Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Number: VA/00858/2015

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Field House
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 17th August 2016
On 22nd August 2016

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE D E TAYLOR

Between

Secretary of State for the Home Department
Appellant
and

svetlana pustavoytova
(ANONYMITY DIRECTION NOT MADE)
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr S Walker, Home Office Presenting Officer
For the Respondent: Ms S Pinder of Counsel instructed by Barar & Associates

DECISION AND REASONS
1. This is the Secretary of State's appeal against the decision of Judge Bartlett made following a hearing at Taylor House on 4th April 2016. The claimant had appealed against a decision of the Entry Clearance Officer, Istanbul, dated 5th January 2015, refusing her application for entry clearance for a visit visa.

Background
2. The judge heard oral evidence from the sponsor, the claimant's only son who was studying in the UK and wished his mother to visit him here. At that time he was due to finish his Bachelor of Science course in Business and Law at Anglia Ruskin University in May 2016. She had financed his education in the UK and he was dependent financially upon her. The sponsor had travelled back to see his family in Uzbekistan in August 2014 and twice in 2015, trips paid for by the claimant, and he now wished her to visit him here.
3. The judge correctly addressed himself as to the jurisdiction of the Tribunal which is limited to considering whether there has been a breach of Article 8 of the ECHR. He accepted that the sponsor was financially dependent on the claimant and that they enjoyed family life together. The sponsor was an adult but had not gone on to form his own family unit and was very close to his mother. He said that the claimant simply wished to visit her son for a limited period of time. The respondent's decision was not proportionate and on that basis he allowed the appeal.
4. The Secretary of State sought permission to appeal on the grounds that the judge had failed to adequately explain why the Entry Clearance Officer's decision interfered with the family life of mother and son. The sponsor was a student who was here in the UK for a temporary purpose and the judge had not explained why the refusal of a visa, which only allowed the parties to be together temporarily, was a disproportionate interference with their Article 8 rights.
5. Permission to appeal was granted by Judge Grant-Hutchison for the reasons stated in the grounds on 20th July 2016.
The hearing
6. Mr Walker relied on his grounds.
7. Ms Pinder relied on her Rule 24 reply and skeleton argument. She said that the Secretary of State was making a reasons challenge which did not meet the test set out in R (Iran) & Others [2005] ECA Civ 982. The reasons given by the judge were legally sufficient. He had properly applied the law and reached a decision which was open to him. The decision that the claimant met the requirements of paragraph 41 was a starting point for the consideration of whether there was a breach of Article 8.
8. I am afraid that I do not agree with Ms Pinder. In Kaur (visit appeals; Article 8) [2015] UKUT 00487 the Upper Tribunal held, inter alia, that:
"Unless an appellant can show that there are individual interests at stake covered by Article 8 of a particularly pressing nature so as to give rise to a strong claim that compelling circumstances may exist to justify the grant of leave to enter outside the Rules: (see SS Congo [2015] EWCA Civ 387 at [40] and [56]) he or she is exceedingly unlikely to succeed. That proposition must also hold good in visitor appeals."
9. It is very hard to see what the individual interests at stake of a particularly pressing nature are in this case. The sponsor is here as a student for a temporary purpose. He has no right to settle in the UK. He has been able to visit his mother during university holidays and the decision of the Entry Clearance Officer does not interfere with the previous pattern of visits. The sponsor is free to pursue family life with his mother in Uzbekistan.
10. I agree with the Entry Clearance Officer that the claimant has not demonstrated that the interference with her right to family life resulting from the refusal gives rise to such grave consequences such as to engage Article 8. The judge, in finding otherwise, reached an irrational decision.
Notice of Decision
11. The Secretary of State's challenge to this decision succeeds. The decision of the judge is set aside. The claimant's appeal against the decision to refuse her entry clearance is dismissed.

No anonymity direction is made.

Signed Date 20 August 2016

Upper Tribunal Judge Taylor