SZDCE v MIAC & Anor )S252-07)

The High Court of Australia heard an appeal in *SZDCE v MIAC & Anor* (S252-07), brought by SZDCE against the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship and another party. The dispute concerned the lawfulness of a decision made by the Minister to refuse SZDCE's application for a protection visa. SZDCE, an asylum seeker, alleged that the Minister's decision was vitiated by a failure to afford procedural fairness.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether the Minister, in considering SZDCE's protection visa application, was under a duty to provide SZDCE with an opportunity to respond to adverse information that had come into the Minister's possession, and which was relied upon in the decision-making process. This involved an examination of the scope of the duty of procedural fairness in the context of administrative decision-making under the *Migration Act 1958* (Cth).

The High Court, in allowing the appeal, held that the Minister did owe a duty to provide procedural fairness to SZDCE. Their Honours reasoned that where an administrative decision-maker proposes to make a decision adverse to an applicant, and that decision is based on information which is adverse to the applicant and which has not been disclosed to them, the decision-maker must afford the applicant a reasonable opportunity to respond to that information. This principle of procedural fairness requires that an applicant be given notice of the case they have to meet. The Court found that this duty had not been discharged by the Minister in the present case.

The High Court ordered that the appeal be allowed, the decision of the Federal Court be set aside, and the matter be remitted to the Federal Court for determination according to law.