The High Court has refused Adnan Safdar’s application for judicial review of a decision upholding the refusal of his application for an EU residence card as a permitted family member of his British cousin, Zahoor Ahmed. The court also rejected his challenge to a proposal to deport him.
Mr Safdar, a Pakistani national, said he entered Ireland in August 2014 as a dependent and member of Mr Ahmed’s household. The Minister refused his residence card application in December 2015, concluding that the documents did not establish either dependence on Mr Ahmed or membership of his household in the UK, from which Mr Safdar had come.
The Minister upheld that refusal on review on 3 April 2017. The review letter said the material showed shared finances and accommodation in Ireland, and that Mr Safdar had lived at two UK addresses, but did not establish that Mr Ahmed supported him or that the UK address was Mr Ahmed’s household. It noted a 2013 bank statement suggesting they shared an address for a time, but said this did not show who lived there or establish Mr Ahmed’s residence.
Mr Safdar argued that Irish regulations failed to properly implement the EU directive on free movement, that the decision was unreasonable and inadequately reasoned, and that fair procedures had been breached. The State also argued that he lacked standing because Mr Ahmed was not a party to the case.
Mr Justice David Keane rejected the State’s preliminary objection. He held that Mr Safdar could challenge the refusal of his own residence card without Mr Ahmed joining the proceedings. The judge rejected Mr Safdar’s arguments that the regulations were defective and that the Minister had failed to give adequate reasons. He found that the evidence did not show dependence or membership of Mr Ahmed’s household in the UK, and that the Minister had given clear reasons for the refusal.
The court also rejected a separate argument that Mr Safdar could only be removed under the EU directive’s expulsion procedure. The judge said that argument had not been included in the grounds for which leave to bring judicial review was granted and, in any event, Mr Safdar had not established that he fell within the directive’s category of other family members.
The judgment refused the judicial review application. It did not make a deportation order; the judgment records that the Minister had issued a proposal to make one.