2104119 (Refugee)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal considered an application for review of a delegate of the Minister for Immigration's decision to refuse a protection visa. The applicant, a citizen of Malaysia, arrived in Australia in February 2016 and applied for a protection visa in August 2016. Following a series of bridging visa grants and cessations, the protection visa refusal decision was made on 2 February 2017. The applicant's initial application to the Tribunal for review of this refusal was found to be out of time and the Tribunal determined it had no jurisdiction in May 2017.

The legal issue before the Tribunal was whether it had jurisdiction to review the delegate's decision to refuse the protection visa, given that the applicant's most recent application for review was lodged on 26 March 2021. This followed a renotification of the original refusal decision by the delegate on 6 June 2020, which the delegate stated was necessary due to a defect in the initial notification. The applicant claimed she was not notified of the original decision until 26 March 2021, having moved and lost her phone.

The Tribunal reasoned that the applicant was not in immigration detention when notified of the decision. Therefore, under regulation 4.31(2) of the Migration Regulations 1994, an application for review must be made within 28 days of that notification. As the application for review was not received by the Tribunal until 26 March 2021, it was not lodged within the prescribed timeframe. The Tribunal had previously notified the applicant of this jurisdictional concern and invited a response, which was not received.

Consequently, the Tribunal concluded that the application for review was not made in accordance with the relevant legislation, and therefore, the Tribunal had no jurisdiction in this matter.