This post reflects on Wednesday’s momentous Supreme Court decision in the Rwanda litigation. You can read Colin’s initial take on the judgment here. The Supreme Court’s decision To recap, the Supreme Court decided that there are substantial grou ...

Last week, the Supreme Court heard an argument that the Rwanda policy breaches retained EU law, which the president Lord Reed described as a potential “knock out” blow in the Rwanda litigation. Under the Rwanda policy, asylum seekers arriving by s ...

The government was granted permission to appeal in the Rwanda litigation in July. This post provides an update on the current state of play ahead of the Supreme Court hearing. You can read Free Movement’s coverage of the Court of Appeal’s judgment ...

This post reflects on last week’s extraordinary Court of Appeal judgment on the Rwanda policy. You can read our initial take on this here. Appeal to the Supreme Court The government has already announced its intention to seek leave to appeal to the ...

How should we seek to comply with the rules relating to foreign language witness statements in litigation that are governed by the Civil Procedure Rules, including judicial review proceedings in the Administrative Court, and civil actions in the Kings ...

Yesterday, the Court of Appeal handed down a judgment dealing with applications for permission to appeal on grounds refused by the High Court. An annex to yesterday’s judgment lists the grounds granted permission by the High Court. Permission to app ...

As the House of Common’s second reading of the Illegal Migration Bill takes place today, this post looks at the detention provisions in clauses 11-14 and what they mean for individuals arriving in the UK. You can read Colin’s analysis of the Bill ...

This post provides an update on legal challenges to the Home Office’s policy and practice of requiring people on immigration bail to wear Global Positioning System (GPS) devices. You can read more about the policy and the legal framework here and he ...

On 16 January 2023 there was a High Court hearing to deal with all matters following on from its ruling published on 19 December 2022. You can you can read more about the case and its implications here and here. You can find a full copy of the judgmen ...

Now that the High Court has decided that the Rwanda policy is lawful, at least at a general level, many people will be wondering when the government will attempt another removal flight. This question will be no doubt be causing a lot of worry to peopl ...

The Divisional Court has now published its judgment addressing the Home Office’s breach of the duty of candour in the mobile phone seizures case. It is reported as R (HM, MA & KH) v SSHD [2022] EWHC 2729 (Admin). Earlier posts address the Di ...

The Divisional Court has refused applications for habeas corpus made on behalf of two British women and their children detained in a camp in northeast Syria. The case is C3 and C4 v Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Affair ...

The Court of Appeal has granted an application made by a woman who was trafficked for the purposes of sexual exploitation, to quash her conviction from November 2009. She was convicted for using a false identity document when attempting to travel to t ...

There are a number of general and individual judicial review challenges to the government’s policy of removing asylum seekers to Rwanda. To recap, in April 2022 the government announced a Migration and Economic Development Partnership with Rwanda fo ...

As we reported last week, a recent letter from government lawyers clarified the Home Office’s position that “[s]ince July 2022… migrants who cross the Channel in small boats who are either rescued or directed to land at designated locations by t ...

On 25 August 2022, the Home Office announced plans to fast-track the removal of Albanian nationals “with no right to be in the UK” under plans agreed with the Albanian government (it was said) “to tackle the scourge of small boat crossings”. T ...

The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights has held that France breached Article 3.2 of Protocol 4 due to the lack of explanation for and independent scrutiny of decisions not to repatriate two French nationals living in camps controlled ...

Asylum seekers arriving by boat have started to receive notices informing them of the UK government’s intention to remove them to Rwanda pursuant to the “Migration and Economic Development Partnership” announced last month. We learned ye ...

The Home Office has withdrawn its “pushback policy” which purported to set out a plan to return migrant boats in the English Channel to France. The climbdown follows recent skirmishes over expert evidence and disclosure — see [2022] EWHC 517 ...

The Court of Appeal has held that the unlawful removal of a vulnerable Afghan child and the 18 months of disruption to his private life entitles him to damages under the Human Rights Act 1998 and under EU law. The case is QH (Afghanistan) v Secretary ...

The High Court has held that the Home Office’s search for and seizure of mobile phones from migrants who arrived by small boats from France, and the retention of extracted data, was unlawful. The case is R (HM, MA, KH) v Secretary of State for the H ...

In R (SB (a child)) v Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea [2022] EWHC 308 (Admin) the High Court held that an interview conducted by social workers as part of a short-form age assessment was “clearly unfair”. This was because of the ...

In R (A and Others) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2022] EWHC 360 (Admin), Mr Justice Fordham refused permission for a judicial review challenge to the consultation on the Home Office’s New Plan for Immigration. The judgment’s l ...

Last August, the provisions in Schedule 10 of the Immigration Act 2016 providing for foreign national offenders liable to deportation to be subject to mandatory tagging as a condition of immigration bail were commenced. This provision was designed to ...

On 7 February 2022 the Home Office updated Detention Services Order 02/2019 on Care and management of Post Detention Age claims. This policy sets out the approach to age dispute cases in immigration detention and applies to Home Office staff and its c ...

In R (SGW) v Secretary of State for the Home Department (Biometrics , family reunion policy) [2022] UKUT 15 (IAC), the Upper Tribunal decided that Home Office guidance on refugee family reunion applications is unlawful because it fails to accurately d ...

In Kaitey v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWCA Civ 1875 the Court of Appeal has upheld the High Court’s decision that the power to set immigration bail exists even when a person cannot be lawfully detained. As Alex commented at t ...

In R (Shahi) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWCA Civ 1676 the Court of Appeal held that a grant of interim relief did not entitle a claimant to his costs, where there was no settlement or court determination of the underlying lega ...

In R (Babbage) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWHC 2995 (Admin), the High Court found that a person with an extensive offending and adverse immigration history who posed high risks of re-offending and absconding was unlawfully det ...

On 21 October 2021 the Home Office published the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration’s (ICIBI) second annual inspection of the Adults at Risk policy, alongside its response. The report itself is an impressive piece of work and pro ...

In R (BAA) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWCA Civ 1428 the Court of Appeal has clarified the reach of Article 8 in Dublin III family reunion judicial reviews. Unlawful refusal to accept Syrian asylum seeker The case was about an ...

A serious crime is enough for humanitarian protection to be revoked, the Upper Tribunal has held. The case is Kakarash (revocation of HP; respondent’s policy) [2021] UKUT 235 (IAC). Appeal against loss of humanitarian protection initially allowed Mr ...