UI2024001194

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the appellant is granted anonymity.

No-one shall publish or reveal any information, including the name or address of the appellant, likely to lead members of the public to identify the appellant. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court .

      The appellant is a national of Albania who appeals with permission against the decision of First-tier Tribunal Judge Le Grys ("the judge"), promulgated on 23 February 2024 following a hearing on 26 January. By that decision, the judge dismissed the appellant's appeal against the respondent's refusal of a protection claim. For reasons set out in due course, the judge declined to consider the appellant's case as it related to Article 8 ECHR ("Article 8").

      It is to be noted that, despite the fact that the case concerned a protection claim, the respondent did not provide a Presenting Officer at the hearing. In our view, that is both surprising and, to say the least, unfortunate. That is particularly so given the jurisdictional matter which arose.

      The judge referred himself to section 65(2) of the Nationality and Borders Act 2002 ("the 2022 Act"), which enabled the respondent to grant individuals "limited leave to remain" for the purposes of, amongst other things, assisting them to recover from harm arising from the trafficking. The judge concluded that the VTS was equivalent to a grant of leave to remain and thus the appellant's appeal was to be treated as abandoned insofar as the human rights claim was concerned: [16]-[21].