s case under paragraph PL 5.1(a) of Appendix Private Life. The Upper Tribunal has power under rule 5(3)(c) of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008 to permit amendment of the grounds of appeal: Ferrer (limited appeal grounds; Alvi) [2012] UKUT 00304 (IAC) at [24]. That discretion must be exercised in accordance with the overriding objective in rule 2. Mr Nappey did not oppose the application and confirmed that he did not require an adjournment or further time to prepare and could deal fairly with the amended ground at the hearing. I was satisfied that the proposed amendment was clearly identified, that the Respondent had a proper opportunity to address it, and that no unfairness would result. I therefore granted the application to amend.
The hearing before the Upper Tribunal
15. The matter came before me at Field House on 25 August 2026. The Appellant was represented by Mr Swabey of Counsel, instructed by ABN Solicitors. The Respondent was represented by Mr Nappey, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer. I had before me a composite Upper Tribunal bundle (‘CB’) comprising 404 pages.
16. There was no rule 24 response. Mr Nappey confirmed that the Respondent opposed the appeal on the original grounds, although, for the reasons set out below, he accepted that the amended ground concerning the Appellant’s claimed 20 years’ residence disclosed a material error of law.
17. Mr Swabey relied upon the grounds and counsel’s record of proceedings before the First-tier Tribunal. He submitted that the Judge’s questioning was adversarial and that the resulting credibility findings were inadequately reasoned. He relied particularly upon the treatment of the evidence concerning dental and hair treatment, the absence of disclosure in the GP records, the evidence from friends and colleagues, and the Judge’s description of the account as a sheer fabrication.
18. Mr Swabey submitted that the Judge had been materially misled about the NRM decision. The record of proceedings states that the Judge asked whether there had been a positive decision and the presenting officer replied that there had been a referral but no decision. In fact, a positive Conclusive Grounds decision had been made on 6 April 2023. Mr Swabey submitted that the Judge’s reliance upon the supposed absence of such a decision rendered the credibility findings unsafe.
19. On the amended ground, Mr Swabey submitted that the 20-year residence case had been expressly advanced in the Appellant’s skeleton argument and supported by extensive documentary evidence. The Judge’s statement that no such argument had been made was therefore demonstrably wrong. He invited me to set aside the decision in its entirety and remit the appeal for a fresh hearing.
20. Mr Nappey opposed the original grounds. He submitted that the hearing remained fair and that the Judge was entitled to ask questions arising from the evidence. The Appellant was represented, counsel objected, and there was an opportunity for re-examination. The decision not to call the remaining witnesses was counsel’s decision.
21. Mr Nappey submitted that, read sensibly, paragraphs 59–61 contained a coherent finding that the Appellant’s friends and colleagues did not know of the claimed exploitation. The absence of any reference to modern slavery in the medical records was a matter the Judge was entitled to consider as part of the evidence in the round. Although the presenting officer’s statement concerning the NRM was regrettably wrong, the Appellant’s representatives had also failed to adduce the decision. Moreover, the Judge had correctly recognised that a Conclusive Grounds decision would not have bound him.
22. Mr Nappey accepted, however, that paragraph 72 did not adequately engage with the expressly advanced 20-year residence case or the supporting evidence. He accepted that the amended ground disclosed an error of law.
23. In reply, Mr Swabey emphasised that only two of the authors of the supporting letters had been expected to give oral evidence and that the Judge could not assume what their evidence would have been. He maintained that the positive Conclusive Grounds decision went directly to the central credibility issue and that the errors identified necessitated a complete rehearing.
24. At the end of the hearing, I reserved my decision.
Decision and reasons
25. I have considered the First-tier Tribunal decision, the documentation that was before it, the grounds of appeal, and the submissions made at the hearing before reaching my decision.
26. The Supreme Court in HA (Iraq) v SSHD [2022] UKSC 22 reiterated that judicial caution and restraint are required when considering whether to set aside a decision of a specialist tribunal. In particular, judges of the specialist tribunal are best placed to make factual findings. Appellate courts should not rush to find misdirections simply because they might have reached a different conclusion on the facts or expressed themselves differently: see AH (Sudan) v SSHD [2007] UKHL 49 and KM v SSHD [2021] EWCA Civ 693. Where a relevant point is not expressly mentioned by the tribunal, the court should be slow to infer that it has not been taken into account: see MA (Somalia) v SSHD [2010] UKSC 49. When it comes to the reasons given by the tribunal, the court should exercise judicial restraint and should not assume that the tribunal misdirected itself just because not every step in its reasoning is fully set out: see R (Jones) v FTT (SEC) [2013] UKSC 19. I have kept these considerations in mind when coming to my decision.
