The High Court has proposed an order quashing a decision to transfer a Pakistani asylum applicant from Ireland to the UK, finding that the Refugee Appeals Tribunal did not properly account for the deadline governing take back requests under the Dublin III Regulation.
The judgment, delivered by Ms Justice Faherty on 27 June 2018, concerns the Tribunal’s 8 April 2016 decision affirming an earlier determination that the UK was responsible for examining the applicant’s asylum claim. The applicant had sought judicial review of that decision.
The applicant lodged an asylum claim in Ireland on 16 June 2015. A Eurodac search linked him to a prior UK asylum claim. Ireland’s Refugee Applications Commissioner (ORAC) sent a take back request to the UK on 15 July. The UK replied on 29 July, saying its records showed the applicant was last known to be in the UK in 2013 and seeking details of his movements since then. The letter said the request was denied pending that information.
ORAC sent further information on 18 August, and the UK then accepted the transfer. The Tribunal later treated the 29 July letter as a request for further information rather than a final refusal, and found the original request had been made within the two month period after the Eurodac hit.
Justice Faherty held that the 29 July letter clearly refused the request, despite inviting ORAC to provide further information. She found it was not rational for the Tribunal to conclude otherwise. The court also rejected the respondents’ reliance on a separate provision allowing a requesting state to seek reconsideration after a negative reply as a basis for upholding the Tribunal’s decision: the Tribunal had not relied on that procedure and had treated the original request as still open.
The court concluded that treating ORAC’s 18 August letter as part of the July request effectively extended the strict two month deadline in Article 23(2), which was not permitted. It found the Tribunal’s error amounted to a failure to consider the relevant time limits.
The judgment also held that the applicant had standing to challenge compliance with those deadlines, applying the reasoning of the European Court of Justice in Mengesteab to take back requests. The court found the judicial review challenge made out and said it proposed to grant certiorari quashing the Tribunal’s 8 April 2016 decision. The judgment records the proposed order; it does not say that the applicant’s asylum claim was determined on its merits.