SZQPT v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship
[2012] FCA 929
•3 September 2012
FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA
SZQPT v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship [2012] FCA 929
Citation: SZQPT v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship [2012] FCA 929 Appeal from: SZQPT v Minister for Immigration & Anor [2012] FMCA 227 Parties: SZQPT v MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION AND CITIZENSHIP and REFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL File number: NSD 518 of 2012 Judge: JAGOT J Date of judgment: 3 September 2012 Cases cited: SZQPT v Minister for Immigration [2012] FMCA 227 Date of hearing: 27 August 2012 Place: Sydney Division: GENERAL DIVISION Category: No catchwords Number of paragraphs: 11 Counsel for the Appellant: The appellant appeared in person with the assistance of an interpreter Counsel for the First Respondent: Mr O Jones of Clayton Utz
IN THE FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA
NEW SOUTH WALES DISTRICT REGISTRY
GENERAL DIVISION
NSD 518 of 2012
ON APPEAL FROM THE FEDERAL MAGISTRATES COURT OF AUSTRALIA
BETWEEN: SZQPT
AppellantAND: MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION AND CITIZENSHIP
First RespondentREFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL
Second Respondent
JUDGE:
JAGOT J
DATE OF ORDER:
3 SEPTEMBER 2012
WHERE MADE:
SYDNEY
THE COURT ORDERS THAT:
1.The orders of 7 August 2012 be set aside.
2.The appeal be dismissed.
3.The appellant pay the first respondent’s costs in a sum to be fixed on further application by the first respondent.
Note:Settlement and entry of orders is dealt with in Rule 39.32 of the Federal Court Rules 2011.
IN THE FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA
NEW SOUTH WALES DISTRICT REGISTRY
GENERAL DIVISION
NSD 518 of 2012
ON APPEAL FROM THE FEDERAL MAGISTRATES COURT OF AUSTRALIA
BETWEEN: SZQPT
AppellantAND: MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION AND CITIZENSHIP
First RespondentREFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL
Second Respondent
JUDGE:
JAGOT J
DATE:
3 SEPTEMBER 2012
PLACE:
SYDNEY
REASONS FOR JUDGMENT
This is an appeal from an order made by the Federal Magistrates Court of Australia dismissing the appellant’s application to set aside a decision of the Refugee Review Tribunal (the Tribunal) for jurisdictional error. This order resulted from reasons for judgment published on 15 March 2012 (SZQPT v Minister for Immigration [2012] FMCA 227).
The Notice of Appeal alleges that the Court below erred because it:
(1)…failed to consider that the Tribunal acted in a manifestly unreasonable way when dealing with the applicant’s claim and ignoring the aspect of persecution and harm in terms of Sec. 91R of the Act. The Tribunal failed to observe the obligation amounted to a breach of Statutory Obligation.
(2)…failed to consider that the Tribunal had no jurisdiction to make the said decision because its “unreasonable satisfaction” was not arrived in accordance with the requirements of the Migration Act.
The appeal was originally listed for hearing on 7 August 2012. The appellant failed to appear. On the application of the first respondent I ordered that the appeal be dismissed and that the appellant pay the first respondent’s costs fixed in the sum of $1,500. The following day, 8 August 2012, the appellant filed an interlocutory application seeking a new hearing date as he could not attend the hearing on 7 August 2012. In an affidavit in support of this interlocutory application the appellant said he could not reach the Court until 2.35 pm on 7 August 2012 “due to work related problems and travel time” and requested another hearing date.
The matter came before me on 27 August 2012. The first respondent submitted that the orders of 7 August 2012 should not be set aside as the appellant did not have any substantive ground upon which to appeal against the orders of the Court below. I requested the appellant to identify all of the arguments he wished to make in support of his claim that the orders of the Court below should be set aside.
First, the appellant contended that the Tribunal had not given him sufficient time to submit further information in support of his claims. Second, the appellant submitted that the Tribunal had not given serious consideration to his claims. Third, the appellant submitted that the Court below also had not given serious consideration to his claims.
The first submission concerns the fact that during the hearing before the Tribunal on 12 July 2011 the appellant was reminded by the Tribunal that he was entitled to seek additional time to provide further information if he so wished. The appellant said he needed a month to provide medical evidence which would show that his father was injured and hospitalised in 2004. When the appellant was asked if the medical reports were likely to reveal anything other than that his father was injured and hospitalised in 2004, the appellant said he was not sure. The Tribunal allowed the appellant until 19 July 2011 to provide additional information. According to its reasons for decision, the Tribunal considered that the appellant had had ample opportunity to provide evidence in support of its case and found it difficult to accept the appellant’s claim that there was no one to support him in obtaining the medical evidence given that his mother, sister and uncles continued to live in India. As matters turned out the Tribunal did not deliver its decision until 11 August 2011 by which time no further information had been submitted by the appellant. The Court below dismissed this claim as not exposing any jurisdictional error because there was no legal obligation upon the Tribunal to provide a longer period of time than the period in fact provided (at [23]). I agree with this conclusion.
The second submission was also dismissed by the Court below as it was not satisfied that the Tribunal had not given due consideration to the appellant’s claims (at [24]). In this respect, the Court below noted that the Tribunal said in its reasons that the appellant “did not impress the Tribunal as a reliable, credible and truthful witness” (at [8]). I also am unable to see anything in the Tribunal’s reasons which would suggest that it did not give proper consideration to the appellant’s claims.
The third submission involves the reasons for judgment of the Court below. Although the reasons are not lengthy, they address all of the arguments put by the appellant and the grounds in the application which, other than ground 1, did not bear any real resemblance to the arguments the appellant in fact put. I am unable to discern any error in the reasons for judgment of the Court below.
The appellant did not make any submissions addressing the two grounds of appeal. It is sufficient to say that there is no basis for the first ground which contends that the Tribunal acted in a manifestly unreasonable way. Nor am I able to discern any proper basis for the contentions in the second ground of appeal.
Nothing in the material or the appellant’s submissions persuades me of the existence of any jurisdictional error affecting the decision of the Tribunal in this case. To the contrary it appears that the Tribunal gave full consideration to all of the appellant’s claims but determined that those claims were not credible in all of the circumstances including a number of inconsistencies between the appellant’s different versions of events as presented at different times.
In circumstances where I have heard all of the appellant’s substantive arguments, I consider that it is appropriate to set aside the orders I made on 7 August 2012 and, on the basis of the hearing on 27 August 2012, to dismiss the application and to make a further costs order, preferably in a fixed sum to be determined on further application by the first respondent.
I certify that the preceding eleven (11) numbered paragraphs are a true copy of the Reasons for Judgment herein of the Honourable Justice Jagot. Associate:
Dated: 3 September 2012