The High Court has refused a family’s application for leave to challenge a deportation order against the father, finding that the proposed grounds did not amount to substantial grounds for arguing that the Minister acted unlawfully.
Mr Justice Cooke delivered the judgment on 25 June 2010. The application sought leave to pursue judicial review and an interlocutory injunction to prevent the deportation while the case proceeded. The proposed judicial review would have sought to quash the order made on 19 January 2010. The court refused leave, so it did not proceed to a full judicial review or decide whether the order should be quashed.
The anonymised applicants were a husband and wife from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and their three children. The children were Irish citizens; the mother had temporary permission to remain in Ireland until 8 December 2010. The father’s asylum claim had been rejected, and the Minister had also refused his application for subsidiary protection.
The family argued that conflict and instability in the DRC made return unreasonable, particularly for the children, and that the deportation would breach family and private life rights. They said the Minister had not properly considered obstacles to the family living together in the DRC, the children’s welfare, or the effect of conditions there. The father’s representatives also disputed how his road traffic convictions were treated.
The judgment reviewed the Minister’s 33-page memorandum, which addressed statutory factors, protection from return, the family’s circumstances and the rights of the children. The court said the memorandum had considered conditions in the DRC and the possibility of the family relocating there. It noted that the mother was a Congolese citizen who had lived there with the father, and that she and the children were not themselves subject to deportation. The children could remain with their mother in Ireland while her permission lasted, or the family could choose to accompany the father; the children could return to Ireland later.
The court said the family’s disagreement with the Minister’s assessment, including concerns about conflict, healthcare and education, did not establish that the decision was unlawful. It also found it was not unreasonable for the Minister to regard the twins, who were slightly over six when the assessment was made, as potentially adaptable to life in the DRC. The court considered the Minister had weighed the family’s rights against the State’s interests, including border control and preventing disorder and crime.
Because leave was refused, the court did not decide whether there was good and sufficient reason to extend the 14-day time limit: the proceeding had been initiated on 3 March, after notice of the order on 28 January. The judgment records the refusal of leave; it does not state that the deportation order was quashed.