Hadi v Minister for Immigration

Hadi (the applicant) sought judicial review of a decision by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (the Tribunal) which found it had no jurisdiction to entertain an application for merits review of a student visa refusal. The applicant had lodged the application for merits review outside the prescribed time limit.

The primary legal issue before the Federal Circuit Court was whether the Tribunal had erred in law by determining it lacked jurisdiction to consider the applicant's out-of-time application for merits review. This required the court to consider the scope of the Tribunal's powers in relation to time limits for lodging applications.

Judge Heffernan found that the Migration Act 1958 (Cth) and the Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) prescribed strict time limits for lodging applications for merits review. The Tribunal had no discretion to extend these time limits in the absence of specific legislative provision allowing for such an extension. As the applicant had failed to provide any basis for the Tribunal to accept the application out of time, the Tribunal had correctly concluded it lacked jurisdiction.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.