X v Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs

The matter before the court was an appeal against a decision of the Refugee Review Tribunal, which had dismissed an application for a protection visa by the appellant, who had sought asylum in Australia on the basis of political persecution in Burma. The court was tasked with determining whether the Tribunal had erred in refusing to consider the appellant’s diary without an authenticated translation, and whether this error had affected the outcome of the appeal.

The primary legal issue was whether the Tribunal was entitled to demand an authenticated translation of the appellant’s diary before considering it. The court found that the Tribunal had misunderstood its function under the Migration Act by refusing to regard itself as bound to consider the contents of the diary. The court held that the Tribunal’s failure to consider the diary constituted an error of law and deprived it of jurisdiction to make the decision it did. The court also found that the Tribunal’s error may have resulted in a decision against the appellant that would not otherwise have been made.

The court allowed the appeal and set aside the orders made by the primary judge. In lieu of those orders, the court ordered that the decision of the Tribunal be set aside, the matter be referred back to the Tribunal, differently constituted, for further consideration, and that the Minister pay the appellant’s costs of the proceeding at first instance and the appeal. The court held that the Tribunal’s failure to consider the diary constituted an error of law, which may have affected the outcome of the appeal, and that the Tribunal had thereby made an error of law, involving an incorrect interpretation of the applicable law.