27. I begin with the amended ground concerning the Appellant’s claimed 20 years’ residence. The error is clear and was properly conceded by Mr Nappey. Paragraphs 52–55 of the Appellant’s skeleton argument expressly submitted that he had resided continuously in the United Kingdom since 2003 and met paragraph PL 5.1(a) of Appendix Private Life. The bundle contained a substantial body of evidence directed to that issue, including tenancy agreements, employment records, a P60, correspondence and supporting letters.
28. The Judge was not bound to accept that evidence. He was entitled to consider its reliability, the absence of evidence for particular periods and whether continuous residence had been established. He was, however, required to decide the case that had been advanced. His statement at paragraph 72 that no argument had been made based upon more than 20 years’ residence was factually wrong. He did not evaluate the documentary evidence cumulatively or determine whether paragraph PL 5.1(a) was met. The speculation at paragraph 73 that the Appellant might have left and re-entered the United Kingdom did not cure that omission and was not supported by any identified evidence. This was a failure to determine a principal issue and was plainly material to the human rights appeal. The amended ground is made out.
29. I next consider the allegation that the Judge descended into the arena. I have considered the decision and counsel’s record of proceedings with care. Some of the Judge’s questions were expressed robustly and the questioning was extensive. It would have been preferable for certain questions, particularly those concerning whether the Judge was ‘right to be surprised’, to have been phrased more neutrally. The question for me, however, is whether the hearing viewed as a whole was unfair.
30. The matters raised by the Judge arose from documents and evidence relied upon by the Appellant and were relevant to the assessment of credibility. A judge is entitled to seek clarification on matters not pursued in cross-examination, provided that the judge does not assume the role of a party or pursue a separate case of his or her own. The Appellant was represented by experienced counsel. Counsel objected to the questioning, the objection was recorded, and there was an opportunity for re-examination. The decision not to call the remaining witnesses was made by counsel. There is insufficient evidence that the Judge’s questioning prevented the Appellant from presenting his case or otherwise caused him material procedural prejudice. Although I understand why counsel was concerned, I am not satisfied that the questioning, considered cumulatively and in the context of the hearing as a whole, crossed the line into procedural unfairness. The procedural unfairness ground is therefore not made out. Whether the Judge subsequently drew sustainable inferences from the written evidence of the witnesses and the other evidence is a separate question concerning the rationality and adequacy of his reasons, rather than the fairness of the hearing.
31. I therefore turn to the distinct challenge to the Judge’s assessment of credibility. I accept Mr Nappey’s submission that paragraphs 59–61 can be understood notwithstanding their awkward drafting. Read together, the Judge was finding it implausible that the Appellant’s friends and colleagues would have remained unaware of the alleged exploitation. That was a matter he was entitled to take into account. Similarly, the absence of any recorded disclosure of trafficking or forced labour in the GP records was capable of being relevant. I do not find that the Judge erred merely by considering those matters, nor is it sufficient that another judge might have attached different weight to them. The question is whether the particular inferences drawn, considered together with the remainder of the credibility assessment, were rational, adequately reasoned and reached with proper regard to the Appellant’s circumstances and explanations.
32. There are nevertheless material difficulties with the inferences drawn from that evidence. At paragraphs 56–58, the Judge treated the Appellant’s ability to obtain private hair and dental treatment, together with his evidence that MX sometimes assisted with the cost of dental treatment, as strongly inconsistent with his claimed exploitation. Those were matters the Judge was entitled to explore and take into account. However, the Judge did not adequately engage with the Appellant’s explanations that the hair treatment had been funded from savings accumulated over a number of years, that the dental treatment was required because he was in considerable pain, and that the control exercised over him was substantially psychological and varied in its intensity over time. The fact that an exploited person retains some freedom of movement or access to accommodation, medical treatment or limited funds is not, without further analysis, logically inconsistent with forced labour or coercive control. The error therefore lies not in the Judge’s consideration of this evidence, but in the strength of the adverse inference drawn from it without adequate engagement with the Appellant’s explanations and circumstances.
33. At paragraph 62, the Judge considered it ‘even less’ credible that the GP records did not record that the ‘prime and principal cause’ of the Appellant’s depression was his claimed exploitation. The Judge was entitled to note the absence of any recorded disclosure. However, the stronger inference drawn required consideration of the Appellant’s evidence that fear and psychological control had prevented him from disclosing the exploitation to others or escaping from it. There was also no finding that the GP records purported to identify every cause of his mental ill-health. Those matters were particularly important given that the Judge had accepted that the Appellant should be treated as a vulnerable witness because of his mental health and memory difficulties.
34. The reasoning at paragraphs 63–64 is also substantially speculative. The Judge considered it incredible that the Appellant had provided no satisfactory account of how the debt was reduced through his labour or why, if caused by gambling addiction, it had not increased substantially beyond £40,000. The account was that MX retained the proceeds of the Appellant’s labour. It was open to the Judge to question the lack of detail or accounting, but the conclusion about how the debt would probably have developed was not tied to evidence about the arrangements between the Appellant and MX.
