The Court of Appeal has ordered two international protection applicants to pay the State respondents’ costs after their appeal failed in full.
The costs ruling, delivered on 3 December 2025, followed the court’s substantive judgment of 8 October 2025. In that earlier decision, the court dismissed the appeal brought by W.P.L. and B.P. and allowed the respondents’ cross-appeal against a High Court finding that the applicants had standing to maintain the proceedings.
The case concerned a challenge connected with the designation of South Africa as a safe country of origin under the International Protection Act 2015.
W.P.L. and B.P. asked the Court of Appeal to make no order for costs. They argued, among other things, that the proceedings raised novel and important legal questions, that costs could deter international protection applicants from raising systemic issues, and that their conduct in pursuing the appeal had been reasonable.
The court rejected those arguments.
Mr Justice Anthony M. Collins said the Court of Appeal had never reached the alleged novel questions about the safe-country designation. It had found that it lacked jurisdiction to hear three of the eight appeal grounds. The remaining grounds failed because the applicants lacked sufficient standing to pursue them.
The court also noted that one of the contingencies on which the High Court had originally found standing had ceased to exist before the appeal was lodged.
The judges concluded that the respondents had been entirely successful and that the applicants had identified no reason to depart from the normal costs rule under the Legal Services Regulation Act 2015.
The respondents were therefore awarded their costs of the appeal, including reserved costs.
The Court of Appeal also declined to disturb the High Court’s separate costs order against W.P.L. and B.P., finding that it had been within the range of orders the High Court was entitled to make.