NA (Pakistan) v Secretary of State for the Home Department; KJ (Angola) v Secretary of State for the Home Department; WM (Afghanistan) v Secretary of State for the Home Department; MY (Kenya) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2016] EWCA Civ 662
‘The claimant foreign nationals, NA, KJ, WM and MY, who had resided for significant periods of time in the United Kingdom, were convicted of offences to which they were sentenced to periods of imprisonment of 12 months or more. As a result, they fell within the definition of foreign criminals in section 32 of the UK Border Act 2007, in respect of whom the Secretary of State was liable to make a deportation order, subject to the exceptions in section 33, which included where deportation would breach the offender’s rights under the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. The claimants in each case made representations against their deportation in reliance on their rights to a private and family life under article 8 of the Convention. Paragraph 398 of the Immigration Rules, as they applied between July 2012 and 27 July 2014 (“the 2012 Rules”), provided that when assessing a claim that deportation would be contrary to an offender’s rights under article 8 of the Convention, the Secretary of State was required to consider whether the circumstances in paragraph 399 and 399A of the 2012 Rules existed, and that if they did not, it was only in exceptional circumstances that the public interest in deportation would be outweighed by other factors. The circumstances: (1) in paragraph 399 were that the claimant had a genuine and subsisting parental relationship with a child dependent on the claimant or a partner and it was not reasonable to expect the child to leave the United Kingdom or there were insurmountable obstacles to family life with the partner continuing outside the United Kingdom; and (2) in paragraph 399A were the long residence of the claimant in the United Kingdom and lack of family, social or cultural ties with the country to which he was to be removed. Pararaphs 399 and 399A applied to offenders sentenced to imprisonment for at least 12 months but less than four years (“medium offenders”) but not to those sentenced to periods of four years or more (“serious offenders”). ‘
WLR Daily, 16th June 2016
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
