United Kingdom Asylum and Immigration Tribunal

APPEAL No. [2004] UKIAT 00013 A (Azerbaijan)

IMMIGRATION APPEAL TRIBUNAL

Date of hearing: 20 January 2004

Date Determination notified: 04 February 2004

Before Mr J Freeman (chairman) Mr D J Parkes Mrs W Jordan
Between

 

A	APPELLANT
and
SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT	RESPONDENT

Miss S Haji (counsel instructed by Dozie & Co) for the claimant Miss J Sigley for the Secretary of State
DETERMINATION AND REASONS
1. This is what purports to be an appeal against the decision of an adjudicator, Mr P Brenells, sitting at Taylor House on 15 May 2003. We say "purports", because the adjudicator ended his decision by upholding the Secretary of State's certificate. This was not the kind of certificate, with which everybody is familiar, certifying only the asylum appeal, because there had already been a human rights claim before the Secretary of State; and it is quite clear that the certificate applied to the claim as a whole. It follows that it was not caught by the decision of the Court of Appeal in Zenovics [2002] EWCA Civ 273, and it must be regarded as prima facie valid.

2. We raised this point, because it occurred to Mr Parkes, who had given permission in this case, that, on a correct view of the law, the certificate had prevented him from considering any such application at all. Miss Haji asked us to disregard the certificate, on the basis that current policy was to withdraw all certificates issued under the 1999 Act. Miss Sigley pointed out that that policy only came into operation as from June 2003; so probably did not cover the present decision, which was issued on 11 June. Certainly, there had been no withdrawal before the adjudicator.

3. While the delay and cost to public funds is regrettable, we cannot accept Ms Haji's argument that either the legitimate expectation, such as it may have been, that an appeal would be heard by the Tribunal; or the change in Home Office policy, since the adjudicator's decision, could possibly confer a power on us to hear such an appeal, which the statute does not give us. We are a creature of statute and cannot get our powers from any other source. It follows that there is no valid appeal before the Tribunal, and the parties must take such further action to deal with the adjudicator's decision as they see fit.

   John Freeman

   (chairman)