The High Court dismissed a judicial review challenge to the refusal to revoke a deportation order against a man whose daughter was living in Ireland. It also discharged an undertaking not to deport him, effective from the oral pronouncement of judgment.
In a judgment delivered on 29 July 2016, Mr Justice Richard Humphreys said the Minister for Justice and Equality had considered the child’s interests and was entitled to conclude that they were outweighed by the requirements of the asylum and immigration system. The court found no clear illegality that would justify setting aside the decision.
The man came to Ireland in December 2006 and claimed asylum. His claim was rejected in January 2007. He later sought residence based on EU Treaty rights through his marriage to a British citizen. Those applications and an appeal were refused. A further application based on the EU Court of Justice’s Zambrano decision was refused in 2012. A deportation order was made in December 2013 and was not challenged.
After the couple’s relationship broke down, the man applied to the District Court for access to his daughter and sought revocation of the deportation order. A consent order in March 2014 granted him access for two hours every second Friday and provided for maintenance. The judge noted there was no evidence about how often the access had been exercised.
The Minister refused to revoke the deportation order in July 2014. The man and his daughter then brought the present proceedings, challenging that refusal. The judge rejected an argument that the man should have a separate procedure to seek permission to remain because of his relationship with his child: that claim was outside the pleaded case, and no application had been made to amend it.
The applicants argued that deportation would disproportionately interfere with family rights, including the child’s relationship with her father, and would impair her EU rights. The judge said the child’s best interests were a primary consideration under the European human rights framework, though not necessarily decisive. He accepted that they favoured the father remaining in Ireland, but found that the Minister had balanced those interests against immigration control. He also found the evidence of dependency insufficient to show that the child’s EU rights would be jeopardised, noting that she remained in her mother’s custody and her mother was entitled to remain in the State.
The court dismissed the application and discharged the respondent from the undertaking not to deport the man from the oral pronouncement of judgment. The ruling addressed the lawfulness of the refusal to revoke the deportation order; it did not make a new deportation order.