2418843 (Refugee)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) considered an application for review of a decision to refuse a protection visa made by an applicant from China. The applicant sought review of the refusal decision, but the application for review was lodged with the Tribunal after the statutory time limit had expired. The Tribunal also noted that no response was provided to an invitation to comment.

The primary legal issue before the Tribunal was whether it had jurisdiction to hear the application for review, given that it was lodged outside the prescribed time limit. This required the Tribunal to consider the relevant legislative provisions governing the timeframes for lodging applications for review of migration decisions.

The Tribunal determined that the application for review was not made in accordance with the relevant legislation because it was received by the Tribunal on 21 June 2024, which was more than 28 days after notification of the visa refusal. As a consequence of the application being out of time, the Tribunal concluded that it lacked jurisdiction to consider the merits of the applicant's case.

Accordingly, the Tribunal made no orders in relation to the merits of the protection visa application, as it had no jurisdiction to do so.