35. These matters are important because the Judge moved from the identified concerns to the emphatic conclusion that the entire trafficking account was a ‘sheer fabrication’. He then relied substantially upon that conclusion when rejecting, at paragraph 69, the distinct account of the assault and threats in Albania. Although the Judge described that account as vague, there was no adequate assessment of the Appellant’s age and circumstances at the time, or sufficient explanation of why the rejection of the trafficking account materially supported the conclusion that the earlier and factually distinct events in Albania were also fabricated. The adverse findings were not merely infelicitously expressed. Viewed cumulatively, they disclose an assessment materially affected by assumptions about inherent probability without adequate consideration of the Appellant’s particular circumstances and explanations.
36. The position is reinforced by what occurred concerning the NRM decision. The contemporaneous record of proceedings states that the Judge asked whether there was a positive NRM decision and that the Home Office Presenting Officer replied that there had been a referral but no decision. That information was wrong. A positive Conclusive Grounds decision had been made on 6 April 2023, more than two years before the First-tier Tribunal hearing, accepting that the Appellant was a victim of modern slavery.
37. The Judge cannot be criticised for failing to analyse a document which was not placed before him. I share Mr Nappey’s concern, and expressed my concern at the hearing, about the conduct of the Appellant’s solicitors. The decision had been sent to them in 2023. No adequate explanation has been given for their failure to file and serve plainly relevant evidence or to ensure that counsel was equipped to correct the position when the issue arose. That failure was serious and should not be minimised.
38. That does not, however, remove the separate and serious difficulty created when the Respondent’s representative gave the Tribunal materially inaccurate information about a decision made by the Respondent’s own competent authority. The Judge expressly referred at paragraph 65 to the absence of a positive Conclusive Grounds decision as part of the context in which he rejected the trafficking account. Although he correctly recognised that such a decision would not have bound him, there is a material difference between departing from a positive decision after considering it and deciding the case on the false premise that no such decision existed. The positive decision went directly to the central disputed allegation. It did not require acceptance of the protection claim, but, had its existence been correctly identified, it would have required evaluation alongside the other evidence.
39. Responsibility for the unsatisfactory position was shared. The Appellant’s solicitors failed to adduce the decision, while the Respondent supplied a factually incorrect answer to the Judge’s direct question. I do not therefore set aside the decision merely because the Judge failed to consider evidence which was not before him, nor do I treat the positive decision as determinative. Rather, the incorrect information and the Judge’s express reliance upon it compound the deficiencies already identified in the credibility assessment. In those circumstances, I am satisfied that the protection findings are unsafe.
40. I have considered whether the alternative finding at paragraph 77 is sufficient to render those errors immaterial. It is not. The paragraph is incomplete and states in general terms that the Albanian authorities’ capacity to protect the general public and persons targeted by criminal organisations is not generally insufficient. It does not contain an individualised assessment of the nature and reach of the persons allegedly feared by this Appellant, their motivation, the Appellant’s circumstances as a person accepted by the competent authority to have been a victim of modern slavery, or the reasonableness of internal relocation. Once the credibility findings are set aside, paragraph 77 cannot independently sustain the dismissal of the protection appeal.
41. For those reasons, the procedural unfairness challenge advanced in Ground 1 is not made out. Ground 2 is made out because the credibility and protection findings were materially affected by inadequately reasoned plausibility assessments and the materially inaccurate information concerning the Conclusive Grounds decision. Ground 3, as permitted to be added at the hearing, is also made out because the Judge failed to determine the expressly advanced case under paragraph PL 5.1(a) of Appendix Private Life. Those errors affected both the protection and human rights assessments. The credibility findings are interconnected and cannot safely be preserved. The decision must therefore be set aside in its entirety.
Disposal
42. Mr Swabey submitted that the appeal should be remitted to the First-tier Tribunal. Mr Nappey indicated that, if the only error concerned the 20-year residence case, the appeal could potentially be retained in the Upper Tribunal. As I have also set aside the protection findings, the appeal requires extensive findings of fact concerning the alleged trafficking, the events in Albania, future risk, sufficiency of protection, internal relocation, the Appellant’s length and continuity of residence, and Article 8 proportionality. The positive Conclusive Grounds decision and the residence evidence will require assessment in the round. I am satisfied that remittal is the appropriate course.
43. Having regard to paragraph 7.2 of the Senior President’s Practice Statements and to Begum (Remaking or remittal) Bangladesh [2023] UKUT 00046 (IAC), the appropriate course is to remit the appeal to the First-tier Tribunal for a hearing de novo before a judge other than First-tier Tribunal Judge Raymond. No findings are preserved.
Notice of Decision
The decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of material errors of law.
The decision of the First-tier Tribunal is set aside in its entirety, with no findings preserved.
The appeal is remitted to the First-tier Tribunal to be heard de novo before a judge other than First-tier Tribunal Judge J G Raymond.

S. Anzani

Deputy Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

25 August 2026