Garzon Cardona (Migration)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) considered an appeal by Garzon Cardona concerning a Partner (Temporary) (Class UK) visa, Subclass 820. The applicant sought review of a delegate's decision to refuse the visa application. The refusal was based on the delegate's finding that the applicant's sponsor had not met the requirements of regulation 1.20J of the Migration Regulations 1994, which imposes limitations on the number of times a person can act as a sponsor for a partner visa and the time that must elapse between sponsorships.

The primary legal issue before the Tribunal was whether regulation 1.20J applied to limit the sponsorship for the applicant's visa application. Specifically, the Tribunal had to determine if the sponsor had met the requirement of a five-year period having passed since a previous partner visa application was made, or if compelling circumstances justified a waiver of this requirement. The Tribunal also considered whether the delegate had made a full assessment of all relevant criteria for the visa.

The Tribunal reasoned that while the delegate had correctly identified that less than five years had passed since the sponsor's previous partner visa application at the time of the delegate's decision, this situation had changed by the time the matter came before the Tribunal. The five-year period had since elapsed, meaning the sponsorship limitation under regulation 1.20J was no longer a bar to the application. The Tribunal noted that the delegate had not made an assessment of the partner relationship itself. Consequently, the Tribunal determined that the appropriate course of action was to remit the application back to the Minister for reconsideration of the remaining criteria for the Subclass 820 visa.