A first-tier tribunal judge conducted the procedure of an appeal with ‘substantial unfairness such that the outcome cannot stand’, the Court of Appeal has held
Lord Justice William Davis allowed Ilirjan Hima’s appeal, in Hima v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2024] EWCA Civ 680, a residence card application case.
Handing down the lead judgment last week, Davis LJ said the ‘core complaints’ were that FTT Judge Mills ‘cross-examined the appellant, that the judge’s response to the appellant’s representative’s objection to the cross-examination was inappropriate, that the judge accused the representative of making an improper submission when no such submission had been made and that the judge had made a finding adverse to the appellant without giving the appellant an opportunity to deal with the point’.
Davis LJ said: ‘In my view the reality of the appellant’s case is that the hearing was unfair, not that there was apparent bias.’
The court remitted the case to the tribunal to be heard by a different judge.
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