OA065992013

The Appellant is a citizen of Bangladesh who appeals against the decision of the Respondent, the Entry Clearance Officer Dhaka, taken on the 28 January 2013, to refuse her application for a settlement visa join her spouse Lala Miah, �the Sponsor�.

The appeal was heard by First-tier Tribunal Judge Cope at North Shields on the 6 January and the 19 January, 2014. The judge refused the Appellant�s appeal finding the Sponsor not to be credible.

The issue before the judge was whether the Appellant had adequately demonstrated that her relationship with the Sponsor was genuinely subsisting at the time of the application and that she intended to live together permanently in the United Kingdom.

There was no reason, he found, to make it inappropriate for him to consider hearing the appeal and in doing so he purported to apply Secretary of State for the Home Department v D (Tamil) [2002] UKIAT 00702 * (formerly known as Devaseelan) and used his finding in the earlier appeal that the sponsor was not a credible witness as a starting point for his findings as to the sponsor�s credibility in this appeal.

I was urged by Mr Mangion to find that there was no error in the judge�s determination. He pointed out that the judge had given every opportunity to the Appellant�s representatives and had pointed out to them that they had also appeared before him. He suggested that the judge had not erred by applying D (Tamil) in those circumstances and the judge was entitled to treat the representatives as having, effectively, waived any potential objections they might have to him hearing the appeal.